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Found 654 results
  1. News Article
    The number of people who try suicide has risen steadily in the U.S. But despite gains in health coverage, nearly half are not getting mental health treatment. Suicide attempts in the United States showed a “substantial and alarming increase” over the last decade, but one number remained the same, a new study has found: Year in and year out, about 40% of people who had recently tried suicide said they were not receiving mental health services. The study, published in JAMA Psychiatry, traces a rise in the incidence of suicide attempts, defined as “self-reported attempts to kill one’s self in the last 12 months,” from 2008 to 2019. During that period, the incidence rose to 564 in every 100,000 adults from 481. The researchers drew on data from 484,732 responses to the federal government’s annual National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which includes people who lack insurance and have little contact with the health care system. They found the largest increase in suicide attempts among women; young adults between 18 and 25; unmarried people; people with less education; and people who regularly use substances like alcohol or cannabis. Only one group, adults 50 to 64 years old, saw a significant decrease in suicide attempts during that time. Among the major findings was that there was no significant change in the use of mental health services by people who had tried suicide, despite the passage of the Affordable Care Act in 2010 and receding stigma around mental health care. Over the 11-year period, a steady rate of about 40%t of people who tried suicide in the previous year said they were not receiving mental health care, said Greg Rhee, an assistant professor of psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine and one of the authors of the study. The Affordable Care Act, which took effect fully in 2014, required all health plans to cover mental health and substance abuse services, and also sharply reduced the number of uninsured people in the U.S. However, many respondents to the survey in the new report said the cost of mental health care was prohibitive; others said they were uncertain where to go for treatment or had no transportation. “It is a huge public health problem,” Dr. Rhee said. “We know that mental health care in the U.S. is really fragmented and complicated, and we also know not everybody has equal access to mental health care. So, it’s somewhat not surprising.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: New York Times,19 January 2022
  2. News Article
    New data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has revealed that unvaccinated adults infected with Covid-19 who are 65 and older are 49 times more likely to need hospitalisation compared to those who have received booster doses. The CDC also found that in December, unvaccinated adults in that same age group experienced a rate of Covid-related hospitalisation 17 times higher than those who are fully vaccinated. For unvaccinated adults between 50 and 64, they are 44 times more likely to require hospitalisation compared with those who are immunised. In that same age group, unvaccinated adults were also 17 times more likely to experience Covid-related hospitalisation. According to the CDC, adults who are 65 and older and have received both doses of either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine showed a 94% reduced risk of Covid-related hospitalisations. “Getting very sick means that older adults with Covid-19 might need hospitalization, intensive care, or a ventilator to help them breathe, or they might even die. The risk increases for people in their 50s and increases in 60s, 70s, and 80s. People 85 and older are the most likely to get very sick,” the CDC said on its website. “Get vaccinated as soon as possible,” the agency added. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 21 January 2022
  3. News Article
    Many supposedly “incidental” infections aren’t really incidental, and cannot be dismissed, writes Ed Yong. More Americans are now hospitalised with COVID-19 than at any previous point in the pandemic. The current count—147,062—has doubled since Christmas, and is set to rise even more steeply, all while Omicron takes record numbers of healthcare workers off the front lines with breakthrough infections. For hospitals, the math of this surge is simple: Fewer staff and more patients mean worse care. Around the United States, people with all kinds of medical emergencies are now waiting hours, if not days, for help. Some reporters and pundits have claimed that this picture is overly pessimistic because the hospitalisation numbers include people who are simply hospitalised with COVID, rather than for COVID—“incidental” patients who just happen to test positive while being treated for something else. In some places, the proportion of such cases seems high. UC San Francisco recently said a third of its COVID patients “are admitted for other reasons,” while the Jackson Health System in Florida put that proportion at half. In New York State, COVID “was not included as one of the reasons for admission” for 43% of the hospitalised people who have tested positive. But the “with COVID” hospitalisation numbers are more complicated than they first seem. Many people on that side of the ledger are still in the hospital because of the coronavirus, which has both caused and exacerbated chronic conditions. And more important, these nuances don’t alter the real, urgent, and enormous crisis unfolding in American hospitals. Whether patients are admitted with or for COVID, they’re still being admitted in record volumes that hospitals are struggling to care for. “The truth is, we’re still in the emergency phase of the pandemic, and everyone who is downplaying that should probably take a tour of a hospital before they do,” says Jeremy Faust, an emergency physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, in Massachusetts. Read full story Source: The Atlantic, 12 January 2022
