Skin Storyteller Niki talks about the role health care professionals played in her recovery – Video


Skin Storyteller Niki talks about the role health care professionals played in her recovery
Niki has experienced a 4 inch scar to her face in addition to a double mastectomy and breast reconstruction. She shares her insight on living with scars and the advice she received from health...

By: BioOilUK

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Skin Storyteller Niki talks about the role health care professionals played in her recovery - Video

Health care sales drive 3M income up in Q3

Updated 4 p.m.

Strong sales growth in its health care sector helped 3M boost third quarter net income 6 percent to $1.3 billion. Revenue reached $8.1 billion.

3M's health care segment had the greatest sales growth in the quarter, with developing markets providing a big boost.

"Many emerging economies are beginning to spend more on health care and a lot of wound care and disposable items that 3M manufactures are being consumed to a greater degree," said Matt Arnold, an analyst with the investment firm Edward Jones.

3M says it has made substantial investments to bolster its health care businesses in China, Germany, Poland, Thailand, India, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Last week, the company announced a $58 million expansion in the U.S. to meet growing demand for medical tapes, dressings, surgical drapes and other wound care products.

Overall, 3M's sales increased 6 percent in the U.S. and 4 percent in Asia. But sales fell in Europe, Latin America and other markets.

About two-thirds of 3M's sales are outside the U.S. The company's products are used across the housing, electronics, automotive, aviation and many other industries. 3M's products range from sandpaper and orthodontics to bandages and films that make TV screens brighter.

All that makes 3M's results a closely-watched economic indicator.

"3M is definitely viewed as a bellwether of the economy and if you look at the quarter, the United States did very well," said Arnold. "Latin American and Europe softened a bit, especially Europe."

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Health care sales drive 3M income up in Q3

U.S. Ranks Last Among Wealthy Nations in Access to Health Care

By Alan Mozes HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, Oct. 22, 2014 (HealthDay News) -- The U.S. health care system ranks dead last compared to other industrialized nations when it comes to affordability and patient access, according to a new survey.

The 2013 survey of the American health care landscape was conducted by the Commonwealth Fund just prior to the full implementation of the Obama administration's Affordable Care Act (ACA).

"I would say that we found two things that really seem to drive the higher barriers to health care in the U.S.," said David Squires, a senior researcher with the Commonwealth Fund in New York City.

"The first is that we have a huge uninsured population, which at least at the time of the survey was about 50 million people. And, the second is that we have millions more who have some kind of insurance, but the coverage isn't really good enough to protect them fully if they actually become ill," explained Squires.

"And these two issues don't really exist in any of the other countries we looked at. They all have universal health insurance," he noted. "So everyone has access and the insurance they have is generally much more protective. It covers more costs and either has no co-pays or relatively modest co-pays. And there's a ceiling on what a patient would have to pay in any one year, if anything," Squires said.

"That's a huge difference from the American experience. In addition, the U.S. is just a much more expensive health care system. We spend about $9,000 per person a year. That compares, for example, with just $3,000 a year in the U.K., and is overall about 50 to 200 percent more than is spent on our peers in other Western nations. So even if an American has insurance it's still in the context of an extremely expensive situation," Squires added.

The new survey is the subject of a perspective analysis, written by Karen Davis and Jeromie Ballreich of Johns Hopkins, and published in the Oct. 23 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

The survey included Canada, Australia, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Of these, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland ranked highest in terms of access to care irrespective of personal wealth, the researchers found.

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U.S. Ranks Last Among Wealthy Nations in Access to Health Care

Health care open enrollment season: Consumer Reports tips

LOS ANGELES (KABC) --

Consumer Reports has just released its analysis of more than 1,000 health care plans, and offers some important questions to consider before you choose.

Consumer Reports experts say even though health insurance is tricky, don't just renew the plan you have.

"There are some basic things that everyone needs to look at no matter how you get your insurance. One is, What are the cost-sharing provisions of the plan? The deductibles? The co-pays?" said Nancy Metcalf, Consumer Reports.

And be sure to check the annual out-of-pocket limit. It's the most you'd have to pay in a year.

Also, check out which doctors and hospitals are in your plan. Choosing a smaller or narrow network can save money.

"However, if you have an ongoing relationship with providers who aren't in the plan, it might not be for you," said Metcalf.

