http://www.infectioncontroltoday.com/hotnews/monitoring-hand-hygiene-compliance.html
“We know that a range of pathogens are spread from healthcare workers to patients by direct touch and that the current rates of hand hygiene compliance are suboptimal,” said Philip Polgreen, MD, University of Iowa Health Care. “Our new low-cost method of monitoring could potentially reduce cost while increasing compliance rates.” The failure of healthcare workers to perform appropriate hand hygiene is one of the leading preventable causes of healthcare-associated infections.
Read about how this may change our future-
Friday, April 3, 2009
Bacteria Meningitis in Ohio
Meningitis case at OSU raises issue of vaccines
Shots not required of Ohio resident students
Wednesday, April 1, 2009 3:18 AM
By Encarnacion Pyle
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Ohio colleges since July 2005 have had to keep records of whether students living in residence halls have been vaccinated against meningitis and hepatitis B.
But the focus has been more on telling students where to find information about the illnesses rather than determining whether the campaign is working.
Some people would like the state to require that every student living at an Ohio college be vaccinated.
"I can't emphasize enough the importance of getting a vaccination for meningococcal, which is so deadly and can spread so rapidly," said Dr. Mysheika LeMaile-Williams, the medical director at Columbus Public Health.
An Ohio State University student is the most recent of 17 bacterial-meningitis cases in the state this year. Ohio State announced yesterday that the illness was diagnosed in the female student Monday morning. She was taken to the OSU Medical Center.
This is the first case of the contagious illness on the campus this year.
OSU spokesman Jim Lynch would not identify the student but said she is a resident of Patterson Hall.
He said people who had direct contact with the student have been notified so they can get a preventive antibiotic. Ohio State's spring break was last week, and the student was hospitalized before she attended classes Monday, Lynch said. People who were around her in Lorain County, where she spent spring break, also were notified.
Two Ohio University freshmen, including the son of Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien, also contracted bacterial meningitis this year.
Bacterial meningitis infects the fluid surrounding the brain and spinal cord and can be fatal if it goes undetected and is not treated early. It is passed from person to person through saliva.
About 2,600 people in the United States catch bacterial meningitis each year. It can destroy organs and tissue within hours, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC has recommended that children as young as 11 be vaccinated.
Common symptoms are a high fever, headache and stiff neck. Other symptoms are confusion, nausea, a rash, sleepiness, vomiting and discomfort in bright light.
Ohio recorded about 40 cases of bacterial meningitis last year, according to the state Department of Health.
The state's colleges are required to ask students whether they have been vaccinated against meningitis and hepatitis B, a virus that affects the liver and is spread through contact with blood or other bodily fluids. But several schools said they use the records only when a student falls ill because the information is often incorrect or outdated.
About 5,000 students at Ohio State and 4,000 at OU have indicated that they have been vaccinated against bacterial meningitis, officials said.
Sen. Gary Cates, a West Chester Republican, has introduced a bill that would require all students living at an Ohio public university to be vaccinated, an effort that has failed in the past.
"It's a first step to better protecting our students," said Cates' legislative assistant, Sarah Spence.
epyle@dispatch.com
Shots not required of Ohio resident students
Wednesday, April 1, 2009 3:18 AM
By Encarnacion Pyle
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Ohio colleges since July 2005 have had to keep records of whether students living in residence halls have been vaccinated against meningitis and hepatitis B.
But the focus has been more on telling students where to find information about the illnesses rather than determining whether the campaign is working.
Some people would like the state to require that every student living at an Ohio college be vaccinated.
"I can't emphasize enough the importance of getting a vaccination for meningococcal, which is so deadly and can spread so rapidly," said Dr. Mysheika LeMaile-Williams, the medical director at Columbus Public Health.
An Ohio State University student is the most recent of 17 bacterial-meningitis cases in the state this year. Ohio State announced yesterday that the illness was diagnosed in the female student Monday morning. She was taken to the OSU Medical Center.
This is the first case of the contagious illness on the campus this year.
OSU spokesman Jim Lynch would not identify the student but said she is a resident of Patterson Hall.
He said people who had direct contact with the student have been notified so they can get a preventive antibiotic. Ohio State's spring break was last week, and the student was hospitalized before she attended classes Monday, Lynch said. People who were around her in Lorain County, where she spent spring break, also were notified.
Two Ohio University freshmen, including the son of Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O'Brien, also contracted bacterial meningitis this year.
Bacterial meningitis infects the fluid surrounding the brain and spinal cord and can be fatal if it goes undetected and is not treated early. It is passed from person to person through saliva.
About 2,600 people in the United States catch bacterial meningitis each year. It can destroy organs and tissue within hours, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The CDC has recommended that children as young as 11 be vaccinated.