  4. News Article
    Patients in the US are able to order “don’t weigh me” cards to take to the doctors in a move aimed at reducing anxiety and stress on a visit. The US group behind the initiative said being weighed and talking about weight “causes feelings of stress and shame for many people”. The cards say: “Please don’t weigh me unless it is (really) medically necessary.” It adds: “If you really need my weight, please tell me why so that I can give you my informed consent”. On the other side, it explains why the patient may not want to be weighed, including “when you focus on my weight I get stressed” and “weighing me every time I come in for an appointment and talking about my weight like it’s a problem perpetuates weight stigma”. It also says most health conditions can be addressed without knowing the patient’s weight. Public Health England guidance to health and care professionals says they are in a “unique position to talk to patients about weight management to prevent ill-health” and recommends brief interventions. It says the first step in a brief intervention over a patient’s weight is to weigh and measure them. “You should view this as a normal part of a routine consultation,” it says. Read full story Source: The Independent, 23 December 2021
  5. News Article
    More than 167,000 children are believed to have lost parents or caregivers to Covid during the pandemic – roughly one in every 450 young people in the US under age 18. The count updates the October estimate that 140,000 minors had lost caregiving adults to the virus, and is four times more than a springtime tally that found nearly 40,000 children had experienced such loss. In a report titled Hidden Pain, researchers from the COVID Collaborative and Social Policy Analytics published the new total, which they derived by combining coronavirus death numbers with household-level data from the 2019 American Community Survey. The death toll further underscores the daunting task facing schools as they seek to help students recover not just academically, but also emotionally, from a pandemic that has already stretched 22 months and claimed more than 800,000 American lives. It’s an issue of such elevated concern that Surgeon General Vivek Murthy, on 7 December, used a rare public address to warn Americans of the pandemic’s “devastating” effects on youth mental health. An accompanying 53-page report calls out the particular difficulties experienced by young people who have lost parents or caregivers to the virus. Bereaved children have higher rates of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder than those who have not lost parents, according to a 2018 study that followed grieving children for multiple years. They are more than twice as likely to show impairments in functioning at school and at home, even seven years later, meaning these children need both immediate and long-term counseling and support to deal with such a traumatic loss. “For these children, their whole sky has fallen, and supporting them through this trauma must be a top priority.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 22 December 2021
  6. News Article
    Three pharmacy and medication safety organisations are warning clinicians about a reported increase in age-related COVID-19 vaccine mix-ups. The Institute for Safe Medication Practice's National Vaccine Errors Reporting Program said it's seen a "steady stream" of mix-ups involving the Pfizer vaccine intended for kids ages 5-11 and formulations for people 12 and older. ISMP said the reports involved hundreds of children and included young children receiving formulations meant for those 12 and up or vice versa. The safety organisation said some errors were linked to vial or syringe mix-ups. In other situations, healthcare providers gave young children a smaller or diluted dose of the formulation meant for people 12 and up. "Vaccine vials formulated for individuals 12 and up (purple cap) should never be used to prepare doses for the younger age group," the organisation said. Read full story Source: Becker's Hospital Review, 7 December 2021
  7. News Article
