The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is announcing a new approach to get critical updates regarding antibiotics and antifungal drugs to health care professionals as part of an overall effort to combat antimicrobial resistance. The agency created a website that will provide direct and timely access to information about when bacterial or fungal infections are likely to respond to a specific drug.…
Doctors, materials scientists and engineers to present the latest research findings
For the fifth time in a row, representatives of international pharmaceutical companies and implementing serialization partners will meet for a two-day exchange within the framework of the Serialization Symposium. The two-day event will focus on the global guideline requirements for protection against counterfeit medicines in the legal supply chain. Established companies and experienced contact…
- Future for Health - FTR4H Pavilion presenting cutting-edge solutions driving digital and mobile healthcare. - Community Care Pavilion focusing on medical innovations for the ‘silver generation’ and home care Solutions.
Coordinating the response to heart attacks among emergency responders and hospitals reduces the time to treatment and saves lives - even on a large, regional scale, according to a study led by the Duke Clinical Research Institute with support from the American Heart Association. In the largest demonstration of the coordinated approach - 132 hospitals and 946 EMS agencies in 12 U.S. regions -…
Parasitic worm infections – or helminthiases – affect more than one billion people and have a considerable public health impact in many parts of the world. In December 2017, international experts gather in Basel, Switzerland, to discuss new strategies to control and eliminate parasitic worms. The scientific symposium is hosted by the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute. Approximately…
About 15 million Americans will have either Alzheimer’s dementia or mild cognitive impairment by 2060, up from approximately 6.08 million this year, according to a new study by researchers at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health. The findings highlight the need to develop measures that could slow the progression of the disease in people who have indications of neuropathological changes…
Breast screening in the Netherlands seems to have had a marginal effect on breast cancer mortality over the past 24 years, suggests research in The BMJ. Their findings show that screening would be associated with up to 5% reductions in breast cancer mortality in women aged 50 and over, whereas improved treatments would be associated with a 28% reduction. And they point out that overdiagnosis…
Fueled by physician staffing shortages and shifting employment patterns, temporary substitute physicians, so-called “locum tenens” physicians, become a regular sight in the medical field. But do they provide the same level of care as the doctors they are filling in for? The answer appears to be “yes,” at least when it comes to death rates in the month following treatment, according to…
The WHO European Region is the only region worldwide where the number of new HIV infections is rising. With more than 160 000 people newly diagnosed with HIV across the Region, including more than 29 000 new cases from the European Union and European Economic Area (EU/EEA), this trend continued in 2016. One reason for this worrying trend: over half (51%) of the reported HIV diagnoses happen in a…
With the growing need for hospitals to raise their competitiveness in the context of budgetary constraints, doctors and healthcare professionals are under ever increasing pressures to maximize their time and ensure each individual patient is treated as fast as possible without compromising quality of care. This is an environment where medical technology can excel.
With cancer care costs projected to increase 32% from 2010 to 2020, researchers are working to determine the main drivers of costs for treating breast cancer. Breast cancer accounted for the highest proportion (13%) of the $124.6 billion in Medicare money spent on cancer care in 2010. In a study led by Ami Vyas, PhD, MS, MBA (currently at the University of Rhode Island) and published in the…
HERCA and COCIR are pleased to announce the outcome of their collaboration on optimising Computed Tomography (CT) dose. The collaboration has set out to minimise patient radiation exposure and to improve patient care. HERCA has published a report on the outcomes of the collaboration between HERCA and COCIR and with other stakeholders. This report and all relevant information can be found on the…
It is of grave concern that there has been no public consultation on government plans to enable accountable care organisations (ACOs) to operate in England, say experts in The BMJ. ACOs were conceived in the US in an effort to improve care and reduce growing health care costs. They involve government and private insurers awarding large contracts to commercial providers to run and provide…
Among products demonstrated at Medica 2017 will be those from Dewert-Okin GmbH, which manufactures and sells single and double drives, lifting columns, control keypads and control units, products that are used for bedding, seating, medical and office application. The firm’s MEGAMAT 12 extra-quiet single drive for hospitals and nursing beds features wash-tunnel resistance on request. ‘With the…
Poor hand hygiene is a global problem. Washing hands with soap, under warm, running water is the single most important measure for preventing the spread of germs and infections.TEAL Patents – the world’s leading manufacturer of portable, hot water, hand washing units – has launched a campaign asking the world to ‘Stand up for Handwashing’ and break the myths surrounding hand gels.…
Primary care consultations last less than 5 minutes for half the world’s population, but range from 48 seconds in Bangladesh to 22.5 minutes in Sweden, reveals the largest international study of its kind, published in the online journal BMJ Open. Shorter consultation times have been linked to poorer health outcomes for patients and a heightened risk of burnout for doctors. And as demand for…
Overcrowding in healthcare systems has become a worldwide phenomenon with regional influences related to the different healthcare structures in different countries. A recent BBC analysis (February 2017) showed that overcrowding afflicted 9 out of 10 NHS hospitals this winter, with 23 declaring ‘black alerts’, as other European hospitals face similar ‘care crises’, especially member states…
The movement to Value-Based Healthcare gives no value to diagnostic processes, including Radiology. ESR aims to establish a more holistic approach to help Europe’s single-payer systems shift to a new economic model. The organisers behind Value-Based Healthcare (VBH) are gaining ground in an effort to transition public and private payers toward value-based reimbursement.To date, the…
Connected, high performance tablets enable healthcare anywhere.
Useful IT tools are abundant in today’s laboratories – ranging from software to evaluate analyses to specialist software for quality control, and middleware linking different devices. However, all these tools generate data, the adequate utilisation of which is not an easy task, said Udo Margraff, CEO of Laboratoires Réunis in Luxembourg, during our European Hospital interview. Among other…
Point-of-care diagnostics (POC) has been established for 20 years. Comprehensive smartphone coverage and ‘shareconomy’ technology are now helping to push the development from previous business models towards a point of patient model.
21st century challenges are multitudinous for all. Ageing populations, a changing disease burden; increasing obesity with associated morbidities – Type 2 diabetes, cancer and cardiovascular disease; climate change pressures and more. Any new build plan demands a low carbon footprint; respect for the environment is paramount. To capture all those elements, the plan to regenerate a previously 10…
A new study indicates that many donated organs that are discarded might be suitable for transplantation if certain steps are taken to limit damage following donation. The findings appear in an upcoming issue of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (JASN). In most cases in the United States, transplant organs come from donors following brain death, in which all the functions of the…