And if you take prescription drugs regularly, especially costly ones, study the plan's formulary (a list of preferred drugs) to make sure yours are covered.

Consumer Reports has analyzed more than a thousand private, Medicare and Medicaid health insurance plans ranked by the NCQA, a nonprofit quality measurement and accreditation organization.

"Our rankings look at overall quality, customer service, how well the plans deal with common conditions like asthma or diabetes," said Metcalf.

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Health care open enrollment season: Consumer Reports tips

McHenry County Board rejection of health care grant sparks concern, anger

WOODSTOCK Local health officials warn a decision by the McHenry County Board to reject a state grant to pay for counselors to help insure people under the Affordable Care Act will hurt county residents in need.

While the County Board voted last year to accept the Illinois Department of Public Health grant, it voted Tuesday against doing so again, and turned down $584,791 to pay for a counselor and several social service agencies to help enroll people through the state health care exchange. The 10-10 vote on which the proposal died was far below the 16 votes needed to pass because part of the grant would fall under the present county fiscal year ending Nov. 30.

Tuesdays vote means the Department of Health will have to return the funding, which will be allocated elsewhere in Illinois, county Public Health Administrator Michael Hill said. While Hill expressed disappointment in the boards decision, others expressed shock and anger.

The decision stunned Suzanne Hoban, executive director of Family Health Partnership Clinic, which since 1996 has worked to provide health care access to those who could not otherwise afford it. The agency, now located in Crystal Lake, serves about 3,000 people a year and is one of the agencies for which counselor funding would be disbursed under the rejected grant.

For us and for the people we serve, this is a huge blow. Our clinic takes care of people with no access to health care at all. Our goal is to see how many people we can get out of our clinic and into private practice [through acquiring insurance], because our resources are stretched to the limit, Hoban said.

Most of the grant funding, which requires no local match, would go to the local agencies to allow them to hire staff to aid in enrollment, and would pay for about five full-time-equivalent employees at the health department until the grant period expires April 15.

The County Board vote came after a brief discussion during which Diane Evertsen, R-Harvard, and Ersel Schuster, R-Woodstock, spoke against taking the grant money, and Nick Chirikos, D-Algonquin, spoke in favor.

This funding for the Affordable Care the Non-Affordable Care Act is another half a million dollars plus to try and make something work that is an admitted failure, Evertsen said.

Finance and Audit Committee Chairwoman Mary McCann, R-Woodstock, called Tuesdays vote a protest against Obamacare that will only hurt the uninsured. She said she has referenced numerous seniors, who are not Internet-savvy on top of the complicated enrollment process, to seek the help the grant funded.

This is crazy. Were penalizing the public were supposed to be serving, McCann said.

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McHenry County Board rejection of health care grant sparks concern, anger

Africa needs health care that works

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Editor's note: Mandy Moore is a singer-songwriter, actress, and an ambassador for Population Services International. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the writer.

(CNN) -- I've just returned from a visit to Tanzania with the global health and development organization Population Services International to better understand the challenges facing health workers in the developing world. The outbreak of Ebola only underscores the dire need for trained health workers -- a global shortage of nearly 7.2 million health workers, according to the World Health Organization.

About half of the spending on health care in Africa goes to private providers and care can be unregulated and quality inconsistent. During my week on the ground, however, I met PSI community health workers, nurses, doctors and business owners who deliver controlled and quality health care across Tanzania.

Mandy Moore

PSI has ensured quality care by applying proven commercial franchising strategies -- think McDonalds or Subway -- to health care. PSI operates a franchise network that spans 31 countries and serves 10 million people every year. In Tanzania, the franchise is called Familia.

Lucy, a Familia community health worker, goes out into the community every day and educates women about family planning and other health issues. Lucy then refers these women back to the neighborhood Familia clinic located right in the village she serves.

I joined Lucy for a session she organized at a modest apartment building with a few rooms separated by concrete walls and colorful fabric curtains. When I climbed the stairs to the front porch, about a dozen women with babies who were seated on straw mats greeted me. Lucy began to talk with them about their contraception options, and they had lots of questions for her. The most vocal was a gregarious woman named Sophia.