    The vast majority of front-line clinical support staff are reporting moderate to extreme burnout, and nearly two-thirds have considered quitting, a new US survey found. "While much has been reported on doctor and nurse burnout, less attention has been paid to the front-line clinical support staff who have been working tirelessly throughout the COVID-19 pandemic to ensure high-quality patient care was maintained," Meg Aranow, senior vice president and platform evangelist for patient experience vendor Well Health, told Fierce Healthcare. "We recognize the critical role clinical support staff play in provider organizations—this study further validates the cascading impact clinical support staff have on the patient experience and so many facets of our healthcare system," Aranow said. Well Health surveyed 320 clinical support staff who are primarily responsible for communicating and coordinating with patients, mostly through phone calls, which can be time-consuming. According to the survey results, the patient-communication coordination process is overwhelming staff to the point of wanting to quit, with 82% saying that contacting and coordinating with patients about their appointments, follow-ups and health issues via phone, email, text or live chat is a direct cause of their burnout. The survey found that 58% of clinical support staff believe their burnout has negatively affected a patient’s quality of care, and 60% report poor or ineffective patient communication has negatively affected a patient’s health outcomes. Read full story Source: Fierce Healthcare, 20 October 2021
  8. News Article
    A California couple gave birth to a stranger's child after being given the wrong embryo by a fertility clinic during in vitro fertilisation (IVF), says a lawsuit. Daphna and Alexander Cardinale say they gave birth in September 2019 to a girl that looked nothing like them. After a DNA test, they found the couple that carried their daughter to term, and together decided to swap the girls. This is not the first alleged mix-up during an IVF procedure. IVF is a procedure during which a woman's eggs are fertilised by man's sperm in a laboratory before the embryos are implanted into a woman's uterus. The Cardinales are suing the Los Angeles-based fertility centre, the California Center for Reproductive Health (CCRH), as well as In VitroTech Labs, an embryology lab. The lawsuit alleges medical malpractice, negligence and fraudulent concealment. Neither company responded to a BBC News request for comment. In an emotional news conference on Monday, Mrs Cardinale said her family's "heartbreak and confusion can't be understated". "Our memories of childbirth will always be tainted by the sick reality that our biological child was given to someone else, and the baby that I fought to bring into this world was not mine to keep." Read full story Source: BBC News, 9 November 2021
  9. News Article
    Inside the emergency department at Sparrow Hospital in Lansing, Michigan, staff members are struggling to care for patients showing up much sicker than they’ve ever seen. Tiffani Dusang, the ER’s nursing director, practically vibrates with pent-up anxiety, looking at patients lying on a long line of stretchers pushed up against the beige walls of the hospital hallways. “It’s hard to watch,” she said. But there’s nothing she can do. The ER’s 72 rooms are already filled. “I always feel very, very bad when I walk down the hallway and see that people are in pain, or needing to sleep, or needing quiet. But they have to be in the hallway with, as you can see, 10 or 15 people walking by every minute,” Dusang said. The scene is a stark contrast to where this US emergency department — and thousands of others — were at the start of the pandemic. Except for initial hot spots like New York City, in spring 2020 many ERs across the country were often eerily empty. Terrified of contracting covid-19, people who were sick with other things did their best to stay away from hospitals. Visits to emergency rooms dropped to half their typical levels, according to the Epic Health Research Network, and didn’t fully rebound until this summer. But now, they’re too full. Even in parts of the country where covid isn’t overwhelming the health system, patients are showing up to the ER sicker than before the pandemic, their diseases more advanced and in need of more complicated care. Read full story Source: Kaiser Health News, 29 October 2021
  10. News Article
    A decade after scientists identified a link between certain implants and cancer, the US Food and Drug Administration has ordered “black box” warnings and a new checklist of risks for patients to review. Federal regulators have placed so-called black box warnings on breast implant packaging and told manufacturers to sell the devices only to health providers who review the potential risks with patients before surgery. Both the warnings and a new checklist that advises patients of the risks and side effects state that breast implants have been linked to a cancer of the immune system and to a host of other chronic medical conditions, including autoimmune diseases, joint pain, mental confusion, muscle aches and chronic fatigue. Startlingly, the checklist identifies particular types of patients who are at higher risk for illness after breast implant surgery. The group includes breast cancer patients who have had, or plan to have, chemotherapy or radiation treatments. That represents a large percentage of women who until now were encouraged to have breast reconstruction with implants following their treatment. Reactions to the new requirements were mixed. While some doctors welcomed the new warning system, others worried that the potential risks and side effects would not be conveyed adequately by plastic surgeons who were eager to reassure patients the procedure is safe and that the new checklist would be handled in a dismissive manner. But Dr. Mark Clemens, a professor at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston who serves a liaison to the F.D.A. for the American Society of Plastic Surgeons Society, said the black box warning and checklist represented “a huge step forward for patient safety and implants.” Read full story Source: The New York Times, 27 October 2021
