RECENT NEWS

The National Patient Safety Agency (NPSA) is urging NHS organisations across England and Wales to follow guidelines aimed at reducing patient falls.

Deb has launched the Deb Hand Hygiene Awards 2010, in conjunction with IPS Education and Professional Development Committee, to promote the importance of improving hand hygiene in the health sector.

New advice is being developed to improve NHS standards on sedating anxious young patients. There is currently no national guidance, which means those aged 19 and under who need sedation before a therapeutic or diagnostic procedure might be given drugs that may be ineffective or unsafe.

The Association for Perioperative Practice (AfPP) has announced four key pathways under which masterclasses and specialist sessions will feature at this year’s AfPP 2010 Congress and Exhibition (14-16 October 2010).

The National Audit Office has reported that most PFI hospital contracts are wellmanaged and the evidence indicates that they are currently achieving the value for money expected when the contracts were signed.

Nine out of ten women with breast cancer who undergo mastectomy or breast reconstruction surgery say that their care was of a high quality, according to the National Mastectomy and Breast Reconstruction Audit.

A procedure which involves “cooling” newborn babies who are at risk of severe disability or death due to oxygen deprivation, has been deemed “safe and effective” enough for NHS use, according to NICE.

Alliance Medical has announced its participation in the College of Radiographers’ Industry Partnership Scheme (CoRIPS).

Leaders of European, national and international organisations representing healthcare workers and national and international academic experts agreed that urgent and decisive implementation of the EU Sharps Directive is needed to prevent potentially fatal or life-changing infections.

Patients and the public will now be provided more up-to-date information about their local hospital, following the decision by the Department of Health to publish weekly hospital data on MRSA bloodstream infections and C. difficile.

Innovation in the NHS is at risk of being stifled as hospitals cut the amount of time senior doctors can devote to new services, the BMA has warned.

Hospital patients remain at significant risk of healthcare-associated infections because more information is required about bed occupancy rates on a ward-by-ward basis, the Royal College of Surgeons (RCS) has warned.

The chairman of the BMA’s Consultants Committee has criticised lists of “banned treatments” on the NHS, and warned that cuts to services were being driven by “the quest for wholesale reductions in budgets”.

NICE has published new guidance approving the use radio frequency ablation for the eradication of dysplastic Barrett’s oesophagus. Barrett’s oesophagus is a condition characterised by abnormal epithelium.

Basildon and Thurrock University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has been fined £50,000 and £40,000 costs, following the tragic death in its care of a severely-disabled young man with cerebral palsy.

NICE has announced that it has recommended two treatments (infliximab and adalimumab) for people with severe Crohn’s disease.

The rates of men dying from malignant melanoma – the deadliest form of skin cancer – have doubled in the last 30 years, according to the latest Cancer Research UK figures.

Figures released by the Health Protection Agency (HPA) show reported cases of Hepatitis C infection in England have increased by 4.5% from 8,196 cases reported in 2008 to 8,563 cases in 2009.

Researchers will be exploring whether a new, very low cost, one-a-day combined “polypill” could reduce the risk of heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular problems across the world, in a major new international trial.

More than two out of three patients say they will have more confidence in their doctor once a new system of regular checks on doctors is introduced, according to a survey commissioned by the GMC.