Common symptoms are a high fever, headache and stiff neck. Other symptoms are confusion, nausea, a rash, sleepiness, vomiting and discomfort in bright light.
Ohio recorded about 40 cases of bacterial meningitis last year, according to the state Department of Health.
The state's colleges are required to ask students whether they have been vaccinated against meningitis and hepatitis B, a virus that affects the liver and is spread through contact with blood or other bodily fluids. But several schools said they use the records only when a student falls ill because the information is often incorrect or outdated.
About 5,000 students at Ohio State and 4,000 at OU have indicated that they have been vaccinated against bacterial meningitis, officials said.
Sen. Gary Cates, a West Chester Republican, has introduced a bill that would require all students living at an Ohio public university to be vaccinated, an effort that has failed in the past.
"It's a first step to better protecting our students," said Cates' legislative assistant, Sarah Spence.
epyle@dispatch.com
Drug Overdoses in Ohio - In loving memory of my Sister Gidgett Burns
Drug overdoses kill more Ohioans than car wrecks
Thursday, April 2, 2009 2:17 PM
By Alan Johnson
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
A new killer has quietly replaced traffic crashes as the No. 1 cause of accidental death in Ohio.
Unintentional poisoning deaths - nearly all of them drug overdoses - eclipsed traffic fatalities in both 2006 and 2007, the Ohio Department of Health reported. Numbers have not been released for last year.
Overdose deaths shot up 249 percent between 1999 and 2007. An average of three people now die each day in Ohio of drug overdoses.
The state agency calls it an epidemic.
In addition, heroin and synthetic opiates such as OxyContin have now replaced cocaine as the second-tier "drug of choice" among those seeking rehabilitation, treatment agencies are reporting. They rank behind only alcohol.
Officials gathered at a Statehouse news conference today said they are alarmed by both trends, given the backdrop of state budget cutbacks for drug-, alcohol- and mental-health treatment programs.
"We have a serious problem with opiate addiction," said Joe Trolian, executive director of the Mental Health and Recovery Services Board of Richland County.
"This is not just down-and-out people from the wrong side of town. This is high-school students that died in the family recreation room, athletes who thought they could take just one more pill, older adults who mix drugs and alcohol."
Cheri L. Walter, chief executive officer of the Ohio Association of County Behavioral Health Authorities, said that as funding evaporates, only those patients who qualify for Medicaid are certain to be served.
"Many Ohio counties have no funds left over to provide services to middle- or lower-income families who have minimal or no health-care benefits."
The Ohio Department of Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services has $38 million in state money, twice as much as when it was created 20 years ago. However, it is treating 100,000 people instead of 40,000.
Health officials said opiates are "largely responsible for this alarming increase in drug-poisoning death rates." There is a direct relationship between increasing sales of prescription opiates and drug overdoses, they concluded.
Franklin County reported 61 deaths by prescription narcotics in 2007, the most among Ohio's 88 counties.
The drugs involved include methadone, oxycodone (OxyContin), hydrocodone (Vicodin) and morphine. Sedatives such as Valium, tranquilizers, anti-depressants and sleeping pills also are often abused, the agency said.
Costs associated with fatal drug overdoses, including medical, work and quality-of-life losses, add up to an estimated $3.6 billion a year in Ohio, the Health Department found. An additional $35.5 million in expenses resulted from nonfatal overdoses.
Paul Coleman, president of Maryhaven, a Columbus alcohol- and drug-treatment center, said a study done for the agency last year found that each $1 spent on treatment saved more than $11 in costs related to crime and medical expenses.
ajohnson@dispatch.com
Thursday, April 2, 2009 2:17 PM
By Alan Johnson
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
A new killer has quietly replaced traffic crashes as the No. 1 cause of accidental death in Ohio.
Unintentional poisoning deaths - nearly all of them drug overdoses - eclipsed traffic fatalities in both 2006 and 2007, the Ohio Department of Health reported. Numbers have not been released for last year.
Overdose deaths shot up 249 percent between 1999 and 2007. An average of three people now die each day in Ohio of drug overdoses.
The state agency calls it an epidemic.
In addition, heroin and synthetic opiates such as OxyContin have now replaced cocaine as the second-tier "drug of choice" among those seeking rehabilitation, treatment agencies are reporting. They rank behind only alcohol.
Officials gathered at a Statehouse news conference today said they are alarmed by both trends, given the backdrop of state budget cutbacks for drug-, alcohol- and mental-health treatment programs.
"We have a serious problem with opiate addiction," said Joe Trolian, executive director of the Mental Health and Recovery Services Board of Richland County.
"This is not just down-and-out people from the wrong side of town. This is high-school students that died in the family recreation room, athletes who thought they could take just one more pill, older adults who mix drugs and alcohol."
Cheri L. Walter, chief executive officer of the Ohio Association of County Behavioral Health Authorities, said that as funding evaporates, only those patients who qualify for Medicaid are certain to be served.