  11. News Article
    Deborah Birx, who was the White House coronavirus response coordinator under President Donald Trump, has told a congressional inquiry that at least 129 000 lives could have been saved if his administration had provided adequate testing and properly communicated the gravity of the situation to the public. But the election year “just took people’s time away and distracted them from the pandemic,” she told the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis. “I felt like the White House had gotten somewhat complacent through the campaign season.” Asked if Trump did everything he should have to counter the pandemic, she said, “No. And I’ve said that to the White House. I believe I was very clear to the president in specifics of what I needed him to do.” “If we had fully implemented the mask mandates, the reduction in indoor dining, the getting friends and family to understand the risk of gathering in private homes, and we had increased testing, then we probably could have decreased fatalities by 30-40%.” That would amount to at least 129 000 preventable covid deaths over the course of the Trump presidency, which saw roughly 429 000 reported deaths attributed to the coronavirus." Read full story Source: BMJ, 28 October 2021
  12. News Article
    Coronavirus cases in the US will spike after Thanksgiving, further stressing health care systems and prompting new restrictions, an emergency physician said Saturday, as states continued to report soaring numbers of new cases, hospitalizations and deaths. Dr. James Phillips, chief of disaster medicine at George Washington University Hospital, told CNN's Erica Hill he is "terrified" about what's going to happen this holiday season. "We're going to see an unprecedented surge of cases following Thanksgiving this year, and if people don't learn from Thanksgiving, we're going to see it after Christmas as well," Phillips said. Already, grim indicators offer a glimpse of what's to come. A little more than a week after the US first topped 100,000 daily infections, it reported a record of more than 184,000 new cases Friday. Hospitalisations also hit a new high – for the fourth consecutive day – with more than 68,500 COVID-19 patients nationwide, according to the COVID Tracking Project. And the country's daily death toll has topped 1,300 at least three times this week. "Things are going to get much, much worse," said Dr. Leana Wen, a CNN medical analyst and former Baltimore Health Commissioner. She expressed concern over the impact on the already-strained health care system when the new cases added in recent days are reflected in hospitalisations. Read full story Source: CNN, 15 November 2020
  13. News Article
    Not a single resident has contracted the coronavirus at Goodwin House’s small residential facility in Northern Virginia, USA, where about 80 seniors live in homey apartments and keep their own sleeping and meal schedules. There’s been just one case at the Woodlands at John Knox Village in Broward County, Fla., where all 140 residents live in private rooms and are cared for by nurses who earn enough not to take a second job. These facilities, part of a national movement in the US to create less-institutionalised long-term care, stand out in a pandemic that has killed more than 61,000 nursing home residents in the US since March. At “Green House” homes, the best-known nontraditional model, residents are one-fifth as likely to get the coronavirus as those who live in typical nursing homes — and one-twentieth as likely to die of the disease it causes. The model has been praised by academics and doctors and seems far better suited than traditional facilities to stave off the spread of infection and the isolation that has devastated the elderly in recent months. But it remains on the fringes of a $137 billion industry. Read full story Source: The Washington Post, 3 November 2020
  14. News Article
    Health resources diverted to fight the COVID-19 pandemic have caused a major drop in critical preventative care in the US, including childhood vaccinations and lead screenings, sexually transmitted disease testing and substance abuse services. In short, many of the routine measures meant to keep Americans healthy – and keep American health from slipping further behind that of other developed, peer nations – have hit a worrying cliff. As attention has focused on the immediate crisis of the pandemic and the hundreds of thousands of lives lost in America, this other hidden crisis represents another layer of disaster that also has profound implications. “This is either the second or first worst pandemic in modern human history,” said Dr Howard Markel, a pandemic historian and pediatrician at the University of Michigan. “We knew there would be repercussions and unintended consequences.” Now, there is a “whole menu of neglect” to address as a national vaccine campaign allows people to slowly emerge from a year of lockdowns and social distancing. “There is no historical precedent for this,” added Markel. In the first few months of the pandemic alone, at least 400,000 children missed screenings for lead, a toxic heavy metal. Doctors and nurses ordered 3m fewer vaccines for children and 400,000 fewer for measles specifically. For the first time, clinics were forced to ration lab tests for sexually transmitted diseases as lab capacity and supplies were diverted to test for COVID-19. Contact tracers were also re-deployed from tracking chlamydia, gonorrhea and syphilis cases to finding people in contact with COVID-19 patients. Data from one large commercial lab showed 669,000 fewer HIV tests were processed. Compared to 2019, the lab diagnosed nearly 5,000 fewer cases of HIV. Delayed diagnosis can lead to people unwittingly transmitting the virus. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 26 April 2021
