Tom McMahon

Facing Overflow, U.K. Hospitals Treating Patients In Cupboards And Kitchens

Confronting full wards and an overflow of patients, hospitals in the United Kingdom (U.K.) are treating patients in areas not designed for clinical care, according to a recent survey of the nation’s nurses.

The survey, conducted by Nursing Times, polled more than 900 nurses and found that about 63% of respondents reported that patients were being moved to “store rooms, mop cupboards,” or a “kitchen area” for treatment. Nearly 60% of respondents who witnessed these situations said that it happened more than once per week, according to the survey. Seventy-nine percent of respondents said the safety of patients is being compromised, as patients may have no access to call bells, water or emergency exits. Meanwhile, hospital staff may have difficulty obtaining medical equipment, emptying urine bottles and providing meals, and the proximity of patient beds increases the risk of infection spread, respondents noted.

Among the nurses who responded to the survey:

83% said they had reported instances of moving patients to senior staff, but just 4% said corrective action had been taken; and 29% said the practice of moving patients happened daily.

Among nurses who raised the issue to management, some reported being bullied or being accused of “not being a team player.” Unions representing health care workers cautioned that the situation may deteriorate because hospitals around the U.K. are planning to shut down clinical wards in order to save money, the London Daily Telegraph notes.

Nurses were told to move patients for several reasons, the survey found. In some cases, patients were moved due to directives from senior managers—even the CEO—or because the hospitals’ four-hour wait time target in the accident and emergency department was “under pressure.” In addition, nurses also were told to move patients because “unfortunately the hospital is full,” according to the survey.

The U.K. Department of Health in a statement said that the “vast majority” of National Health Service (NHS) patients receive safe and effective health care, London’s Times reports. A spokesperson for the health department added that local health providers have the authority to assess the quality of health services.

The director of the U.K. Patients Association said that the survey suggests the practice of moving patients may be more widespread than reported. She added that the survey “highlights the gap between rhetoric and reality in the NHS lottery of care” and that funding for front-line care may be inadequate

A Picture That Is Used To Assess Stroke Patients

A Picture That Is Used To Assess Stroke Patients

You and I immediately notice the boy falling off of the stool and the water overflowing the sink, but some stroke patients don't notice these unsafe conditions. I just found this interesting.

An Interesting Idea: Allocate Donated Organs First To People Who Have Agreed To Donate Their Own Organs When They Die

From Dave Undis:

As the death toll from the organ shortage mounts, public opinion will eventually support an organ market in the United States. Changes in public policy will then follow.

In the mean time, there is an already-legal way to put a big dent in the organ shortage -- allocate donated organs first to people who have agreed to donate their own organs when they die. UNOS, which manages the national organ allocation system, has the power to make this simple policy change. No legislative action is required.

Americans who want to donate their organs to other registered organ donors don't have to wait for UNOS to act. They can join LifeSharers, a non-profit network of organ donors who agree to offer their organs first to other organ donors when they die. Membership is free at www.lifesharers.org or by calling 1-888-ORGAN88. There is no age limit, parents can enroll their minor children, and no one is excluded due to any pre-existing medical condition.

Giving organs first to organ donors will convince more people to register as organ donors. It will also make the organ allocation system fairer. Non-donors should go to the back of the waiting list as long as there is a shortage of organs.

More at lifesharers.org

Healthifeet Foot Cream for Diabetics: Clinically Proven To Increase Foot Temperature 5 - 8 Degrees And Improve Blood Flow 33 To 35 Percent In People With Diabetic Foot Problems

Healthifeet Foot Cream for Diabetics: Clinically Proven To Increase Foot Temperature 5 - 8 Degrees And Improve Blood Flow 33 To 35 Percent In People With Diabetic Foot Problems

I've used it, and this stuff really works. If you want to know more about the technology, click here. Highly recommended.

Diabetes in African Americans

Diagnosed Diabetes By County - All Races

(via Boots and Sabers)

Black Population By County

From BlackHealthCare.com:

• In 1993, 1.3 million African Americans were known to have diabetes. This is almost three times the number of African Americans who were diagnosed with diabetes in 1963. The actual number of African Americans who have diabetes is probably more than twice the number diagnosed because previous research indicates that for every African American diagnosed with diabetes there is at least one undiagnosed case.
• For every white American who gets diabetes, 1.6 African Americans get diabetes.
• One in four black women, 55 years of age or older, has diabetes. (Among African Americans, women are more likely to
• Twenty-five percent of blacks between the ages of 65 and 74 have diabetes.
• African Americans with diabetes are more likely to develop diabetes complications and experience greater disability from the complications than white Americans with diabetes.

