Christina Spencer's blog

Hospitals are institutions that are vital to the human population; their standing in society is unquestionable and it is with great reliance that we live with them. But how can we bring together design and technology to administer health outside of hospitals?

The IwB, in collaboration with its commutual cohorts, presented the idea of having health care convenient to you in your very own home—the Health eHome. They explored the idea of embedding health care in the home by embracing technology, essentially giving your house the ability to “take care of you”.

In recent years, there has been an increase in the value that we have been placing on our quality and independence of life. Health care is a crucial institution in society that is helping to support our desired lifestyle.

Should you crowdsource your medical problems?

Sometime in 1995, an e-mail from China arrived in my inbox with a desperate request for medical advice. I was a naïve medical student at Johns Hopkins University and an early adopter of the modem; the e-mail's author was identified only as "Peking University." In broken English, the message described a 21-year-old woman who had felt sick to her stomach and within days lost all her hair. This problem went away, but a few months later, "She Began to facial paralysis, central muscle of eye's paralysis, self-controlled respiration disappeared," and needed to be put on a ventilator. "This is the first time that Chinese try to find help from Internet," the message explained. "Please send back e-mail to us." With immature confidence I consulted some texts and replied that maybe she had a weird form of lupus. I never heard back and figured it was a prank.

Paramedics association concerned

Manitobans from rural parts of the province coming to Winnipeg by ambulance are facing the prospect of being transported with less available paramedic care.

The province is looking into multi-patient ambulances that could transport up to four patients instead of the usual one or two.

But the number of paramedics travelling with them would remain the same as it is now: two, one driving and one tending to patients.

The prospect of having one paramedic looking after as many as four people worries the association representing emergency services providers.

"One paramedic with four patients? I am at a loss to even think that that's a good idea," said Eric Glass, chair of the Paramedic Association of Manitoba.

"I'm telling you as a paramedic, I'm not sure I want to be responsible for four people. I'm not sure how you're going to guarantee that patients are properly treated and assessed."

Research from University of Leicester identifies needs for nurse training in mental health

New research from the University of Leicester reveals that nursing staff have 'considerable difficulty' detecting depression and distress in patients.

Two new research studies led by Dr Alex Mitchell, consultant in psycho-oncology at Leicestershire Partnership Trust and honorary senior lecturer at the University of Leicester, highlight the fact that while nurses are at the front line of caring for people, they receive little training in mental health.

The researchers call for the development of short, simple methods to identify mood problems as a way of providing more targeted and appropriate treatment for patients.

Dr Mitchell, of the Department of Cancer Studies and Molecular Medicine at the University of Leicester, said: "In terms of dealing with distress and depression, nursing staff are probably the most important group of health professionals."

First large studies of EMR-integrated population care tool

(PORTLAND, Ore.) October 1, 2010— A Web-based tool that extracts information from the electronic medical record (EMR) helps primary care physicians improve care and manage their entire panel of patients. Those are the findings of two new Kaiser Permanente studies – the first to examine the effectiveness of a population care tool in a large, diverse patient population.

The first study, published today in The American Journal of Managed Care, found that the Panel Support Tool (PST), helped doctors improve care for patients with diabetes and/or heart disease. The other study, whose findings appeared in Population Health Management, found that the PST also helped doctors provide better preventive care for healthy patients.

'Coordinated, multidisciplinary' care linked to better patient outcomes

Characteristics such as patient engagement, physician communication, and staff coordination may help to explain why some dialysis centers achieve higher patient survival rates than others, according to a study appearing in an upcoming issue of the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (CJASN).

"The purpose of this study was simple: to figure out what top-performing dialysis units might be doing differently from bottom-performing units, and to translate those findings into a blueprint for action," comments Brennan M.R. Spiegel, MD, MSHS (VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System). "We identified many factors that may enhance survival in dialysis, and we hope our findings can pave the way for future quality improvement initiatives."

ANN ARBOR, Mich.---Twelve years ago, then 28-year-old graduate student Brian Zikmund-Fisher was forced into the toughest choice of his life: Die from a blood disorder within a few years or endure a bone marrow transplant that could cure him or kill him in weeks.

Zikmund-Fisher, now an assistant professor at the University of Michigan School of Public Health specializing in health communication, chose to gamble. After nine months of blood transfusions, a bone marrow match was found in Australia. Zikmund-Fisher spent another month in isolation until his new immune system began working.

"That experience taught me how to be a well-informed patient," said Zikmund-Fisher, who studies medical decision making because of his own experience. "Unfortunately, today many patients don't learn what they need to in order to make informed medical decisions."

While many young adults will share the details of their daily lives with dozens – sometimes hundreds – of friends on Facebook, communicating with their health care providers about mental illness is another story.

“Roughly one in every five young adults between 18 and 25 has a mental illness,” says Melissa Pinto-Foltz, a postdoctoral scholar and instructor at the Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing at Case Western Reserve University. “Seventy percent of them don’t receive treatment. Of those that do receive treatment, they have trouble managing the illness and often drop out of treatment early.”

Getting individuals in this age group the adequate help and services they need inspired Pinto-Foltz’s line of research that focuses on improving access to mental health services and the mental health self-management adolescents and young adults.