Home Sputum Collection - A Step-by-step Guide - Lao
The purpose of this video is to show you how to provide a sputum specimen that was requested by your health care provider. Sputum is the mucus that you cough up from your lungs.
By: Public Health Madison Dane County
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Thune: No Surprise Democrats Are Rethinking Their Support for ObamaCare
U.S. Senator John Thune (R-South Dakota), Chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, discusses a prominent Democrat #39;s second thoughts on ObamaCare and highlights the damage the law is...
By: JohnThune
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Thune: No Surprise Democrats Are Rethinking Their Support for ObamaCare - Video
The Allegheny County Health Department is urging all health care workers in Allegheny County to get vaccinated against influenza. Vaccination against the flu will help to protect not only health care workers but also their patients. Health care workers include staff involved in patient care as well as other personnel who work in patient areas and can play a role in the transmission of flu.
Boosting vaccination rates among health care workers can help reduce the transmission of influenza, curb staff illness and absenteeism, and ultimately decrease influenza-related illness and death. Vaccination is especially important in reducing influenza among the elderly and the chronically ill who are at increased risk for severe complications from the flu, said Health Director Dr. Karen Hacker.
We strongly encourage health care workers who have been vaccinated against the flu to let their patients know, because it sets such a positive example for everyone else to follow, added Dr. Hacker.
Our goal is community immunity and that includes not just the general public but health care workers too. When theyre vaccinated, it protects them, their families and the community they serve. Thats why we support the efforts of acute care facilities to increase vaccination rates among their health care workers, said Cindy Callaghan, Chairperson of the Allegheny County Immunization Coalition.
In a national survey, 75% of health care workers reported being vaccinated against influenza last season, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Reported coverage was higher among health care workers in hospitals (90%) than among workers in long-term care facilities (63%) and higher among physicians (92%) and nurses (91%) than among assistants/aides (58%) and nonclinical personnel (67%) who participated in the survey.
Flu vaccination rates were lower among employees in health care facilities in Allegheny County, with median coverage of 67% at hospitals (2012 data) and median coverage of 55% at long-term care facilities (2013 data). Of the 64 licensed long-term care facilities in Allegheny County, 26 had flu vaccination coverage of less than 50% among employees.
National surveys indicate that vaccination coverage in health care personnel is much higher if vaccination is mandatory or if vaccination is actively promoted and offered free on-site on multiple days.
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Health Department urges Health Care workers to get vaccinated against the Flu
Making OHIP billings public would give the province a leg up during contract negotiations with doctors, says the former president of the Ontario Hospital Association.
The government always has one hand tied behind its back in those negotiations because the medical association advertises on behalf of doctors, suggesting they should be compensated well because they are performing an important task, Tom Closson said.
The Ontario Medical Association (OMA), which bargains on behalf of the provinces 28,600 physicians, has launched expensive advertising campaigns during past negotiations in an attempt to build public support.
If the public had more information on the way doctors are compensated, they might have a more balanced perspective in terms of giving their views to the government during negotiations, said Closson, who also previously served as president of the University Health Network and, prior to that, president of Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre.
The province is currently in contract negotiations with the OMA, and according to multiple sources the talks are limping along.
A conciliator was recently brought in after the two sides were unable to reach an agreement on their own or with a facilitators help.
What I can say is that we are pleased to have the Hon. Warren K. Winkler, former Chief Justice of Ontario, to serve as the conciliator, OMA president Dr. Ved Tandan said in an emailed statement. Justice Winkler is internationally recognized for his experience in mediation and dispute resolution, and we look forward to working with him during this phase.
Negotiations for a new Physician Services Agreement centre on establishing how much doctors should get paid for each consultation or procedure performed, a payment model known as fee-for-service.
Talks started early this year, prior to the March 31 expiration of the last agreement.
There is a media blackout on the negotiations, but sources say Dr. David Naylor, past president of the University of Toronto, was brought in as a facilitator last August. He issued confidential recommendations to each side, but was unable to bring the parties to an agreement, and they continue to dig in their heels.
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Making OHIP billings public could alter Ontarios health-care landscape
Preferred Company 12-2-14: Suzanne McMurray
Did you know home health is a cost-effective way to receive high-quality professional health care in the comfort of your own home? Call to find out more on how Preferred Home Health Care and...
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Three Big Ideas To Transform Health Care with Dr. Danielle Martin
Last spring, Dr. Danielle Martin took on a U.S. Senate committee and defended Canada #39;s health care system. While igniting pride from coast to coast, Dr. Martin also acknowledged that our health...
By: SFU Public Square
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Three Big Ideas To Transform Health Care with Dr. Danielle Martin - Video
Save West Sacramento #39;s Family Resource Centers
Yolo County Children #39;s Alliance currently operates West Sacramento #39;s Family Resource Center, which provides stronger family support services to thousands of West Sacramento residents including:...
