Australian Work Exposures Study - Asthmagens

Recent research shows 47% of male and 40% of female workers were exposed to one or more asthmagens in their workplace. The Extended Australian Work Exposure Study (AWES–2) examined the types of work and workers most likely to be exposed to asthmagens (substances that cause asthma) in their workplace. The study also found that workers could be exposed to more than one asthmagen depending on the types of tasks undertaken at work.

This summary from Safe Work Australia, describes the results of a national, population-based survey of Australian workers to examine the prevalence of exposures to asthmagens at work.

A full description of the methodology and findings of this study was published in the peer-reviewed paper "The estimated prevalence of exposure to asthmagens in the Australian workforce, 2014." The article in BMC Pulmonary Medicine is open access.  

The Lazarus Phenomenon

The Lazarus phenomenon or the unassisted return of spontaneous circulation after cardiac arrest is a largely underreported phenomenon in medical literature which essentially implies the ‘resurrection’ of an individual after cardiac arrest.
 Because of the presumed infrequency of this condition, there are no studies specifically researching Lazarus phenomenon in scientific literature. This review intends to systematically present current and past knowledge on this rare phenomenon.

Sahni, Vaibhav. (2016). The Lazarus Phenomenon. JRSM Open, 7(8) doi:0.1177/2054270416653523 

Hospital care for Aboriginal people

This edition of Patient Perspectives: Hospital Care for Aboriginal People provides an important opportunity to listen to what Aboriginal people have to say about their experiences in hospital. It explores whether there are differences in care provided to Aboriginal patients compared to non-Aboriginal patients. It also allows us to contrast performance across local health districts, examining whether Aboriginal patients’ perspectives differ according to location or geography; and identifying where patients report good, or poor, experiences of care.

Published by the Bureau of Health Information in August 2016, the report draws on data from almost 2,700 Aboriginal patients who were admitted to a NSW public hospital in 2014.

Fractures: Assessment and Management

NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) has developed four related clinical guidelines and one service delivery guideline related to the management of people with traumatic injuries including this guideline on complex fractures and the following guidelines:

• Fractures (non-complex): assessment and management
• Major trauma: assessment and initial management
• Major trauma: service delivery
• Spinal injury: assessment and initial management

The Nurses' Health Study

The Nurses' Health Study was formed in 1976 with 121,701 female registered nurses in the USA, originally to look at the relationship between the use of oral contraceptives and breast cancer.  Graham Colditz has published a paper in Public Health Research & Practice, which looks at how the study, still operating forty years later, has broadened its focus through biannual questionnaires, to include a much wider analysis.

Nurses’ health study: demonstrating the impact of research, and adapting new measures and approaches to increase relevance and effect of cohort studies looks both at this particular study, which now reports on a wide range of measures and their relationships to chronic disease, and also at the contribution of cohort studies as a methodology.  "The aim of this report is to highlight the features of the Nurses’ Health Study and other cohorts that demonstrate continuing contributions to the changing epidemiology of chronic conditions."


Public Health Res Pract. 2016;26(3):e2631628  DOI: doi.org/10.17061/phrp2631628             

Seven strategies for ending violence against children

Across the world up to one billion children have experienced physical, sexual or psychological violence in the past year.  The World Health Organization has published INSPIRE: seven strategies for ending violence against children as an evidence based resource aimed at government strategists, community groups, the private sector and health workers. 

The strategies selected have been shown to be effective in reducing violence against children.  They are categorised as:  Implementation and enforcement of laws; Norms and values; Safe environments; Parent and caregiver support; Income and economic strengthening; Response and support services; and Education and life skills. 

Understanding health research videos

The National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools (NCCMT) in Canada has published a series of twelve videos to support "evidence-informed public health".  These videos, each only 5 - 10 minutes long, explain some of the basic concepts you need to understand when looking at research evidence.  

Understanding Research Evidence includes: 

What’s the Risk? Understanding Absolute and Relative Risk Reduction   Making Sense of a Standardized Mean Difference Evidence Informed Decision Making Effectiveness of Interventions  6S Pyramid - a tool that helps you find evidence quickly and efficiently   Types of Reviews - What kind of review do we need   Relative Risk  Understanding what a P value tells us   Clinical Significance   Confidence Interval   Forest Plots - Understanding a Meta-Analysis in 5 Minutes or Less   Odds Ratios

Australia's Hospitals - three new reports

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has just released three new Australia's hospitals 2014-15 reports, as well as an at-a-glance online overview:

Australia's hospitals 2014-15 at a glance provides a summary of Australia's public and private hospitals.  During that year there were 10.2 million hospitalisations.  There were 7.4 million presentations to emergency departments in public hospitals, with 74% of patients seen within the recommended times for their triage category.

Hospital resources 2014-15: Australian hospital statistics gives a detailed overview of public and private hospital resources in Australia.  There were 698 public hospitals with over 60,000 beds and 624 private hospitals with almost 3000 beds in that year.