  15. News Article
    For the last 10 months, everyone in healthcare has lived their lives as if they were trapped in a burning building without a fire escape. No matter how much water we throw on the fire or how many firefighters (healthcare providers in this instance) we send in, we cannot gain control of the flames. The catastrophic loss of life has been insurmountable, and we often haven’t had enough physicians to take care of everyone. This is not new for a healthcare system. For years prior to this pandemic, there has been a physician shortage in the United States that is expected to worsen over the coming years. The Association of Medical Colleges (AAMC) predicts that the US could see a shortage between 54,000 and 139,000 physicians in both primary and specialty care by 2033. Although the total physician supply is expected to grow, it won’t be at a fast enough rate to outpace demand. This is where physician assistants (PAs) and advanced practice nurses (APRNs) come in. Many people don’t realise that PAs and APRNs have been around for over 50 years. For 50 years, a plethora of research has shown that PAs and APRNs are safe, reliable, high quality healthcare providers and essential members of the healthcare team. But too often critics claim that because they have not gone through physician training, they cannot provide exceptional medical and surgical care. In fact, they already do. A recent comprehensive review of PA and APRN outcomes from 2008 to 2018 found that PAs and APRNs had similar outcomes compared to physicians including hospital length of stay, readmission rates, quality and safety and patient and staff satisfaction. Read full story Source: The Hill, 16 January 2021
  16. News Article
    U.S. News has just released its list of the best hospitals with associated rankings and ratings. Scores are based on several factors, including survival, patient safety, nurse staffing and more. U.S. News reviews hospitals performance in 15 adult specialties, 10 pediatric specialties and 17 surgical procedures and medical conditions affecting millions of people across the country. Find all of the rankings and ratings here
  17. News Article
    The US Institute for Safe Medication Practices (ISMP) has expressed its shock that the Tennessee (TN) Board of Nursing has recently revoked RaDonda Vaught’s professional nursing license indefinitely, fining her $3,000, and stipulating that she pay up to $60,000 in prosecution costs. RaDonda was involved in a fatal medication error after entering “ve” in an automated dispensing cabinet (ADC) search field, accidentally removing a vial of vecuronium instead of VERSED (midazolam) from the cabinet via override, and unknowingly administering the neuromuscular blocking agent to the patient. While the Board accepted the state prosecutor’s recommendation to revoke RaDonda’s nursing license, ISMP doubts that the Board’s action was just, and believe that it has set patient safety back by 25 years. On September 27, 2019, in a stark reversal of a 2018 decision to take no licensing action against the nurse, the TN Board of Nursing filed disciplinary action against RaDonda that focused on three violations: Unprofessional conduct related to nursing practice and the five rights of medication administration Abandoning or neglecting a patient requiring nursing care Failure to maintain a record of interventions. During the hearing, RaDonda was given an opportunity to testify and defend herself; however, she never shrank from admitting her mistake. According to her defense attorney, her acceptance of responsibility for the error was immediate, extraordinary, and continuing. However, RaDonda also testified that the error was made because of flawed procedures at the hospital, particularly the lack of timely communication between the pharmacy computer system and the ADC, which led to significant delays in accessing medications and the hospital’s permission to temporarily override the ADC to obtain prescribed medications that were not yet linked to the patient’s profile in the ADC. Although many questions regarding RaDonda’s alleged failures and the event remain unanswered, the Board still voted unanimously to strip RaDonda of her nursing license and levy the full monetary penalties allowed, noting that there were just too many red flags that RaDonda “ignored” when administering the medication. The ISMP has asked whether the Board’s action was fair and just in this situation? Read full story Source: ISMP, 12 August 2021
  18. News Article