By: Francisco Castillo
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SDSM San Diego Sexual Medicine: New Medicine to Treat Peyronies Disease
Led by internationally respected physician Dr. Irwin Goldstein, San Diego Sexual Medicine is a multidisciplinary health care facility providing compassionate, state-of-the-art, evidence based...
By: sdsexualmed
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SDSM San Diego Sexual Medicine: New Medicine to Treat Peyronies Disease - Video
You Are Not Alone Series - Health Wellness Modalities With Amy Wootton
1 Best-Selling Author April J. Ford released You Are Not Alone How To Rise Above Life #39;s Challenges With Grace, Gratitude Love Joy and dedicated the proceeds to the non-profit...
By: April J Ford
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You Are Not Alone Series - Health & Wellness Modalities With Amy Wootton - Video
Identifying opportunities to discuss multiple vaccines
The Merck Adult Vaccination Program (MAVP) recognizes pharmacists as trusted health care leaders in their communities. The program features continually updated articles, videos, educational...
By: MAVPforPharmacists
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Identifying opportunities to discuss multiple vaccines - Video
Colbert Report Obama, Colbert Report Anita Sarkeesian, Colbert Report 2014 Full Episode
Colbert Report Full Episodes, Colbert Report Tickets, Colbert Report Last Show, Colbert Report Obama, Colbert Report Schedule, Colbert Report Hulu, Colbert Report Ebola, Colbert Report Final...
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Colbert Report Obama, Colbert Report Anita Sarkeesian, Colbert Report 2014 Full Episode - Video
Throughout the health ecosystem new technologies and medical advancements enter the market every day. Yet, as Jonathan Bush, President and CEO of athenahealth commented during the 2014 Forbes Healthcare Summit, Only in health care can you increase the staff needed and slow productivity, costing more, by adding new technologies.
His point is well taken. Negative labor productivity is ultimately the underlying complaint of hospital leadership, providers and patients surrounding technology such as electronic health records (EHRs). Although more EHRs enter the market and mergers continue between health systems everyday, the need to actually connect care has sadly been lost in the debate about what software to use and how to use it.
As the President and CEO of Texas Medical Center Robert Robbins pointed out, Just like we are not going back to using pay phones and rotary phones over smart phones, the EHR will never be overtaken by file folders of the past. He contends that there are plenty of opportunities for improvement, but the progress of technology will not be undone because people do not like them, as they exist.
Jonathan Bush used that transition to equate the state of health care technology to the movie Blade Runner, in which a dystopian future involves hover cars and artificial intelligence, but the characters still use pay phones.
While no one can predict with certainty what the future of health analytics and scientific advancement look like, its clear that regression in one area as others surge forward is not an option. Just as we cannot go back to health care in the US before the ACA, the future of health will certainly not look like it does under the ACA.
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Health care workers have more than 100 times the risk of catching Ebola in Sierra Leone as the general public there does, according to a new report.
And it's not necessarily down to failed protective measures in hospitals. Health care workers form their own community, and when one gets sick or dies, he or she can infect fellow medics, the report finds.
The World Health Organization has been saying that health care workers such as doctors and nurses are at special risk of Ebola. It says 622 health-care workers have been infected and 346 of them have died in all the affected countries.
"They can ill afford to lose health care workers."
Sierra Leone already has far too few health care workers just about 2,400 for a country of 6 million people.
"They can ill afford to lose health care workers," said Dr. Peter Kilmarx of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who led an investigation into the high infection rate in Sierra Leone.
Ten physicians have died of Ebola in the current epidemic, including Dr. Martin Salia, who died after being evacuated to the University of Nebraska for emergency treatment last month.
Salia wasn't even treating Ebola patients. He was a primary care doctor at a Methodist hospital, probably infected, experts believe, when he was treating a patient for other symptoms without suspecting he or she had the virus.
It's a story that CDC experts found over and over in their investigation of health care worker deaths.
"We think of health care worker infections as a failure of personal protective equipment," Kilmarx told NBC News. "But there are so many different ways that they are exposed there."
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Editorials represent the majority opinion of The Maneater editorial board.
MU Health Care recently announced starting on Jan. 1, it will no longer hire nicotine users. While current employees will not be affected by the new policy, future applicants will be asked whether or not they use nicotine products and will be drug tested upon applying. Current employees who are nicotine users will be grandfathered in and exempt from the policy.
We recognize that this policy was founded in good intentions. When put into place, it might successfully help some members of our community begin to live a healthier lifestyle. However, we think its an unnecessary overreach into potential employees lives and sets a risky precedent for hiring practices and stipulations in the UM System.
Refusing to hire smokers could be construed as discrimination. With this policy, a qualified candidate applying to work at an MU Health Care facility could be denied a position if they used any nicotine products, including smokeless tobacco and e-cigarettes. Employees should be hired based on their ability to perform, not based on a personal decision they can legally make.
