RECENT NEWS

Two cutting-edge cancer treatments using targeted radioactive therapy injections to destroy cancer cells are now being offered to patients with rare neuroendocrine tumours and patients with prostate cancer at Weston Park Hospital.

Researchers from Imperial College London claim that government reforms of GP working practices in 2004 were associated with a rise in potentially avoidable emergency admissions for children.

Whether or not patients see the same GP could affect how quickly bowel and lung cancers are diagnosed, according to a Cancer Research UK study published in the British Journal of General Practice. Symptoms of lung and bowel cancer tended to be picked up more quickly if patients consulted an unknown doctor than if they saw their usual GP, the University of Bristol researchers found.

New research by the University of Westminster suggests that single-use towels are the most hygienic way to dry hands after visiting the washroom. The peer-reviewed study entitled ‘Comparison of different hand-drying methods: the potential for airborne microbe dispersal and contamination’ was published in the March 2015 edition of The Journal of Hospital Infection.

GPs need to be freed from the constraints of the ten minute consultation to help meet their patients’ needs according to a major new British Medical Association (BMA) survey.

ConvaTec has announced results from a study that found Moldable Technology skin barriers highly effective in preventing peristomal skin lesions in new ostomy patients. Peer-reviewed study results were published in the journal Ostomy Wound Management.

A Patient Safety Alert has been issued by NHS England to raise awareness of the introduction of new medical device connectors. The connectors are being introduced to prevent the danger of connecting the wrong types of medical devices together.

A new statutory duty of candour, which was introduced last year for NHS bodies in England following the Mid Staffordshire public inquiry, will now apply from April to all other healthcare providers registered with the Care Quality Commission. This new statutory obligation requires organisations to disclose information where they believe poor care has resulted in death or harm to a patient.

A large pilot study of a new bowel cancer screening test has demonstrated a major increase in participation rates across population groups. The new data was presented by Bowel Cancer Screening Hubs and Queen Mary University of London at Cancer Research UK’s early diagnosis conference, which took place in London, in March 2015.

As countries marked World Tuberculosis Day, WHO called for “global solidarity and action” to support a new 20-year strategy aimed at ending the global tuberculosis epidemic.

Drive Medical Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Drive Medical and a global manufacturer and distributor of durable medical equipment, has announced the acquisition of Park House Healthcare, a leading supplier of specialist pressure area care equipment, hospital and community beds, and service and maintenance provisions.

According to research carried out by University Medical Center Utrecht, patients with pneumonia can initially be treated with most common antibiotics, as they are just as effective as the more expensive alternatives. The fact that bacteria are less likely to become resistant to these beta-lactam antibiotics is an additional benefit.

The Health Foundation has published a report which underlines the challenges facing NHS finances. The report Hospital finances and productivity: in a critical condition?concludes that financial performance of NHS providers in England has deteriorated sharply since 2013, from a net surplus of £582m in 2012/13 to a net deficit of £108m in 2013/14. At the end of the third quarter of 2014/15 the deficit had grown to £789m. Other key findings included:

Details have been announced of the ‘Completing the Picture’ 2015 symposium, an educational event for biomedical engineering and clinical procurement specialists.

A leading dementia expert has called for greater attention to be paid to vascular health. At the Alzheimer’s Research UK Conference 2015, Professor James Nicoll, professor of neuropathology at the University of Southampton, highlighted evidence linking vascular disease and dementia, outlining a number of common risk factors including high blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol, inflammation and obesity.

A report from the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) claims that staff health and wellbeing in the NHS is ‘too often seen as an optional extra’ and highlights the fact that less than two thirds of Trusts (65%) have a staff health and wellbeing plan in place.

GAMA Healthcare has announced a new clinical research and education department. Heading up this new division will be a new clinical director, Martin Kiernan, who joined GAMA on 1 April 2015. Martin has worked in the field of infection prevention and control (IPC) for 25 years, most recently as former nurse consultant in infection prevention at Southport and Ormskirk NHS Trust in the North-West of England.

The coalition government will leave office with health services under significant strain and a real risk that patient care will suffer as the NHS heads towards a deficit, according to a major assessment of the NHS under the coalition published by The King’s Fund.

The Health and Social Care (Safety and Quality) Act 2015, which aims to improve safety and quality of care, has received Royal Assent. Among the measures introduced by the act is a duty on health and adult social care providers to share information about a person’s care with other health and care professionals. This means that doctors and other professionals providing a person’s care and treatment will have the information they need so they can treat patients more effectively.

A UK company working with hospitals to prevent thousands of deaths by predicting and preventing acute kidney injury (AKI) has won a national Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) competition to scale its technology across the health service.