Workplace Safety

From The Toronto Star:

Ontario's front-line health care workers will soon be better protected against job-related injuries and life-threatening infections.

The province announced yesterday it will provide nurses and other health care workers with new respirators and safety needles in an effort to make their workplaces safer.

One more reason to move to Canada. What are we doing again in the US?

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E-Prescriptions In the North

Electronic drug prescriptions can be delivered to pharmacists in all 50 states for the first time this week as Alaska became the final state to join the technological bandwagon.

In the past year, Georgia, South Carolina and West Virginia have all joined the national network, and the change in Alaska regulations means doctors' hieroglyphic handwriting and prescription pads could soon be a thing of the past.

Dick Holm, a member of the state Board of Pharmacy, said the process took so long to get to Alaska because "we're a small state and we address things as they come up." He said the change was not mandated by the federal government.

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It may be legal, but I've never seen it.

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Overhyped Antimicrobial Soap

Washing hands with an antibacterial soap was no more effective at reducing bacterial levels or preventing illness than washing with ordinary soap, researchers said.

Furthermore, the soaps, most of which contain the antimicrobial triclosan, produced worrisome antibiotic cross-resistance among different species of bacteria, according to a study reported in a supplement to the Sept. 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases.

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It's going to take more than one study to change how people wash their hands after years of aggressive marketing by the soap industry.

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Crazy Coumadin

Widely used blood thinner warfarin will come with new instructions explaining that people with certain genes may need a lower dose to take the drug safely, U.S. health officials said on Thursday.

The change is part of a move toward personalized medicine in which doctors tailor treatment based on genetic makeup, the Food and Drug Administration said.

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I'm not sure of the cost effectiveness of a genetic test to figure out a dose of coumadin. When the medication is started in the hospital, with daily PT/INR monitoring, and reasonable dosing, patients really shouldn't become hypertherapeutic.

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Protecting Children

Parents shopping for school supplies probably haven't thought to include body armor on their lists, but after recent school shootings including April's Virginia Tech massacre, two companies are marketing armored backpacks and uniforms.

"Back in '99 following the Columbine shootings, me and my buddy Joe Curran — both of us are parents of two children — wondered if there was anything out there in the world to protect children in school if there was a shooting," Mike Pelonzi, co-inventor of My Child's Pack, a bulletproof backpack, told ABCNEWS.com.

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It's a sad day in America when this is what is needed to keep a child safe at school.

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The Video.

Laparoscopy HD

I have previously posted about my research on the use of high definition TV (HDTV) for surgical endoscopy. I am honored to have participated in the evaluation of the highest resolution surgical system ever created which I used to capture the footage showcased in the amazing upcoming National Geographic HD special “Inside The Living Body” which will be the first surgical procedure broadcast in HD.

What’s also new is that this system allowed me to record footage that will be seen by the lay public in their living room that is higher resolution and quality than virtually any surgeon has ever seen in the OR!

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I will say that most surgeons I know are quite pleased if their laparoscope isn't fogging throughout the procedure with no picture. Barely half the monitors at the hospitals I deal with are even LCD, and they are the older CRT's. Surgery HD is a long way off from the masses at this point unless someone can show the benefit.

Recall that everything used in a hospital costs a ton of money once it gets the medical moniker attached to it. A few years ago, the VCR that a radiologist was using to record barium swallows broke. For a Sony "Medical VCR" they wanted over two thousand grand for it. He kept fighting with administration over the price tag as they didn't want to go for it. After a few months, he finally got fed up, went down to the local Best Buy, and picked one up for a hundred bucks, and of course it worked just as well. I can only imagine how much surgery in HD is going to cost when we consider all of the equipment involved, going for ten times more than in the consumer market.

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Sugar High

Added sugars are the bane of our modern diet - and drinking sugar is arguably the easiest way to over-indulge.

What are the most sugary drinks?

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Some list...Red Bull isn't even on it.