    At a certain point, it was no longer a matter of if the United States would reach the gruesome milestone of 1 in 500 people dying of COVID-19, but a matter of when. A year? Maybe 15 months? The answer: 19 months. The burden of death in the prime of life has been disproportionately borne by Black, Latino, and American Indian and Alaska Native people in their 30s, 40s and 50s. “So often when we think about the majority of the country who have lost people to covid-19, we think about the elders that have been lost, not necessarily younger people,” said Abigail Echo-Hawk, executive vice president at the Seattle Indian Health Board and director of the Urban Indian Health Institute. “Unfortunately, this is not my reality nor that of the Native community. I lost cousins and fathers and tribal leaders." The pandemic has brought into stark relief centuries of entwining social, environmental, economic and political factors that erode the health and shorten the lives of people of colour, putting them at higher risk of the chronic conditions that leave immune systems vulnerable to the coronavirus. Many of those same factors fuel the misinformation, mistrust and fear that leave too many unprotected. Many people don’t have a physician they see regularly due in part to significant provider shortages in communities of colour. If they do have a doctor, it can cost too much money for a visit even if insured. There are language barriers for those who don’t speak English fluently and fear of deportation among undocumented immigrants. “Some of the issues at hand are structural issues, things that are built into the fabric of society,” says Enrique W. Neblett Jr., a University of Michigan professor who studies racism and health. Read full story (paywalled) Source: The Washington Post, 15 September 2021
  19. News Article
    Oversight failures, a fearful workplace culture and lax quality standards for years at a Veterans Affairs hospital in Arkansas, USA, allowed a pathologist who was routinely drunk on the job to misdiagnose thousands of veterans — sometimes with dire or deadly consequences, a new investigation has found. Hospital leaders “failed to promote a culture of accountability” that would have led more of the doctor’s colleagues to come forward with accounts that his behavior was putting patients at risk, according to the report released Wednesday by VA’s Office of Inspector General. But the staff members at the Veterans Health Care System of the Ozarks in Fayetteville feared that reporting their concerns would lead to retaliation from their bosses. “Any one of these breakdowns could cause harmful results,” Inspector General Michael Missal’s staff wrote in an 86-page report about the failures to stop the pathologist, Robert Morris Levy. “Together and over an extended period of time, the consequences were devastating, tragic, and deadly.” Read full story Source: The Washington Post, 2 June 2021
  20. News Article
    To lower hospital readmission rates for patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), UB pharmacy researcher David Jacobs has received a $962,000 award from the US National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute to develop a real-time readmission risk-prediction algorithm. Through a five-year Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award, Jacobs will combine social information with rich clinical data to build predictive models that will be integrated into patient-centric interventions and tested in clinical practices. If successful, the research will help clinicians provide individualized treatment at the transition from hospital to home for COPD patients, who experience high rates of early hospital readmission, says Jacobs. “Each year, 7.8 million hospital-discharged patients are readmitted, costing the United States $17 billion,” says Jacobs, assistant professor of pharmacy practice, School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences. “High readmission rates are linked to several quality-of-care and patient-safety factors, such as medication-related problems, inaccurate information transfer, and lack of care coordination with primary care,” he says. “Our focus will be to apply innovative informatic techniques to the development of risk prediction models for hospital readmissions that ultimately personalizes care management interventions.” Read full story Source: UBNow, 21 May 2021
  21. News Article
    A Virginia gynaecologist has been sentenced to 59 years in prison for a fraud scheme that caused insurance programmes to lose more than $20 million, according to the U.S. Justice Department. Javaid Perwaiz was sentenced after being convicted last November of 52 counts of healthcare fraud and false statements related to a scheme in which he performed medically unnecessary surgeries, including hysterectomies and improper sterilisations, on his patients. From about 2010 to 2019, Dr. Perwaiz often falsely told his patients that they needed the surgeries because they had cancer or could avoid cancer, prosecutors said. Additionally, evidence showed Dr. Perwaiz falsified records for his obstetric patients to induce labor early to ensure he was reimbursed for the deliveries and violated Medicaid's required 30-day waiting period for elective sterilisation procedures by backdating records to make it appear that he had complied with the waiting period. Dr. Perwaiz also billed insurance companies for diagnostic procedures that he only pretended to perform at his office, prosecutors said. "Motivated by his insatiable and reprehensible greed, Perwaiz used an arsenal of horrifying tactics to manipulate and deceive patients into undergoing invasive, unnecessary and devastating medical procedures," Raj Parekh, acting U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, stated. "In many instances, the defendant shattered their ability to have children by using fear to remove organs from their bodies that he had no right to take." Read full story Source: Becker's Hospital Review, 18 May 2021
