The Health News – 12 December 2016

Overview:
• Researcher Helen Brooks of the University of Manchester and her colleagues found that pets helped people manage their feelings “through distraction from symptoms and upsetting experiences” and acted as “a form of encouragement for activity.”

• A plan to manage patient transition to the New Royal Adelaide Hospital (NRAH) by using other hospitals, including the soon-to-close Repatriation General Hospital (Repat), has been labelled a “high-risk” strategy. Opposition Health spokesperson Stephen Wade said the Government was walking a very thin line with timing and feared it would result in a “train wreck.”

• The Health Care Complaints Commission prosecuted Doctor Jeremy Charles Reader following complaints from nine patients over treatment and adverse outcomes. The NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal found Dr Reader guilty of unsatisfactory professional conduct and has ordered ordered the cancellation of the doctor’s registration and precluded him from applying for reinstatement for a year.

News on Health Professional Radio. Today is the  12th of December 2016. Read by Rebecca Foster. Health News

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-10/pets-help-people-with-serious-mental-illness-manage-condition/8109368

There is significant evidence owning a pet has benefits for general wellbeing, but new research has found that pets can also play an important role in the daily management of long-term mental illness.

When people living with serious mental illness were asked what helped them manage their condition, many put their pets right near the top of the list.

In the study, published in BMC Psychiatry, 60 per cent of participants placed their pets in their central circle of support when given a diagram to illustrate their support network, and a further 20 per cent put their pet in the second circle.

Through interviews with the participants, researcher Helen Brooks of the University of Manchester and her colleagues found that pets helped people manage their feelings “through distraction from symptoms and upsetting experiences” and acted as “a form of encouragement for activity”.

They also found that pets were of particular importance to people who had limited or difficult relationships with other people, which Janette Young from the University of South Australia said was more common among people with mental illness.

…Dr Young said human-to-non-human relationships tended to be far less complicated than those with other people.

Dr Brooks also noted that within the group of study participants’ pets were “unanimously neither considered nor incorporated into individual mental health care plans”, but said they should be.

Dr Young echoed this call, saying the study demonstrated why research into the health benefits of pets was important.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-09/new-rah-transition-a-high-risk/8108202

A plan to manage patient transition to the New Royal Adelaide Hospital (NRAH) by using other hospitals, including the soon-to-close Repat, has been labelled a “high-risk” strategy by the State Opposition.

The NRAH in the city will only open at half capacity in 2017 for safety reasons and patient numbers in the old RAH will be reduced to a manageable 400 ahead of the transition.

Patients will be distributed to other hospitals in the metropolitan area to support the move.

But the doors of the Repatriation General Hospital [Repat] are scheduled for closure in October, meaning its use for the transition could be difficult.

Opposition Health spokesperson Stephen Wade said the Government was walking a very thin line with timing and feared it would result in a “train wreck”.

Professor Phil Aylward from the Southern Area Local Health Network … told a Parliamentary Committee that he was in the dark about how the transition would work.

Lengthy delays and building complications at the NRAH meant there was no firm date set for the hospital’s opening.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-09/wollongong-doctor-deregistered-botched-procedures/8107938

A NSW court has cancelled a Wollongong GP’s registration as a doctor in Australia over botched skin cancer procedures.

The Health Care Complaints Commission prosecuted Doctor Jeremy Charles Reader following complaints from nine patients over treatment and adverse outcomes.

The NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal found Dr Reader guilty of unsatisfactory professional conduct.

The tribunal ordered the cancellation of the doctor’s registration and precluded him from applying for reinstatement for a year.

Dr Reader was awarded a Diploma of Skin Care Medicine by the Skin Cancer College of Australia in 2007 and started practicing in the area of medicine in October 2014.

He was also the college’s secretary and NSW representative for several years.

The complaints raised by the nine patients ranged from …failure to explain procedures, excessive scarring and disfigurement.

The HCCC in its prosecution relied on expert reports by skincare physician Dr Peter Lye.