In the news release announcing the new policy, MU Health Care Chief Operating Officer Mitch Wasden is quoted saying that in order to improve the health of patients and the community, staff members at MU Health Care need to lead by example.
We think that employees in this institution can perform well in their positions without being role models in their personal lives. For example, if a doctor has received 12 or more years of medical training in order to diagnose, treat and give medical advice to patients, will their smoking habits really affect their ability to do their jobs?
If staff members are expected to lead by example at MU Health Care, then why is this policy only affecting future employees? The stated goal of this policy is to create an environment where employees can be seen as role models. By allowing existing employees to continue smoking, MU Health Care is contradicting its own goal.
Another noticeable problem with this policy is that nicotine products such as cigarettes, chew and e-cigarettes are legal in the United States and in the state of Missouri, which funds MU Health Care. Turning away employees who use these products opens the door to not allowing employees to use other legal unhealthy products. Alcohol has negative effects on individuals health, as does an unbalanced, unhealthy diet. By enforcing this nicotine-free policy, MU Health Care is blurring the lines concerning what are acceptable and unacceptable lifestyle and behavioral choices for employees.
All MU Health Care facilities have been smoke-free since 2006, according to the news release. MUs campus has been smoke-free since July 2013. Theoretically, if an employee of MU Health Care was to smoke, it would be within the privacy of their own home or car, or far away from MU facilities. If an employee wants to legally smoke, chew or vape, they should be able to. It doesnt directly affect patients or customers, thus allowing employees to still lead by example.
We think that there are better ways for MU Health Care to go about promoting healthy lifestyles among its staff. For example, as part of the its 2015 Wellness Incentive, the UM System has created an incentive program where taking part in healthy activities helps staff members gain points, and a certain number of points will lead to a raise. Focusing on these positive initiatives help promote healthy lifestyles without enforcing a problematic hiring policy.
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MU Health Cares nicotine-free policy an unnecessary overreach
Health care workers have more than 100 times the risk of catching Ebola in Sierra Leone as the general public there does, according to a new report.
And it's not necessarily down to failed protective measures in hospitals. Health care workers form their own community, and when one gets sick or dies, he or she can infect fellow medics, the report finds.
The World Health Organization has been saying that health care workers such as doctors and nurses are at special risk of Ebola. It says 622 health-care workers have been infected and 346 of them have died in all the affected countries.
"They can ill afford to lose health care workers."
Sierra Leone already has far too few health care workers just about 2,400 for a country of 6 million people.
"They can ill afford to lose health care workers," said Dr. Peter Kilmarx of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who led an investigation into the high infection rate in Sierra Leone.
Ten physicians have died of Ebola in the current epidemic, including Dr. Martin Salia, who died after being evacuated to the University of Nebraska for emergency treatment last month.
Salia wasn't even treating Ebola patients. He was a primary care doctor at a Methodist hospital, probably infected, experts believe, when he was treating a patient for other symptoms without suspecting he or she had the virus.
It's a story that CDC experts found over and over in their investigation of health care worker deaths.
"We think of health care worker infections as a failure of personal protective equipment," Kilmarx told NBC News. "But there are so many different ways that they are exposed there."
Read more:
Dr Hans Hammers discusses how kidney cancer patients can take an active role in disease management
At the Thirteenth International Kidney Cancer Symposium, Dr Hans Hammers (Johns Hopkins, MD) encourages kidney cancer patients to take an active role in health care. Currently, a strategic...
By: European Medical Journal
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Adopt Taneisha from Foster Care in Florida
Soft-spoken and kind-hearted, this future fashion designer with a dazzling smile spent some fun time with Brian Shields recently at the Orlando Science Center... It #39;s where she shared her...
By: Forever Family
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Theres good news to report on health care in America. Obamacare has increased coverage by 10 million people, spending growth has dramatically declined, and preventable hospital errors such as drug mistakes fell 17 percent from 2010 to 2013, saving 50,000 lives.In the U.S., at least, it appears possible to increase efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and access all at the same time.
The picture is less positive across much of the developing world. While the call for universal health care in every country is now the official stance of the World Health Organization, attempts to meet that goal have often seen limited returns.The overwhelming focus on quantity of care is ignoring a massive problem with quality and efficiency. Unless thats addressed, a lot of money will be spent on expanding accesswith little impact.
A World Bank review of extending universal health coverage in developing countries found that providing subsidized or free care did increase access to those services, especially by the poorest people. Such schemes also reduced recipients out-of-pocket expenses associated with health care. There were also some successes related to health outcomes. Argentinas Plan Nacer, for example, provided services to pregnant women and young children, which was associated with a 2 percentage point reduction in early newborn mortality.