Sophia had used condoms and pills to space her births, but when Familia began offering longer-term methods like implants, she switched. The implant prevents pregnancy for up to three years, and she shared with us how it was a great weight off her shoulders. She told the group that she wanted to be able to plan her family size, so she and her husband could save for the future. Lucy reiterated that for women like Sophia, access to family planning is a key to health and economic stability.

According to a report by the United Nations Population Fund and Guttmacher Institute, returns on investment in contraception can be recouped four times or more by reducing the need for public spending on social services. This is something Lucy knows well -- before she ended the session, she gave out vouchers to our new friends for a consultation at their local Familia clinic.

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Africa needs health care that works

MPs to vote 'soon' on new gene therapy – pioneered by Newcastle University team

MPs will vote soon on a new gene therapy to stop incurable diseases passing to babies ending fears the Government is ducking the controversy.

The health minister threw her weight behind a DNA-altering procedure pioneered by a team at Newcastle University, saying: This is something I want to take forward.

Jane Ellison told a parliamentary inquiry: I am now actively seeking cross-Government approval for parliamentary time in this session to bring regulations before the House.

Im extremely conscious that there are real families waiting on progress on this work. We need to keep up the momentum.

The comments are a huge boost to the Newcastle team, which has called for legislation as soon as possible, because of the number of patients waiting for treatment.

Also appearing before the Commons science select committee, the teams Professor Doug Turnbull said the worst-affected babies died within 24 or 48 hours.

He said most diseases develop in childhood, or adolescence, adding: We can do a lot to help with epilepsy and diabetes, but there is no cure.

And, on the gene therapy, This sort of approach to try to present a transmission of these sorts of diseases - would be really important.

The treatment involves replacing faulty mitochondria responsible for inherited diseases, including muscle wasting, heart problems, vision loss, organ failure and epilepsy.

Embryos are given healthy DNA from donor eggs, meaning a baby has the DNA of three people from two parents, plus less than one per cent from the donor.

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MPs to vote 'soon' on new gene therapy - pioneered by Newcastle University team

Futurist Jack Uldrich Set to "Ignite Some Fires" in Chicago at ABB/Thomas & Betts New Product Launch

Chicago, IL (PRWEB) October 24, 2014

"Seeing the future is easier if you take off blinders in the present," says Jim Montague of the Emerson Community Site. What he's referring to is a keynote speech delivered by futurist Jack Uldrich to the Emerson Global Community Exchange on October 7th. Uldrich, a world renowned futurist and trend expert, will also be helping ABB/Thomas & Betts take the blinders off when he delivers his keynote, "Breakthrough: Ten Trends Transforming Tomorrow" at their new product launch in Chicago on October 27th.

Montague goes on to discuss Uldrich's approach to future-proofing businesses: "Many potential and upcoming innovations are already foreseeable given today's capabilities and tools. What's needed to reveal them is awareness and the humility to give up stuck-in-a-rut thinking patterns that stifle useful questions and possibilities. Then, the will to action can turn these desired futures into new realities...easier said than done, of course, but futurist Jack Uldrich lit some sparks in his keynote address to Emerson Global Users Exchange delegates."

When it comes to future-proofing, lighting sparks and igniting fires is what Uldrich has made a career of, and he loves doing it. "The futurist's job is to focus on the big picture, and point out the 800-pound gorillas that others are missing because their attention is focused elsewhere," said Uldrich. "I want to help future-proof as many businesses as I can against all the changes that are coming tomorrow. Business models are changing quickly, while others are fading away, so it's important to be aware of changes these companies might not be able to see."

Uldrich spends a lot of time researching and 'seeing' what those changes may be--he then writes on those trends (he is the author of over 11 books,) his most recent of book is Foresight 20/20. And following his research, he crosses the globe speaking on emerging trends in health care, education, agriculture, energy and utilities, just to name a few.

His keynotes are thought provoking, motivating and incredibly easy to digest and relate to; he is anticipating a great turn out in Chicago for the ABB/Thomas & Betts Emax 2 product launch there and he will be rounding the month off with another product launch for them in New York City.

Parties interested in learning more about Uldrich, his writing or speaking availability are encouraged to go to his website. Media wishing to interview him, or know more about the event can contact Amy Tomczyk at (612) 343-0060.

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Futurist Jack Uldrich Set to "Ignite Some Fires" in Chicago at ABB/Thomas & Betts New Product Launch