Non-admitted patient care 2014-15: Australian hospital statistics details that about 34.9 million non-admitted patient service events were provided in public hospitals. 46% of these events occurred in allied health or clinical nurse specialist clinics.

Australia's hospitals 2014-15 at a glance is an online overview of all three published reports. 

Newly mapped brain

Neuroscientists have recently reported on an analysis of the brains of 210 healthy young adults and mapped 180 areas of the brain in full colour.  This includes 97 regions of the outer layer of the brain that were previously undiscovered. The research team led by Matthew Glasser and co-funded by the US National Institutes of Health, used data from the Human Connectome Project and was published in the journal Nature.

Pankaj Sah from the University of Queensland penned a useful explanatory article about this research in The Conversation this week, Mapping the brain: scientists define 180 distinct regions, but what now?  He writes, "An updated brain atlas will provide greater insights into how the brain controls behaviour and how disorders in certain regions contribute to brain diseases."

Glasser, MF et al. A multi-modal parcellation of human cerebral cortex. Nature. 2016 Jul 20. doi: 10.1038/nature18933. [Epub ahead of print]

Australia's Health Tracker 2016

The Australian Health Policy Collaboration (at Victoria University) has launched Australia's Health Tracker 2016, a report card on preventable chronic diseases, conditions and their risk factors: tracking progress for a healthier Australia by 2025.  This is the first of a series of regular issues and there are also seperate report cards for Adult Health and Children and Young People's Health. Over 50 public health organisations and experts have contributed to this document. 

One in two Australians suffers from a chronic disease, a third of which could be prevented by removing exposure to risk factors such as smoking, high body mass, alcohol use, physical inactivity and high blood pressure.  The emphasis is to increase resources for preventive measures.

Diabetes among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people

Published recently by The Australian Indigenous HealthInfoNet is a comprehensive Review of diabetes among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.  The review is aimed at informing people involved in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health care and to provide evidence for policy makers. 

There have been varying reports about the extent of this problem, but in 2012-2013, national estimates of the prevalence of diabetes among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people ranged from 9% (based on self-reported data) to 11% (based on biomedical data). "After age-adjustment, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were more than 3 times as likely as non-Indigenous people to have diabetes."  In addition, hospitalisation rates for complications of type 2 diabetes were almost six times higher than for non-Indigenous people.

As well as looking at the data for prevalence and complications, the review puts Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander diabetes into context, discusses current prevention and management programs and policies and suggests future directions.

Poisoning in children and young people 2012-13

The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has released a new report, Poisoning in children and young people 2012-13.  It reports on people aged 0-24 who were hospitalised due to poisoning in Australia, which was over 30% of all cases of poisoning.  49% of poisoned people under 24 were aged 18 and over, and 26% were aged 15-17.    

For all types of poisoning the rates were much higher for girls and young women than for boys and young men.  The largest category of poisoning was from non-opioid analgesics, such as ipbuprofen and paracetamol and 15-17 year old girls had the highest rate of poisoning by pharmaceuticals.

Almost two-thirds (63%) of poisoning cases among children and young people aged 10-24 were due to intentional self-harm, most common in people over 15. In these groups, intentional self-harm accounted for the largest proportion of hospitalised poisoning among both sexes, though the rates of intentional self-poisoning were higher among females in each age group.

Mentoring to Retain Newly Hired Nurses

Failure of the current transition experience from education to clinical practice is evident when new nurses exhibit characteristics of burnout and role stress during their first year of employment. Supporting the professional socialization of nurses is critical because engaged nurses are satisfied with their careers and stay longer at their employing institutions, which in turn decreases staff turnover and improves patient outcomes satisfaction.
This recent article looks at how mismanagement of a nurse's early professional experiences leads to lack of motivation, low productivity, and decreased quality of patient care.

Gazaway, S.b., Schumacher, A.M., Anderson L. (2016). Mentoring to retain newly hired nurses. Nursing Management (Springhouse), 47(8), 9-13. NSW Health Staff can access this journal via CIAP.

Diabetes Australia app

The Diabetes Australia app is a great resource for meal planning, latest news and health articles. It’s freely available for Android and Apple phones.You can also use the app to keep track of your appointments. Click the Health and Wellbeing section for information on when you need to see specialists and set a reminder.
You can also check out the great recipes, find a healthcare service nearby, and try the 30 minute yoga class by Diabetes Australia ambassador Sammy Veall and take the Fast Facts Quiz!
The updated version 1.02 is now available. Download from on Google Play or iTunes

Gardens and Health

This report from the Kings Fund sets out the evidence base on how gardens and gardening relate to health across the life-course. It highlights how, at different points in the health and social care system, gardens and gardening can make a strong contribution to keeping us well and independent.
The report includes a ‘menu’ of recommendations that aims to encourage the UK NHS, government departments, national bodies, local government, health and wellbeing boards and clinical commissioning groups to make more of the diverse health benefits of gardening in support of their priorities. In the future hopefully all new hospitals and those undergoing rebuilds in Australia will look at the benefits of gardens for both patients and staff.

 Buck David. (2016) Gardens and health: Implications for policy and practice