Yet only five out of 18 studies of coverage roll-out found a positive impact on health indicators such as death rates or reduced sickness. In India, for example, the government has started paying mothers who deliver children in hospitals. As a result, from 2005 to 2011, the number born in a health facility more than doubled in nine Indian states. But the massive increase in institutional births had no impact on infant mortality. If anything, according to World Bank researcher Jishnu Das, the rise of hospital births is remarkably consistent with the halting of a slow decline in infant mortality. Rwanda has seen a similar phenomenon: a big rise in births with a skilled attendant with no impact on health.
Across countries, there is no relationship between overall levels of health expenditures and health outcomes at a given income per head, nor a link between health inputs such as doctors and nurses per capita and health outcomes. The number of hospital beds per person worldwide actually fell by a quarter from 1960 to 2005, even as global health massively improvedwith average planetary life expectancy climbing from 52 years to 69 years.
One reason for the gap between health inputs and health outcomes is the low quality of care. Though many health-care practitioners are hard working and honest, a lot arent. In 2003, if you turned up unannounced to a health-care facility in India and asked to see a staff member, 40 percent of staffers who were meant to be there were absent. Among doctors in rural Bangladesh in 2004, that figure was above 70 percent.
And hospital staffers are often ignorant of the right approaches or face incentives to provide the wrong treatments. A 2013 survey in Kenya found that only a little over half of doctors and nurses could diagnose at least four out of five common conditions when their major symptoms were describedmalaria with anemia, diarrhea with dehydration, pneumonia, tuberculosis, and diabetes. When it came to treatment, health providers adhered to less than 43 percent of the clinical guidelines governing management of these conditions. Public providers only followed 44 percent of the guidelines for managing maternal and newborn complications.
The lack of a relationship between the availability of health care andlife expectancy in developing countries goes beyond weaknesses in hospitals and clinics. Its also related to the fact that what kills most people in poor countries are conditions that dont require hospitals to fix. In sub-Saharan Africa, the five leading killers are malaria, HIV, lower respiratory infections, diarrhea, and malnutrition. Further and growing causes of mortality across the developing world include traffic accidents, tobacco usage, and health conditions related to being overweight. Clean water, access to and use of toilets, condoms, soap, vaccinations, and and bed nets, alongside better nutrition, tobacco controls, and road safety measures can prevent the majority of these deaths. Doctors and nurses save thousands of lives a day, but infrastructure and public health interventionsneither requiring highly trained medical staffsave many millions each year. Often, the medical system can do little more than provide palliative care when these other approaches arent used or dont work.
Doctors, nurses, and hospitals remain vital to a countrys well-being. The Ebola virus outbreak in West Africa has demonstrated that there are times when only skilled care in medical facilities can adequately protect the public. It has also shown that even in health systems that are as weakly governed, understaffed, and woefully underfunded as Liberias or Sierra Leones, many people are willing to risk their lives, day after day, to help.
But when most people are dying from conditions that can be prevented at the cost a few cents, in countries where total health expenditures can be as low as a few dollars per year per person, its folly todivert scarce resources to expanding broken health-care systems. Doing so will only mean that more people are going to die. While governments and donors should spend more money on the health needs of the worlds poorest peoplethey should also insist that money is spent efficiently, rather than on simply chasing an illusory goal of universal coverage.
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NEW YORK ( TheStreet) -- The health business in the U.S. undergoing transition thanks to the changes created by the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare.How can savvy investors capitalize? Buy into companies helping the new health care economy function.
The open enrollmentperiod for consumer buying health care coverage for next year ends on Feb. 15, meaning that companies poised for success in this market will still be attractively priced. So now is the perfect time to invest.
Must Read: 10 Stocks Carl Icahn Loves in 2014
Here'swhere the opportunities lie.
These private market places are being offered by different providers includinginsurance companies Aetna (AET) and Cigna (CI) as well as broker/consultant networks Towers Watson (TW) and AonHewitt (AON) . These players provide a marketplace for their respective network of individuals and small groups to customize their benefit packages. Many of these companies outsource the private exchange infrastructure and stock it with their own customized products, including medical plans. Technology Platforms Providing Exchange Infrastructure Technology platform companies develop the health care exchange infrastructure by providing cloud software and data analytics solutions to clients such as theinsurers listed above, brokers and consultants and also large employers looking for a custom exchange. Up to 40 million consumers will be using private health care exchanges by 2018, according to Accenture, representing tremendous growth for a market that did not exist a few years ago. To compare, three million Americans are enrolled in private health insurance exchanges for their 2014 employer benefits. That's a lot of infrastructure to develop in the next four years. Must Read: The 7 Most Important Drug-Stock Lessons From This Weekend's Blood Cancer Meeting
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3 Health Care Stock Picks That Will Profit in 2015 Thanks to Obamacare