"Many Ohio counties have no funds left over to provide services to middle- or lower-income families who have minimal or no health-care benefits."
The Ohio Department of Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services has $38 million in state money, twice as much as when it was created 20 years ago. However, it is treating 100,000 people instead of 40,000.
Health officials said opiates are "largely responsible for this alarming increase in drug-poisoning death rates." There is a direct relationship between increasing sales of prescription opiates and drug overdoses, they concluded.
Franklin County reported 61 deaths by prescription narcotics in 2007, the most among Ohio's 88 counties.
The drugs involved include methadone, oxycodone (OxyContin), hydrocodone (Vicodin) and morphine. Sedatives such as Valium, tranquilizers, anti-depressants and sleeping pills also are often abused, the agency said.
Costs associated with fatal drug overdoses, including medical, work and quality-of-life losses, add up to an estimated $3.6 billion a year in Ohio, the Health Department found. An additional $35.5 million in expenses resulted from nonfatal overdoses.
Paul Coleman, president of Maryhaven, a Columbus alcohol- and drug-treatment center, said a study done for the agency last year found that each $1 spent on treatment saved more than $11 in costs related to crime and medical expenses.
ajohnson@dispatch.com
Monday, March 23, 2009
Infection hits close to home..Necrotizing fasciitis
Please keep this young man and his family in your prayers.
COLUMBUS, Ohio — An Upper Arlington high school senior remained in critical condition on Monday after he contracted a rare infection.
Blake Haxton lost both his legs to a flesh-eating bacteria, 10TV's Tino Ramos reported.
Haxton, 18, was coaching basketball in a recreation league tournament last week when he complained about pain in his lower leg. Within a short period, doctors found what appeared to be necrotizing fasciitis, a rare infection that spreads underneath the skin, Ramos reported.
Doctors had no choice but to amputate both legs.
Haxton, described by his coaches as one of the best high school rowers in the state, is recovering at The Ohio State University Medical Center.
"He is truly a model student," said Upper Arlington principal Kip Greenhill. "He's an excellent person, an excellent citizen in the school. He's very involved in school, a top academic student. You can't say enough good things about this boy."
According to Greenhill, Haxton's friends have been flooding into the hospital to wish him well.
Dr. Susan Koletar at The Ohio State University Medical Center said experts are not completely sure why people contract necrotizing fasciitis, 10TV's Lindsey Seavert reported.
"There is probably some immune defect that makes people more susceptible," Koletar said.
There was no word about how Haxton might have contracted the infection but 10TV News was told he was making progress.
On late Monday afternoon doctors said they were cautiously optimistic after Haxton's heart started to beat on its own and he was removed from life support, Seavert reported.
Watch 10TV News and refresh 10TV.com for additional information.
COLUMBUS, Ohio — An Upper Arlington high school senior remained in critical condition on Monday after he contracted a rare infection.
Blake Haxton lost both his legs to a flesh-eating bacteria, 10TV's Tino Ramos reported.
Haxton, 18, was coaching basketball in a recreation league tournament last week when he complained about pain in his lower leg. Within a short period, doctors found what appeared to be necrotizing fasciitis, a rare infection that spreads underneath the skin, Ramos reported.
Doctors had no choice but to amputate both legs.
Haxton, described by his coaches as one of the best high school rowers in the state, is recovering at The Ohio State University Medical Center.
"He is truly a model student," said Upper Arlington principal Kip Greenhill. "He's an excellent person, an excellent citizen in the school. He's very involved in school, a top academic student. You can't say enough good things about this boy."
According to Greenhill, Haxton's friends have been flooding into the hospital to wish him well.
Dr. Susan Koletar at The Ohio State University Medical Center said experts are not completely sure why people contract necrotizing fasciitis, 10TV's Lindsey Seavert reported.
"There is probably some immune defect that makes people more susceptible," Koletar said.
There was no word about how Haxton might have contracted the infection but 10TV News was told he was making progress.
On late Monday afternoon doctors said they were cautiously optimistic after Haxton's heart started to beat on its own and he was removed from life support, Seavert reported.
Watch 10TV News and refresh 10TV.com for additional information.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Will Congress Listen - What is the American Standard???
I am fed up the "American Standard" Listen UP!
Hospitals are not cleaning to the Standard -Who decides if the hospital is clean?????
Well in my state and most their is NO governing authority to make them report other than
by survey methods. Well listen up the public needs to do a better job reporting by survey, writing, email & telephone calls.
Standards don't specify how rooms should be cleaned or what bacterial levels are unacceptable.
So how is the world are they going to measure "Infection Rates" ???
I believe from my personal experience - I expect a CLEAN, STERILE Room during my stay at the hospital to be VITAL part of my patient care. Its NOT everyone standard of care.
