Five mental clinics to come up in Jammu region |  |
- Five mental clinics to come up in Jammu region
- Higher levels of public reimbursement positively influence national birth rates and reduce unmet needs in subfertile populations
- Childless women with fertility problems at higher risk of hospitalization for psychiatric disorders
- The prevention of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer by PGD is 'feasible'
- Measuring the uncertainties of pandemic influenza
- Taxman Foundation pledges $2.5 million to boost training of digestive disease experts
| Five mental clinics to come up in Jammu region Posted: 02 Jul 2012 04:44 PM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Jammu, July 2 - Kashmir's Health Minister Sham Lal Sharma has announced opening of mental health clinics in five of the 10 districts in Jammu region. The six million people in the region have only three specialist doctors in the only government psychiatry hospital in Jammu city. The hospital's OPD gets about 250 patients per day. The clinics, sponsored under the National Mental Health programme, will come up in Gandhi Nagar, Samba, Kathua, Udhampur and Rajouri districts. An itial funding of Rs.25 lakh will be given to these health facilities and each clinic will have one doctor, who will be trained by the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences, Banglore, according to Sharma. Studies show that about five percent population of any region may suffer from acute mental disorders, while 15-20 percent from mild disorders, according to an official at the Jammu psychiatry hospital. The number of mentally ill patients have grown in the state due to over two decades of militancy, the official said. Patients do not get treated in the initial stage of disorders due to non-availability of psychiatrists in these districts. They are brought in for treatment only when the illness gets acute, a doctor said. Besides civilian patients, the Jammu hospital has also been treating referral cases from police, para-military and army, the doctor added. With no post-graduation in psychiatry offered in the Jammu Medical College, the government will have to work hard to cover the inadequacies, the doctor said. http://www.rxpgnews.com |
| Posted: 02 Jul 2012 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Istanbul, 2 July 2012: The state funding of fertility treatment through public reimbursement policies has a direct influence on national birth rates. Lower levels of reimbursement are correlated with higher unmet needs for treatment, while more generous reimbursement policies increase access to treatment and may even make a measurable contribution to national birth rates. The findings come from a study reported here today at the annual meeting of ESHRE (European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology). The results, says health economist Dr Mark Connolly from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands, reflect the wide variety of reimbursement policies throughout Europe and come at a time when many national and local authorities have made plans to cut back their IVF funding as a cost-cutting initiative.(1) Dr Connolly and colleagues quantified the reimbursement policies of 23 European countries, using an index score ranging from 0 to 18; the higher index scores indicated fuller state funding/reimbursement for treatment. The countries with the most generous funding policies were Belgium, France and Slovenia (with scores between 14 and 18); those with the least generous were the UK, Russia and Ireland (all with scores under 3). These index scores were then correlated with treatment practice and outcomes in each of the 23 countries. Results first showed a significant relationship between the level of reimbursement and the annual contribution of assisted reproduction (ART) births to national birth numbers. This finding, said Dr Connolly, has important policy implications for national authorities concerned about ageing populations and interested in policies for influencing national birth rates. Although the influence on birth rates is small, the relationship is positive and provides an opportunity to compare with other policies implemented by local and national governments to influence birth rates.(2) Results also showed... http://www.rxpgnews.com |
| Childless women with fertility problems at higher risk of hospitalization for psychiatric disorders Posted: 02 Jul 2012 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Istanbul, 2 July 2012: While many small studies have shown a relationship between infertility and psychological distress, reporting a high prevalence of anxiety, mood disorders and depressive symptoms, few have studied the psychological effect of childlessness on a large population basis. Now, based on the largest cohort of women with fertility problems compiled to date, Danish investigators have shown that women who remained childless after their first investigation for infertility had more hospitalisations for psychiatric disorders than women who had at least one child following their investigation. The results of the study were presented today at the annual meeting of ESHRE (European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology) by Dr Birgitte Baldur-Felskov, an epidemiologist from the Danish Cancer Research Center in Copenhagen. Most studies of this kind have been based on single clinics and self-reported psychological effects. This study, however, was a nationwide follow-up of 98,737 Danish women investigated for infertility between 1973 and 2008, who were then cross-linked via Denmark's population-based registries to the Danish Psychiatric Central Registry. This provided information on hospitalisations for psychiatric disorders, which were divided into an inclusive group of all mental disorders, and six discharge sub-groups which comprised alcohol and intoxicant abuse, schizophrenia and psychoses, affective disorders including depression, anxiety, adjustment and obsessive compulsive disorder, eating disorders, and other mental disorders. All women were followed from the date of their initial fertility investigation until the date of psychiatric event, date of emigration, date of death, date of hospitalisation or 31st December 2008, whichever came first. Such studies, said Dr Baldur-Felskov, could only be possible in somewhere like Denmark, where each citizen has a personal identification number which can be linked to any... http://www.rxpgnews.com |
