FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. — It’s something patients probably aren’t thinking about as they walk into General Leonard Wood Army Community Hospital or one of Fort Leonard Wood’s dental clinics, but it’s arguably one of the most important elements to Army medicine — instrument sterilization.The technicians who perform this task every day help to ensure patient safety, and the week of Oct. 11 through 17 is designated Sterile Processing Week to recognize their efforts.“Sterile Processing Technicians are behind the scenes in the medical and dental community, but we’re also a very crucial part of eliminating infections,” said Shirley Caracci, one of two technicians at Boak Dental Clinic. “This job requires passion, dedication, patience and precision to ensure the safety and well-being of all patients and staff.”Caracci said patients are at risk of infections from dirty instruments used during any type of medical procedure, and the consequences can be disastrous for
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3 win Nobel medicine prize for discovering hepatitis C virus
“For the first time in history, the disease can now be cured, raising hopes of eradicating hepatitis C virus from the world,” the Nobel Committee said in announcing the prize in Stockholm.
The challenge now is to make these still-expensive drugs more widely available and to stem the spread of the disease among drug users, whose sharing of needles has led to spikes in cases.
“What we need is the political will to eradicate it” and to make the drugs affordable enough to do it, Alter said.
Scientists had long known of the hepatitis A and B viruses, spread largely through contaminated food or water and blood, respectively, but were “toiling in the wilderness” to try to explain many other cases of liver disease until the blood-borne hepatitis C virus was identified in 1989, said Dr. Raymond Chung, liver disease chief at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Now, it’s the only chronic
Medicine Nobel for discovery that made blood transfusions safer
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While Alter and his collaborators, working through the 1970s, defined the characteristics of the virus, Houghton and his research partners identified the virus in 1982; in 1997, Rice conclusively showed that the virus was responsible for chronic hepatitis in human beings.
In a year when the world has been held hostage by a virus, the Nobel for physiology/medicine going to the scientists who discovered the hepatitis C virus seems apt. American scientists Harvey Alter and Charles Rice and the UK’s Michael Houghton have been recognised by the Nobel committee for their groundbreaking discovery that has made blood transfusion safer. Hepatitis C virus (HCV), along with hepatitis B and HIV, is among the major pathogens for blood-borne infections, and as per the WHO, about 71 million people in the world-6-11 million Indians included-suffer from HCV infection, a top cause of cirrhosis and liver cancer.
Before
2020 Medicine Winners Are Team Players
Yesterday’s announcement of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine looked similar to many previous years. Three senior male scientists were chosen for their contributions to a field of great scientific significance—the discovery of the Hepatitis C virus, the causative agent of blood-borne hepatitis. Hepatitis C infection is a major global health problem with an estimated 71 million cases of chronic hepatitis C virus infection around the world (World Health Organization) that can result in cirrhosis and liver cancer.
The work of Harvey J. Alter, MD, senior scholar at the Clinical Center’s Department of Transfusion Medicine at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and one of the three 2020 Nobelists, demonstrated that an unknown virus was a common cause of chronic hepatitis. The lab of Michael Houghton, PhD, professor in the department of medical microbiology & immunology at the University of Alberta in Canada, isolated the genome of the virus.
Leica Microsystems Center of Excellence established at Icahn School of Medicine
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Leica Microsystems, Inc. have combined efforts to establish the Leica Microsystems Center of Excellence at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
The new Center will support a mission to drive new discoveries and insights from scien-tific research performed using state-of-the-art imaging systems. A virtual ceremony took place today to mark the occasion.
The Center of Excellence features cutting-edge confocal and widefield microscopy technology such as Leica SP8 STED nanoscopy imaging, allowing researchers to capture images and video of the cellular and molecular processes of life.
The new partnership between Mount Sinai’s Microscopy and Advanced Bioimaging Core and Leica will ensure that we can meet the growing demand for novel microscopy-based instru-ments and strategies.”
Deanna Benson, PhD, Director, Microscope and Advanced Bi-oimaging Core and Leica Microsystems Center of Excellence in
Cancer patient dies in lock-up, family says denied medicine
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A 50-year-old man, who was detained and brought to Vejalpur police station in Ahmedabad in a case of gambling, died on Sunday morning, prompting his family members to allege that he died because he was not provided his daily medication despite being a cancer patient.