Its just NOT acceptable to me -What do you think????
The CDC claims that 1.7 million people contract infections in U.S. hospitals each year.
Together we can make a difference!
Hospitals are not cleaning to the Standard -Who decides if the hospital is clean?????
Well in my state and most their is NO governing authority to make them report other than
by survey methods. Well listen up the public needs to do a better job reporting by survey, writing, email & telephone calls.
Standards don't specify how rooms should be cleaned or what bacterial levels are unacceptable.
So how is the world are they going to measure "Infection Rates" ???
I believe from my personal experience - I expect a CLEAN, STERILE Room during my stay at the hospital to be VITAL part of my patient care. Its NOT everyone standard of care.
Its just NOT acceptable to me -What do you think????
The CDC claims that 1.7 million people contract infections in U.S. hospitals each year.
Together we can make a difference!
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
How much are you WORTH.......Health care for PROFIT!
This week, the new administration convenes a national summit about our nation's long overdue investment in health care -- an investment that will lead to new jobs, new industries, and a renewed ability to compete with the rest of the world.
Because we've let a broken system founder, we each spend more than ever for health coverage, and get less for it. While giant health insurance companies pay their CEOs huge bonuses and rake in fat profits -- about $13 billion last year -- we get nickel-and-dimed for every treatment. Small businesses struggle to survive.
If we keep letting the big insurance companies run the show, our health care system will remain, like Wall Street, broke and unreliable.
Tell your lawmakers to come together now and make the long overdue investment in affordable health choices.
This week's summit is a bipartisan first step towards fixing our economy by fixing our health care system. Join millions of other Americans today -- part of a national coordinated action -- to tell Congress to give us relief from unaffordable health care costs and unreliable insurance coverage.
As unemployment hits new highs, each layoff from those companies that offer insurance means another family without coverage. Small businesses which create two thirds of all new jobs are getting hammered by health care costs, further dragging down our economy. And the millions of Americans who work hard and still have insurance end up paying more for care because others can’t afford to pay at all.
Tell Congress to get our economy moving by taking the worry out of health coverage.
If we want to put people before profit in these hard times, then we need new health care options, and we need to ask for it right now. Your voice, joined by millions of others TODAY, can let our leaders know we won’t stand by any longer while the big insurance companies dictate our health care and costs. So HOW MUCH ARE YOU WORTH? Please take action.....
Because we've let a broken system founder, we each spend more than ever for health coverage, and get less for it. While giant health insurance companies pay their CEOs huge bonuses and rake in fat profits -- about $13 billion last year -- we get nickel-and-dimed for every treatment. Small businesses struggle to survive.
If we keep letting the big insurance companies run the show, our health care system will remain, like Wall Street, broke and unreliable.
Tell your lawmakers to come together now and make the long overdue investment in affordable health choices.
This week's summit is a bipartisan first step towards fixing our economy by fixing our health care system. Join millions of other Americans today -- part of a national coordinated action -- to tell Congress to give us relief from unaffordable health care costs and unreliable insurance coverage.
As unemployment hits new highs, each layoff from those companies that offer insurance means another family without coverage. Small businesses which create two thirds of all new jobs are getting hammered by health care costs, further dragging down our economy. And the millions of Americans who work hard and still have insurance end up paying more for care because others can’t afford to pay at all.
Tell Congress to get our economy moving by taking the worry out of health coverage.
If we want to put people before profit in these hard times, then we need new health care options, and we need to ask for it right now. Your voice, joined by millions of others TODAY, can let our leaders know we won’t stand by any longer while the big insurance companies dictate our health care and costs. So HOW MUCH ARE YOU WORTH? Please take action.....
Monday, March 2, 2009
My new BFF Gov. Kathleen Sebelius going to the White House
AP – President Barack Obama introduces Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius as his nominee for Health and Human Services ...
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's choice to lead the Health and Human Services Department has a history of bucking the insurance industry, which faces the biggest hit under Obama's initial health care reform plan.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/09/03/02/Sebelius-at-HHS/
****Governor Sebelius is going to be the woman to watch & make monumental changes in policy & government in 2009 upon her confirmation. I am very excited to see her in action.
Just my personal prediction to influence health care and close the gap on insurance for the nation. I told you so. Best wishes, Kacia Warren
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama's choice to lead the Health and Human Services Department has a history of bucking the insurance industry, which faces the biggest hit under Obama's initial health care reform plan.
Visit the white house blog -
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/09/03/02/Sebelius-at-HHS/
****Governor Sebelius is going to be the woman to watch & make monumental changes in policy & government in 2009 upon her confirmation. I am very excited to see her in action.
Just my personal prediction to influence health care and close the gap on insurance for the nation. I told you so. Best wishes, Kacia Warren
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