Researchers suggest that African Americans and recent African immigrants to America have inherited a "thrifty gene" from their African ancestors. Years ago, this gene enabled Africans, during "feast and famine" cycles, to use food energy more efficiently when food was scarce. Today, with fewer "feast and famine" cycles, the thrifty gene that developed for survival may instead make weight control more difficult. This genetic predisposition, along with impaired glucose tolerance (IGT), often occurs together with the genetic tendency toward high blood pressure. ...

Diabetes was an uncommon cause of death among African Americans at the turn of the century. By 1993, however, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics, death certificates listed diabetes as the fifth leading cause of death for African Americans aged 45 to 64, and the third leading cause of death for those aged 65 and older in 1990. Diabetes is more dangerous for African-American women, for whom it was the third leading cause of death for all ages in 1990. Diabetes death rates may actually be higher than these studies show for two reasons. First, diabetes might not have been diagnosed. Second, many doctors do not list diabetes as a cause of death, even when the person was known to have diabetes.

Prevention Costs Money

From Charles Krauthammer:

Think of it this way. Assume that a screening test for disease X costs $500 and finding it early averts $10,000 of costly treatment at a later stage. Are you saving money? Well, if one in 10 of those who are screened tests positive, society is saving $5,000. But if only one in 100 would get that disease, society is shelling out $40,000 more than it would without the preventive care.

That's a hypothetical case. What's the real-life actuality? In Obamaworld, as explained by the president in his Tuesday town hall, if we pour money into primary care for diabetics instead of giving surgeons "$30,000, $40,000, $50,000" for a later amputation -- a whopper that misrepresents the surgeon's fee by a factor of at least 30 -- "that will save us money." Back on Earth, a rigorous study in the journal Circulation found that for cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, "if all the recommended prevention activities were applied with 100 percent success," the prevention would cost almost 10 times as much as the savings, increasing the country's total medical bill by 162 percent. That's because prevention applied to large populations is very expensive, as shown by another report Elmendorf cites, a definitive review in the New England Journal of Medicine of hundreds of studies that found that more than 80 percent of preventive measures added to medical costs.

This doesn't mean we shouldn't be preventing illness. Of course we should. But in medicine, as in life, there is no free lunch. The idea that prevention is somehow intrinsically economically different from treatment -- that treatment increases costs and prevention lowers them -- is simply nonsense.

Scott Gottlieb, M.D.: How to Make Better Vaccines--Quickly

• Vaccines were long seen as commodity products, marked by little new investment.
• Flu vaccines were made by the same process used for 50 years--by being grown inside chicken eggs--despite advances in science that enable ordinary animal cells to be turned into more reliable incubators.
• By comparison, using the cell-based technology, a vaccine could theoretically be produced in a matter of weeks.
• Another option to boost supply is to use an adjuvant, which is basically a vaccine additive that makes a smaller amount of vaccine more effective.
• Right now, there are adjuvants approved in Europe that could be used in a swine flu vaccine, but none are approved in the U.S.
• The FDA needs to rapidly assess this vaccine additive and make a decision if it will use it in this case. 

http://www.aei.org/publications/pubID.29793,filter.all/pub_detail.asp

Low-Cost $15 Heart Rate Monitor for the One Laptop Per Child Computer

Low-Cost $15 Heart Rate Monitor for the One Laptop Per Child Computer

Golf Is Forever: Alzheimer's Patients Perk Up On the Greens

An excerpt from Matthew Futterman:

A little after 9 a.m. last week, Wardell Johnston declared he wanted to be left alone. Confused and annoyed by the activities and tasks confronting him, the 87-year-old Alzheimer's sufferer shut his door at the Silverado Senior Living home in Belmont, Calif.

Just hours later, Mr. Johnston was measuring the uphill, right-to-left break on a 12-foot putt and knocking his ball into the hole. Then the former civil engineer, who played the game regularly as a younger man, ambled over to the driving range. He grabbed a six iron and practiced chipping with the sort of easy, stress-free swing duffers half his age could learn something from.

"I quit," he said with a cocky grin after each successful shot. Then he deftly cradled another ball with his club, moving it into position for the next stroke. "I haven't played a lot lately," he added. "I should, though. I've still got all the strokes."

Anyone who has dealt with people suffering from mid- to late-stage Alzheimer's knows how difficult it can be to transport someone from fear and confusion to contentment and lucidity. But at Silverado, caregivers have stumbled onto a technique that works nearly every time -- a golf outing. They run through a series of putting drills, knocking the ball around with the wonder of small children playing the game for the first time, which is how many of them experience it each week. For those who played the game when they were younger, swinging a club often sparks a startling transformation, however fleeting, that can make them seem like regular old folks again.

Dr Naylor Udder Balm: Great Stuff For Diabetic Feet

Dr Naylor Udder Balm: Great Stuff For Diabetic Feet

They, of course, can't make such an off-label claim, but that's been my experience. Your mileage may vary. Available online if you normally don't frequent stores that carry livestock supplies.