The Health News Australia November 8 2017

• Doctors with no surgical experience are likely to be banned from using the title “cosmetic surgeon” in a move that would be a big win for Australian patients. The move from federal, state and territory health ministers comes after a series of serious, potentially life-threatening medical mishaps from cosmetic surgeons, including patients suffering suspected heart attacks during breast implant procedures.
• Heterosexual people living in major cities have driven a 63% rise in gonorrhoea in Australia over the past 5 years. The data is revealed in the annual surveillance report on HIV, viral hepatitis and sexually transmissible infections, released by the Kirby Institute in Sydney. The report shows there were 23,887 new diagnoses of gonorrhoea in 2016, with about three quarters of them in men.
• More than 140 people have been bitten or scratched by bats in New South Wales so far this year, putting them at risk of a rabies-like disease. All have been treated with a preventative course of vaccines to try to stop them contracting the lyssavirus.

News on Health Professional Radio. Today is the 8th of November 2017. Read by Tabetha Moreto.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-06/cosmetic-surgeon-to-have-tighter-restrictions-on-doctors/9120388

Doctors with no surgical experience are likely to be banned from using the title “cosmetic surgeon” in a move that would be a big win for Australian patients. The move from federal, state and territory health ministers comes after a series of serious, potentially life-threatening medical mishaps from cosmetic surgeons, including patients suffering suspected heart attacks during breast implant procedures. According to the ABC, the Medical Board of Australia will consider placing restrictions on the title “cosmetic surgeon”, including allowing health ministers to ban use of the title if the board recommends it. At the moment in Australia, any doctor with a medical degree can call themselves a cosmetic surgeon even if they have no surgical training or experience. Under the proposal, only doctors with plastic surgery training would be able to call themselves “cosmetic surgeon”.

Australasian Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgeons president Mark Magnusson said the term “cosmetic surgeon” did not mean anything because it was not a separately recognised specialty. He added:  “There isn’t a benchmark in place for who can use the term, and so it has become the working title for anyone with a basic medical degree who wants to go into the arena of aesthetics.”
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New South Wales Health Minister Brad Hazzard is conducting a further review after a woman died from a botched breast operation in a beauty salon. Federal Health Minister Greg Hunt said following the tragic circumstances, New South Wales took action to crack down on dodgy operators and tighten regulation. The changes regarding where procedures can be performed have been welcomed by Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons president Professor Mark Ashton. Consumer Health Forum chief executive Leanne Wells told the ABC that patients needed to be clear what they were getting into and make sure they had a reputable doctor.
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Any doctor can call themselves a cosmetic surgeon, making it hard for patients to know who they can trust. Previously, Daniel Fleming from the Australasian College of Cosmetic Surgeons said Australia needed recognised standards for cosmetic surgery.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/nov/06/australias-gonorrhoea-rise-63-driven-by-urban-heterosexuals

Heterosexual people living in major cities have driven a sixty three percent rise in gonorrhoea in Australia over the past five years. The data is revealed in the annual surveillance report on HIV, viral hepatitis and sexually transmissible infections, released by the Kirby Institute in Sydney. The report shows there were twenty three thousand eight hundred eighty seven new diagnoses of gonorrhoea in two thousand sixteen, with about three quarters of them in men. Between two thousand twelve and two thousand sixteen, gonorrhoea notification rates increased from sixty two per one hundred thousand people to one hundred one per one hundred thousand people. Rates increased by seventy two percent in men and forty three in women. Men aged between twenty five and twenty nine and women between twenty and twenty four saw the largest increase in gonorrhoea infections, the report found. There was a ninety nine percent increase in gonorrhoea notification rates in major cities in the five years to two thousand sixteen, while rates increased by fifteen percent in regional areas and declined by eight percent in rural areas. Associate professor Rebecca Guy, the head of Kirby’s surveillance evaluation and research program at the University of New South Wales, said gonorrhoea had been uncommon in young heterosexual urban people until recently. It was unclear why rates were increasing in this population, but it was not because of increasing awareness and diagnosis alone, she said.

She said the data suggested doctors should be aware of the need to test patients for the infection, which is asymptomatic in fifty percent of men and eighty percent of women. While treatment is simple with antibiotics if caught early, untreated it can cause serious health problems including infertility and sterility.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-06/nsw-bats-infected-with-rabies-like-virus-lyssavirus/9122874

More than one hundred forty people have been bitten or scratched by bats in New South Wales so far this year, putting them at risk of a rabies-like disease. All have been treated with a preventative course of vaccines to try to stop them contracting the lyssavirus.
New South Wales Health is urging people to treat every bat as if they carry the fatal disease because it was unclear “which bats have the infection”. The department advised anyone who came into contact with a bat to see their doctor immediately. New South Wales Health’s director of communicable diseases Doctor Vicky Sheppeard said “Everyone who gets bitten or scratched by a bat in Australia should have the preventative treatment”.
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Three people have died from lyssavirus, between nineteen ninety six and two thousand thirteen, and all have been from Queensland. The vaccine includes a course of four shots over a month and is free. NSW Health expects the number of people to be bitten or scratched by bats to reach two hundred by the end of the year because this month is local breeding season.