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First Specialist Dementia Advisors Start Work
People with dementia and their families will get more support throughout the course of the illness as the first dementia advisors started work on Wednesday.

Strategies For Lower Extremity PAD Compared
Lower extremity peripheral arterial disease (PAD) affects more than eight million Americans, with significant risks of limb loss, disability and death. Treatment of lower extremity PAD focuses on restoring normal blood supply to the affected limb. Traditional treatment, such as surgical bypass, is effective but invasive. In recent years, many patients have been treated with newer endovascular interventions, using catheter-based devices to reopen peripheral arteries in a less-invasive fashion. According to past research, it is unclear if these newer treatments are as effective as conventional surgical bypass in preventing amputation.
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Diarrhea Spreads In Parts Of Bangladesh In Cyclone Aila's Aftermath
Health officials on Sunday said that a diarrhea outbreak has spread across Bangladesh"s southwest due to the effects of Cyclone Aila, which hit parts of Bangladesh and India on May 25, AFP/Google.com reports. Diarrhea broke out at an "alarming rate" because inundation and water logging have destroyed large amounts of land and supplies of drinking water near Sundarbans, the world"s largest mangrove forest, according to health workers.
Sexual Health

Reducing Medical Residents' Hours Would Cost $2.5B Annually, Study Says

Implementing proposed reductions in the number of hours medical residents work could cost as much as $2.5 billion annually, according to a recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, the Baltimore Sun reports. The study follows an Institute of Medicine report that proposed reducing the maximum hours that residents can work without sleep from 30 to 16, increasing the number of days they must take off and improving their supervision (Desmon, Baltimore Sun, 5/21). In 2003, the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education reduced the number of hours residents at teaching hospitals could work weekly from more than 100 hours to 80 hours. In the recent study, which was partially funded by IOM, researchers examined post-2003 literature on resident work hours and patient harm and evaluated it against additional labor costs. The authors concluded that the IOM recommendations "would be costly, and their effectiveness is unknown" (Shishkin, Wall Street Journal, 5/21). Teryl Nuckols, the lead author of the study, said that teaching hospitals would most likely need to hire more residents and experienced physicians to take care of patients, which would likely cost each teaching hospital $3.2 million annually (Baltimore Sun, 5/21). The study was accompanied by an NEJM editorial in which the authors "strongly disagree" with the IOM recommendations, claiming that reducing resident work hours "leads to an increase in the number of handoffs in care, and this increase outweighs the potential benefits of reducing residents" fatigue." The accreditation council said that more research is needed before it decides whether to adopt the IOM recommendations. The council"s decision will be announced in February 2010 (Wall Street Journal, 5/21). The study is available online. The editorial also is available online. Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at http://www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. © 2009 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.


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