By Cheri
During Dr. Don Wright’s update on the HHS Action Plan to reduce the rates of hospital-acquired infections (HAIs) in the country at APIC 2009, he noted that before the problem can be fixed there were vast gaps in HAI knowledge. Some of the problems he brought up were:
- Patient Tracking: Many patients leave the hospital to reside in long term care or proceed with out patient treatments. If an infection develops as a result of a procedure/medical device that is implanted for these on going therapies, it is never tracked back to the hospital to be included in their HAI rates.
- Measurement: Hospitals report on infections in different ways. Catheter related blood stream infections, for example, can be reported on by the number of infections that occur over the number of days (infections/catheter days) or by the number of infections per catheters inserted (infections/catheters inserted). This makes it difficult to compare rates across hospitals.
- Infrastructure: The way the infrastructure is currently set up, information reported or plugged into one government system, cannot be easily formatted/extrapolated for another report.
There are certainly steps that need to be taken to help reduce rates of HAIs but it sounds like HHS has developed a comprehensive plan, taking into account the current system’s short comings, to find a solution.
June 10th, 2009
By Cheri
DiagnosisPR has made the trek to sweltering Fort Lauderdale to report on the latest trends in the broad field of infection control from the Association of Professionals in Infection Control and Epidemiology (APIC) Annual Conference. This year’s show was kicked-off by an inspiring keynote presentation from Benjamin S. Carson, MD of Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions about turning challenges into triumphs. The audience walked away with new strategies for succesful infection prevention and control programs. With guidelines in place from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid where some hospital-acquired conditions are deemed non-reimbursable, infection control is top of mind for infection control specialists and the C-suite alike. Stay tuned for more coverage from APIC!
June 8th, 2009
By Cheri
This week’s World Health Care Congress has put healthcare reform at the center stage. Today, an impressive panel of Nobel Laureate Mohammed Yunus and Frank Rijsberman of Google met to talk about the sustainability of healthcare. The audience was able to hear Yunus’ view of reforming the healthcare in developing countries and ways to increase access to healthcare providers. Rijsberman provided his thoughts on improving the distribution of healthcare data, a space that Google has already made moves into. Further reporting on the panel can be found on the Healthcare Congress blog.
Additionally, X PRIZE has announced its latest contest with funding from WellPoint, seeking ideas “to create an optimal health paradigm that empowers and engages individuals and communities in a way that dramatically improves health value.” Written entries will be accepted over the next 18 months and five entries will be selected for a three-year experiment. The model will have to work across a community of 10,000 people and improve health by 50% in this three- year period. The winning entry will receive $10 million.
Will you be submitting or have thoughts about how this could be executed?
April 15th, 2009
By Dana
The race for discovery and innovation within the field of genomics has followed an exciting and prosperous trajectory of late, and that uphill climb has spiked over the first half of 2008 for companies with a stake in the burgeoning genetic testing industry. Although genetic testing and sequencing has captivated the public for the better part of this century, the field remains largely uncharted, with much research, definition and regulation left to be put in place.
It is the absence of regulation and common definition that has brought the race to a screeching halt for genetic testing companies that specialize in Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) genetic testing. These tests, purported by companies like 23andMe, Navigenics, and deCODE Genetics to help consumers determine whether they are carrying genes associated with everything from baldness to breast cancer, have spawned major debate and a public outcry for a crackdown on what some regulators suggest is a rampant disregard of social responsibility. Most recently, the California Department of Public Health issued cease-and-desist letters to 13 companies accused of peddling DTC genetic tests to state residents, an action strikingly similar to that taken by New York against 31 genetic testing companies earlier this year.
In today’s New York Times, Andrew Pollack explores some of the more extreme points-of-view to emerge from this issue. On one side is a group beseeching federal measures be put in place to ensure companies offering DTC tests are licensed and provide results with “clinical” validity—that is to say, the assurance that a recognized genetic variation is an actual indicator of a disease or an increased risk for one. Following this chain of logic, it is assumed these federal measures will help prevent the unfounded hysteria that can crop up after an individual receives an “invalid” genetic reading. On the other side are individuals who staunchly believe every consumer has the right to have and control his or her complete, accurate and affordable medical information and subsequent treatment, genome sequence and all. Stifling the power of DTC companies to innovate and offer services, they say, will stifle the fundamental right of individuals to take control of their own lives and their own health care.
It’s a valid debate, and one that will be interesting to watch as the arguments continue to refine and take shape. Eliminating consumer access to genetic testing services might prevent patients from unecessarily going off the deep end in the wake of receiving an ominous genetic reading. At the end of the day though, the same patients who take advantage of these services will surely go to any measure to self-diagnose–and go off the deep end anyway after they draw their own ominous conclusions from information they’ve gleaned from the Internet, medical journals and conversations with friends. If we run block on companies that are helping to drive important science and research, wouldn’t we have to likewise regulate everything that could potentially be misused or misinterpreted? Where does it end, and how far will these naysayers push before this revolutionary science is reduced to a sliver of its true potential?
June 26th, 2008
By Dana
Tune in to the news on any given day and you’re likely to find a story about an infectious outbreak somewhere around the globe. Take today, for instance: in today’s news, five infants in Australia have tested positive for MRSA, hospitals in Canada are reporting a rash of rare infections and resistant virus strands that have afflicted 15 people to date, and an Irish hospital is coming under fire for the deaths of 40 patients from a virus outbreak.
These stories can at times strike fear in the hearts of us all, as we saw (today, incidentally) when ears perked up for the story of 15,000 hens slaughtered on an Arkansas farm after exposure to a particularly virulent strain of the bird flu. A collective sigh of relief was breathed after learning that this time, the strain was of no threat to the human population.
It is this endemic fear that is driving companies to create solutions that stave off virus outbreaks. New products, ranging from cleaning solvents and hand wipes to facemasks and antimicrobial mattress pads, crop up all the time and purport to have properties capable of killing these viruses – or at least stopping them in their tracks.
But how many of these “miracle” products are truly effective in preventing the spread of disease, and aren’t just gimmicks that capitalize on the sentiment of an anxious population? And how many of them could well lead to bacterial evolutions and the spawn of even more impervious superbugs? MY personal fear is that counting on these products instead of things like good ol’ fashioned diligent hand washing is going to give these bugs a chance to gear up, mutate, and launch a counter attack on us humans that we’re not going to be able to beat.
June 6th, 2008
By Palmer
Welcome to the launch of Diagnosis PR, Racepoint Group’s healthcare-focused blog. A natural extension of the agency’s work in healthcare public relations, Diagnosis PR will provide you with analysis and commentary on developments, trends and issues in the healthcare industry.
It’s an honor to be writing the inaugural post but one of the first points that I’d like to make is that although we (the Diagnosis PR blogging team) could throw on scrubs or a white coat and attempt the bed-side manner of a physician, none of us should ever handle a scalpel. We are not doctors, nurses or healthcare professionals and have not played one on TV.
Billy Ray Cyrus contemplates treatment options
So, for a healthcare diagnosis please see your physician or consult Peyton Manning who seems to have some luck with the healing powers of dirt.
But, if you’re looking to chat about the healthcare industry you’ve come to the right place. Check out the Diagnosis PR bloggers’ bios – you’ll see that we all have experience in healthcare PR – some with medical devices, others with drug therapies and healthcare informatics. The team is always looking to engage in interesting dialogues about healthcare so if you’ve got a point of view, please don’t be afraid to share it.
You’ll be seeing a number of posts from Diagnosis PR team in the coming weeks so please come back often.
May 23rd, 2008
