Author: healthprofessionalradio

Overview:
•  Gynaecologist Rosemary Jones in Adelaide says Transgender people are facing waiting lists of up to six months to see a specialist and a lack of training is compounding the issue.

• The AMA is now accepting applications for the 2017 AMA Indigenous Peoples’ Medical Scholarship. The successful applicant will receive $10,000 each year for the duration of their course. AMA President, Dr Michael Gannon said the Scholarship, the AMA Indigenous Health Report Card, and the work of the AMA Taskforce on Indigenous Health are all part of the AMA’s commitment to reconciliation.

•  Dr Amali Mallawaarachchi, a genomics researcher at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research and a nephrologist at Sydney’s Liverpool Hospital recently spoke to an audience of clinicians and researchers at the 2016 Renal Genetics Symposium, organized by KidGen, at the Royal Women’s Hospital, Melbourne. Her talk focused on autosomal dominant polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD), an inherited disorder in which cysts progressively expand and destroy the kidneys, eventually causing renal failure.

Overview:
•  The Australian Aged Care Quality Agency audited Estia Health’s Tea Gardens nursing home in September. The Agency said immediately after the audit, the home implemented a number of actions to improve the care and services for recipients. It was now satisfied that the home met the expected outcomes, that it previously failed to meet.

• Most Australian parents will be unable to buy a vaccine for the B strain of the dangerous meningococcal disease until the new year. Pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline said increasing global demand had constrained supply of the vaccine, known as Bexsero.

•  The father of a baby who died during a home birth in New South Wales lays part of the blame on a “communication problem” with doctors. The coroner found in September the parents of NA were clearly warned by their doctor of the dangers of a home birth because the baby was lying sideways.

Overview:
•  The Mersey Community Hospital in Latrobe has marked the end of an era with birthing services no longer available there. A barbeque lunch marked the occasion with past and present midwives gathering to remember and discuss the maternity ward at the hospital.

• The latest NT Health Department of Health annual report said close to half of NT public hospital admissions were already made up of same-day haemodialysis and that demand for the services was set to rise.

•  The non-profit Delta Therapy Dog program has brought smiles to the faces of hundreds of people in need in the New South Wales Hunter region over almost two decades. In Newcastle, the program operates in the busy John Hunter Hospital (JHH) on some of its children’s and adult wards.

Overview:
•  Guidelines set out by the Australian Government’s Office of Drug Control state there is no limit to the number of medicinal cannabis licences that can exist but all applicants must first obtain a cannabis research licence and permit. However national president of the Australian Medical Association Doctor Michael Gannon said there was limited scope for its use in modern medicine.

• Australian medical authorities have long denied the existence of Lyme in Australia, despite growing numbers of Australians claiming to have contracted it locally. Lyme Disease Association Australia’s Sharon Whiteman said the definition of Lyme disease should be expanded to include more than one strain of Borrlia bacteria.

•  The AMA has recently launched its 2016 Safe Hours Audit, an online survey to assess the fatigue risk of the working hours of salaried doctors and doctors in training, including GP registrars. The 2016 AMA Safe Hours Audit will be a snapshot of doctors’ working hours and patterns between 31 October and 6 November. The results will be made public early next year.

Overview:
•  Shift work has long been associated with obesity and other metabolic diseases like Type 2 diabetes. Preliminary results from Dr Amy Reynolds’ – a post-doctoral researcher at Central Queensland University research – suggest that gut microbiota may have their own circadian rhythm, married to the sleep cycle.

• Anthony Mark Edward O’Donohue, 48, has been charged with the murder of Manmeet Alisher, who police say was set on fire with an accelerant on Friday while picking up passengers at a Moorooka bus stop. Health Minister Cameron Dick said O’Donohue had previously received public mental health treatment from the Metro South Hospital and Health Service.

•  For over a decade, the ‘Newcastle Model’ of dementia care has been operating in the New South Wales Hunter region, which sees an integrated, collaborative approach between GPs, geriatricians and specialist dementia nurses in delivering support to patients and their carers.

Overview:
•  Dr Dilip Gahankari planning his 10th annual trip home to his birth country of India to perform lifesaving surgeries says it is an honour to help. Next month he will travel to a remote area of India to treat locals with tumours, deformities, and burns. Each year, he volunteers a week of his time performing back-to-back surgeries.

• A joint venture by eight hospitals around Australia is working to reduce the high rate of heart disease among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. An estimated 60 per cent of the Indigenous community is likely to die from coronary heart disease, a percentage health workers would like to reduce through the Lighthouse Project.

•  Indigenous organisation Wunan Foundation is applying to the Director of Liquor Licensing to have the daily per person quota of six bottles of wine or two cartons of beer cut in half. “Alcohol is causing huge amounts of harm in our community here and reducing the supply is one of the things we have to do,” the foundation’s executive director Ian Trust said.