The deceased identified as Abdul Kadir Shaikh (50), a resident of Vejalpur in Ahmedabad, was detained by the Gujarat Police State Monitoring Cell for gambling on Saturday night and brought to Vejalpur police station. Shaikh, who ran business of biscuits from his house, was suffering from Laryngeal cancer (voicebox cancer) and he was put under detention at Vejalpur police station after his Covid-19 test at 9 pm on Saturday.
On Sunday morning around 11 am, the family of Shaikh was informed by the police that he had died inside police lock-up under mysterious circumstances. The body has been sent
4-day Nebraska Medicine computer system outage wreaking havoc at 2 health systems
North Platte, Neb.-based Great Plains Health is unable to access its EHR due to a computer system outage at Omaha-based Nebraska Medicine, according to a report in The North Platte Telegraph.
Nebraska Medicine reported a security incident that caused a computer outage at its hospitals and clinics four days ago. Staff have canceled some appointments and reverted to paper records as the IT team works to get the system back up.
Nebraska Medicine provides EHR systems to several other providers, including Norfolk, Neb.-based Faith Regional Health Services. Great Plains Health and Faith Regional both have reported their EHR and patient portals are offline. The local ABC affiliate in Omaha also reported that people have been unable to get COVID-19 test results back because of the outage
The health systems can access patient data in other record-keeping systems and provide urgent care, but some nonurgent procedures have been postponed. Great
Schwazze, Formerly Operating as Medicine Man Technologies, Inc., to Host Investor Meetings at the Alliance Global Partners Virtual Consumer Cannabis Conference
DENVER–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Schwazze, formerly operating as Medicine Man Technologies, Inc. (OTCQX: SHWZ) (“Schwazze” or “the Company”), announced today that Justin Dye, Chief Executive Officer, and Nancy Huber, Chief Financial Officer, will be hosting meetings at the Alliance Global Partners Virtual Consumer Cannabis Conference on Tuesday, September 29, 2020. Please contact your institutional salesperson at Alliance Global Partners to schedule a meeting.
For more information about Schwazze, please visit https://www.Schwazze.com/.
About Schwazze
Medicine Man Technologies, Inc. is now operating under its new trade name, Schwazze. Schwazze (OTCQX: SHWZ) is executing its vision to become a leading vertically integrated cannabis holding company with a portfolio consisting of top-tier licensed brands spanning cultivation, extraction, infused-product manufacturing, dispensary operations, consulting, and a nutrient line. Schwazze leadership includes Colorado cannabis leaders with proven expertise in product and business development as well as top-tier executives from Fortune 500 companies. As a leading platform for vertical
Uncertain future for Indians studying medicine in China
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The number of Indian students pursuing MBBS in China has grown immensely in the past few years. Today there are an estimated 21,000 Indian students studying MBBS in China. Now due to India-China border tension, the future of these students looks bleak, reports Nikunj Sharma.
By Nikunj Sharma
Thousands of Indian doctors who graduated from Chinese universities, foreign education consultants in India, and medicine aspirants for Chinese universities are all skeptical about their future prospects in their own country. Reason? The continuously growing anti-China sentiments since the COVID-19 outbreak coupled with India-China border stand-off is making both the domestic work environment and study scenario in the neighboring country tad complicated.
So much so that Indian students who came back from China during winter break in January are not even sure whether they will be allowed to join back their course or university in China.
While most students
OMRF, OU Medicine team up to create local COVID-19 test
OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) – The COVID-19 pandemic forced a testing supply shortage across the country early on.
Oklahomans saw that firsthand months ago, when our state simply did not have enough COVID-19 tests to go around.
Doctors tell KFOR that clinical laboratories across the US were all trying to get their hands on the same testing supplies at the same time.
“We felt like the test needed to be out there and we were having trouble getting reagents for the normal tests” said Joel Guthridge, with the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation.
So researchers with the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation teamed up with OU Medicine to come up with a way to create a test right here in our state.
They say they also partnered with the Fluidigm Corporation.
“We had equipment that we thought would be ideal for this,” said Guthridge.
The unique equipment helped to create a local COVID-19