  22. Event
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    Join the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s Committee on Improving the Representation of Women and Underrepresented Minorities in Clinical Trials and Research as it discusses its newly released report Improving Representation in Clinical Trials and Research: Building Research Equity for Women and Underrepresented Groups. This new report makes a compelling case for why we need more equitable participation in clinical trials and clinical research, including an economic analysis on the cost of health disparities in the United States. It provides a review of the barriers to having more equitable participation in clinical trials, describes strategies to overcome those barriers, and provides actionable recommendations to drive lasting change on this issue. The webinar will take place at 11:00-13:00 EST (16:00-18:00 GMT+1) Register for the webinar
  23. Event
    Sensemaking, according to Karl Weick, is the process through which the complex and unpredictable world is given order, within which people can orient themselves, find purpose, and take effective action. Organisations unravel when sensemaking collapses, when they no longer supply meaning, and when they cling to interpretations that no longer work. As we enter the third year of a global COVID-19 pandemic, when nearly every aspect of our care and caring has faced disruption, how do we make sense of and take action to prevent the unraveling of organisations and sustainably reverse setbacks in patient and workforce safety? Join IHI’s annual Patient Safety Awareness Week webinar on March 16, 2022 from 11:00 AM to 11:50 AM ET with speakers Don Berwick, MD, MPP, and Jessica Berwick, MD, MPH, for a conversation on sensemaking during times of uncertainty, complexity, and chaos. This session will provide insights and perspective to foster sensemaking and action to reinforce patient and workforce safety in your organisation. Register
  24. Event
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    It’s time to register for the 2022 World Patient Safety, Science & Technology Summit, hosted by Patient Safety Movement in the USA. The 2022 World Patient Safety, Science & Technology Summit (WPSSTS) is co-convened by the American Society of Anesthesiologists, the European Society of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care and the International Society for Quality in Health Care, and will celebrate the Patient Safety Movement Foundation’s first 10 years of achievements. The 2022 WPSSTS will confront leading patient safety issues with actionable ideas and innovations to transform the continuum of care by dramatically improving patient safety and eliminating preventable patient harm and death. The WPSSTS brings together all stakeholders; we need everyone to step up and be part of the solution. We invite international hospital leaders, patient and family member advocates who have experienced harm, public policymakers and government officials, other non-profits working toward zero harm, healthcare technologists, engineers, and the future of healthcare – students and residents. All stakeholders are invited to actively and intimately plan solutions around the leading patient safety challenges that cause preventable patient deaths in hospitals and healthcare organizations worldwide. The WPSSTS will also feature keynote addresses from public figures, patient safety experts, and plenary sessions with healthcare luminaries, patient advocates, as well as announcements from organizations who have made their own commitments to reach the Patient Safety Movement Foundation’s vision of ZERO preventable harm and death across the globe by 2030. Event timings: 4 March 2022 8.00 am PST (4.00pm GMT) - 5 March 2022 5.00 pm PST (6 March 1.00am GMT) Buy tickets
  25. Event
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    This webinar by the Institute for Safe Medication Practices in the US is aimed at: Pharmacists, physicians, nurses Medication safety officers Quality professionals Risk managers Leaders in pharmacy and nursing Pharmacy and anaesthesia technicians Although most medications in healthcare today have a wide margin of safety, there remains some which can cause serious harm or death if they are misused. To reduce the risk of error with these “high-alert” medications, special precautions and high leverage strategies should be implemented to avoid serious patient safety events. Numerous organizations have taken steps to identify these medications, but many are still less than confident that they have taken all the necessary precautions against serious patient harm. Join the ISMP faculty as we focus particular attention on the potential safe use risks with heparin, concentrated electrolytes, and magnesium using the results from ISMP’s National Medication Safety Self Assessment® for High-Alert Medications. Faculty will review specific safety characteristics of each these important drug classes, describe self-assessment findings related to the use of these medications, and discuss the necessary practice strategies for harm prevention when using these high-alert medications. Register for the webinar 3.00pm Eastern Time (US and Canada), 8.00pm GMT
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