-
On the horizon: Video selfie blood pressure monitoring
Dorothy L. Tengler Medical & Allied HealthcareBlood pressure readings taken at home are often lower than those taken at a doctor’s office and may provide a more accurate picture of a patient’s blood pressure. However, users tend not to follow American Heart Association guidelines and device manufacturers' suggestions to take multiple measurements each time. In a recent study, Kang Lee, Ph.D., professor at the University of Toronto, and colleagues measured the blood flow of 1,328 Canadian and Chinese adults by capturing two-minute videos using an iPhone equipped with transdermal optical imaging software.
-
New research highlights potential incentives to encourage organ donation
Chelsea Adams Medical & Allied HealthcareThe donor-priority rule was developed as a potential way to encourage organ donor registrations. If a person signs up to be an organ donor, the potential donor will receive a higher priority on the transplant list if he or she ever needs an organ transplant. However, this arrangement brings about an unintended consequence. People who are at risk of needing an organ transplant are more likely to register as organ donors. And generally speaking, people who need organ transplants are sick. New research published in the journal Management Science pinpoints a potential solution.
-
How being mistreated because of learning disabilities made me push back
Amy Temple EducationIn 2006, shortly after moving to Florida, I was hired as a dog sitter for a couple who were living in the same residential community as me. They had the cutest Boston terrier with the calmest disposition I had ever seen in a dog. It was the perfect job. I could set my own hours and the pay was pretty good. However, the couple's true colors began to show shortly after. I think my learning disabilities were the reasoning behind the couple's behavior. They often talked down to me.
-
The upside of grief
Victoria Fann Mental HealthcareThe loss of a loved one is a major event in one’s life. There’s no way to prepare for it or to lessen its emotional impact. It’s one of life’s inevitable natural disasters, leaving families in varying degrees of shock, disagreements over the deceased’s possessions and myriad casualties from regrets over things said, left unsaid or undone to the daunting task of adjusting to life without this person. There’s not much good to be found at the end of someone’s life…or is there?
-
Study: Air pollution particulates can even harm unborn children
Scott E. Rupp Waste Management & EnvironmentalIt turns out that air pollution is worse on us than we may have previously known, especially for those not yet born. According to the findings of a new study, pollution can be so pervasive that it can penetrate a pregnant woman's placenta and may threaten the health of a developing fetus. The study reviewed and analyzed high-resolution images taken of placenta tissue retrieved from 28 women who had given birth at East-Limburg Hospital in Genk, Belgium.
-
Study: ED patients report less rest than hospital inpatients
Chelsea Adams Medical & Allied HealthcareA new study published in the Emergency Medicine Journal has confirmed what anyone who's ever spent time in a hospital emergency department already knows: ED patients don't rest as well as inpatients. Researchers surveyed 49 ED patients who were awaiting an inpatient bed and 44 people who had already been admitted to an inpatient unit. During the survey, patients described noise levels and rated the quality of their sleep using the Richards-Campbell Sleep Questionnaire.
-
Resistance to change in healthcare: Our fatal flaw
Keith Carlson Medical & Allied HealthcareIt’s been said that change is the only constant in the universe, and that also pertains to healthcare. Since the days of Hippocrates, Florence Nightingale, and many others, medicine and nursing have continued to morph, and those individuals and organizations willing to do so have also evolved apace. But for those who resist or fight change, becoming an irrelevant dinosaur is the likely result. Are you and your organization willing to play along?
-
Report: Many US healthcare employees receive no cybersecurity training
Scott E. Rupp Medical & Allied HealthcareThere's a healthcare data security problem in the U.S., and news reports suggest that insiders are not getting the amount of education they need to help keep hospital data safe. Per a new Kaspersky report, a massive number of the healthcare sector’s workforce does not receive the necessary training required to improve awareness of their organization’s policies, regulations, and rules. Nearly a quarter (24%) of U.S. healthcare employees have not received cybersecurity training, "but felt they should have," Health IT Security points out.
-
5 ways professional coaching can help hospital physicians
Lisa Mulcahy Healthcare AdministrationExternal coaching can be a valuable tool in helping members of your hospital’s staff navigate their tasks more effectively. You may have primarily used it to train IT or administrative workers — but did you know that outside professional coaching can help your physicians perform better, too? Here are five science-driven ways can coaching help your doctors feel and do better — and why it's well worth the economic cost.
-
Study provides new insight into the decline of older brains
Dorothy L. Tengler Mental HealthcareAs people age, their ability to perform tasks may be impaired not just because they can’t remember but because they are unable to suppress other memories that are irrelevant. A recent study showed that some older adults who had no noticeable cognitive problems had a more difficult time separating irrelevant information from what they needed to do than younger people. According to Susan Courtney, a cognitive neuroscientist at Johns Hopkins, some memory problems are more a matter of retrieving the correct information at the right time to solve the problem at hand rather than a matter of specific memory.
All Medical & Allied Healthcare Articles