| The prevention of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer by PGD is 'feasible' Posted: 02 Jul 2012 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) Istanbul, 2 July 2012: Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) for the breast cancer genes BRCA1/2 is now feasible and established, with good success rates for those treated, according to investigators from the reproduction, oncology and genetics centres of the university hospitals of Maastricht and Brussels. The results follow a review of the largest number of PGD treatments for BRCA1/2 in Europe and were presented today at the annual meeting of ESHRE (European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology) by Professor Willem Verpoest from the Centre for Reproductive Medicine at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium. Behind his vote of confidence lie 145 PGD cycles for BRCA1/2 mutations performed in 70 couples at the two centres (a mean of 2.1 cycles per woman). Almost 60% of the mutation carriers were female, two-thirds with a BRCA1 mutation. Just over one quarter (26.2%) of female carriers had undergone a prophylactic bilateral mastectomy. Following IVF, 717 embryos were found suitable for genetic analysis, and of these 43.1% were diagnosed as affected by the mutation, with 40.7% unaffected and thus suitable for transfer (the remainder had an abnormal genotype or the analysis was inconclusive). Hence, 62.1% of the PGD cycles led to fresh embryo transfer - with 3.6% transferred from one or two frozen-thawed unaffected embryos - resulting in 42 pregnancies in 40 women. Pregnancy rates were 41.4% per fresh embryo transfer and 23.1% per frozen. The overall pregnancy rate was 29%. The series also included three cases of PGD on embryos previously cryopreserved for fertility preservation prior to chemotherapy, and these too resulted in two ongoing pregnancies. Two female BRCA1 carriers were diagnosed with breast cancer within three months of the PGD treatment, despite breast screening shortly before treatment. One had a history of breast cancer, the other patient hadn't. The former patient went on to have healthy twins three years... http://www.rxpgnews.com |
| Measuring the uncertainties of pandemic influenza Posted: 02 Jul 2012 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) A major collaboration between US research centers has highlighted three factors that could ultimately determine whether an outbreak of influenza becomes a serious epidemic that threatens national health. The research suggests that the numbers in current response plans could be out by a factor of two or more depending on the characteristics of the particular pandemic influenza. Researchers from Argonne, Los Alamos, and Sandia National Laboratories, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, have used sensitivity analysis to uncover the most important disease characteristics pertaining to the spread of infection with an influenza virus. These are: the fraction of the transmission that occurs prior to symptoms, the reproductive number, and the length of each disease stage. Their use of data from past pandemics as well as information on potential viral evolution demonstrates that current response planning may underestimate the pandemic consequences significantly. It has become critical to assess the potential range of consequences of a pandemic influenza outbreak given the uncertainty about its disease characteristics while investigating risks and mitigation strategies of vaccines, antiviral drugs, and social distancing measures, explains Jeanne Fair of Los Alamos National Laboratory and her colleagues. The team has used a simulation model and rigorous experimental design with sensitivity analysis to show the extremes of consequences of a potential pandemic outbreak in the USA. The simulation incorporates uncertainty in the evolution and characteristics of the pathogen and differences in the epidemic response, and uncertainties in the sociological response to a pandemic. Although we are yet to face an H5N1 avian influenza epidemic, the team suggests that they have nevertheless been able to develop a worst-case scenario for all possibilities considering mortality rates and infectiousness based on current knowledge and historical... http://www.rxpgnews.com |
| Taxman Foundation pledges $2.5 million to boost training of digestive disease experts Posted: 02 Jul 2012 05:00 AM PDT ( From http://www.rxpgnews.com ) The Taxman Family Foundation will donate $2.5 million to support the training of specialists in the study and treatment of digestive disease at the University of Chicago Medicine. The gift was announced Saturday evening at the annual fundraising event for the Gastro-Intestinal Research Foundation (GIRF). It will honor Joseph B. Kirsner, MD, PhD, the Louis Block Distinguished Service Professor of Medicine at the University of Chicago, who helped establish GIRF in 1962. This magnanimous gift is a fitting tribute to the seminal role played by Dr. Joseph Kirsner to further our understanding of gastrointestinal health and disease and to advocate for every patient he ever cared for, said Kenneth S. Polonsky, MD, Dean of the Biological Sciences Division and the Pritzker School of Medicine and Executive Vice President of Medical Affairs at the University of Chicago. For more than 60 years, Joe Kirsner was a model in the care of the patient, a skill he passed on to his students, and in the study of complex disease. This gift will extend that legacy. We are very appreciative that the Taxman Foundation has agreed to honor Dr. Kirsner in this manner and would also like to acknowledge the critical role played by the Gastro-Intestinal Research Foundation in facilitating this gift. The gift will support an endowed fellowship that will enable young physician-scientists of high promise to continue their clinical training while developing research skills and experience. It will support research and faculty recruitment initiatives, and it will help build the Joseph B. Kirsner faculty reception area in the medical center's New Hospital Pavilion, which will open in early 2013. Very few people have had an impact on me, or on the world, like Dr. Joseph Kirsner, said Seymour Taxman, CEO and founder of the Chicago-based Taxman Corporation. He has helped thousands of patients in their personal battles against digestive disorders. He also has trained... http://www.rxpgnews.com |
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