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Endobarrier For Weight Loss

"This is again performed endoscopically with a device that goes down the esophagus into the stomach where the device is deployed. The theory is food goes on the inside of this endobarrier. The digestive enzymes are on the outside of the endobarrier and the food and digestive enzymes don't mix until two feet further down stream in the smaller bowel.”

While it is similar to the gastric bypass, it’s not a replacement for those who need the surgery just yet.

"For now, it's not instead of, it's prior too gastric bypass. Whether or not this becomes a procedure instead of gastric bypass remains to be seen," said Gersin.

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Ok, so let me get this straight. So we put this baggie inside the stomach, and it goes into the small intestine a ways. This keeps the food from getting digested. And no one thinks that this thing is going to move and cause an obstruction? Not for nothing, but this is making "Fat March" look like a better idea...

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Magnet Beats X-Ray

Doctors diagnosed more cases of an invasive form of breast cancer using magnetic resonance imaging than with standard mammography technique, according to a study published in The Lancet today.

Researchers at the University of Bonn in Germany found that out of 167 women diagnosed with ductal carcinoma in situ, often a precursor to invasive breast cancer, 92 percent were diagnosed using MRI scans, while only 56 percent were found using mammography, the diagnostic standard.

These findings suggest that MRI could improve the ability of doctors to catch the condition, which is found in 60,000 women in the U.S. each year, according to the American Cancer Society. Previous studies dismissed MRI screenings as not sensitive enough to find pre-cancer. Mammography detects about 20 percent of early, non-invasive breast cancers, the researchers said.

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Cost?

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So Why Bring It Up?

The popular heartburn drugs Prilosec and Nexium do not appear to spur heart problems, according to preliminary U.S. and Canadian probes announced yesterday.

The Food and Drug Administration and its Canadian counterpart, Health Canada, began reviewing the drugs, used by tens of millions of people, in May, when manufacturer AstraZeneca provided them an early analysis of two small studies that suggested the possibility of a risk.

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All of this excitement about today's purple pill.

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Gephyrophobia

A racing heart. Panicked feelings of losing control.

Most people might experience these physical reactions when real danger is imminent. But for some, the seemingly simple act of crossing a bridge brings on this type of terror.

And with the news of last night's tragedy in Minneapolis, those with gephyrophobia (pronounced: JEFF-i-ro-FO-bee-uh) -- or "bridge phobia" -- could see their anxiety increase.

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What do we call fear of EZ Pass?

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Zinc Out: No Cure For Common Cold

A new study, published online in advance of the Sept. 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, reviews 14 placebo-controlled studies from the past two decades and finds significant fault with 10 of the studies. Of the four other studies, three reported no therapeutic effect from zinc lozenges or nasal spray, and one study reported positive results from zinc nasal gel.

“The best scientific evidence available indicates that zinc lozenges are not effective in treating colds,” said Jack M. Gwaltney, Jr., MD...

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At least the cherry flavored lozenges taste pretty good!

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Capitalism Comes To Canada's Health

A push by the Canadian Medical Association to let doctors work in both the public and private systems with an eye to easing wait times under medicare is running into more opposition, this time from Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty.

McGuinty said the CMA's track toward a two-tier health system – which critics fear would erode medicare by luring doctors away from it – ignores efforts by Ontario and other provinces to improve public health care by reducing wait times for treatment in key areas such as hip and knee replacements.

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Hold Breath While Printing

Hewlett-Packard Co. Friday disputed research published earlier this week that said some of its laser printers may be a health risk to office and home computer users. While it did not directly contest the data gathered by Australian researchers, the U.S.-based printer and computer manufacturer flatly rejected the idea that emissions pose a danger.

"We do not believe there is a link between printer emissions and any public health risk," the company said in a statement.

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Well... What did we expect them to say? Maybe they're better off going with it, and trying to sell the higher consumable cost inkjet printers as the safer alternative.

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Leaves of Three...

Let them be! (Poison Ivy)

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