Culture

Improvements in quality of care associated with the GP pay for performance scheme in the UK appear to have been achieved at the expense of small detrimental effects on non-incentivised aspects of care, finds a study published on bmj.com today.

The findings raise important questions about the potential unintended consequences of financial incentive schemes, in particular that they could lead to neglect of non-incentivised aspects of patient care.

MAYWOOD, Ill. -- Loyola University Hospital spine surgeon Dr. Alexander Ghanayem is co-author of a landmark editorial challenging the integrity of published industry-sponsored research involving a bone-growth product.

The unusually blunt editorial in The Spine Journal notes that in 13 trials involving 780 patients, industry-funded researchers did not report a single adverse advent involving Medtronic's Infuse® Bone Graft. (The product, approved for certain spinal-fusion surgeries, is designed to eliminate the need to harvest bone from the hip.)

Burlington and Toronto, Ontario, June 27, 2011 – Boehringer Ingelheim and Lilly today announced Phase III study results for linagliptin, demonstrating improved glycemic control in adults with type 2 diabetes (T2D) whose blood glucose is not adequately controlled on current therapy. In one long-term study over two years evaluating linagliptin or glimepiride when added to metformin, linagliptin was effective at lowering blood glucose, as measured by haemoglobin A1C (A1C)** but with relative weight loss (-1.4 kg vs.

Coordinating care among emergency medical services (EMS) and hospital systems significantly reduced the time to transfer heart attack patients to hospitals providing emergency coronary angioplasty, according to research reported in Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes, an American Heart Association journal.

Researchers examined "door-in-door-out" times at North Carolina hospitals among 436 patients experiencing ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) ― the deadliest form of heart attack when the blood supply is blocked to a large area of the heart.

We all know people who are able to roll with life's punches, while for others, every misfortune is a jab straight to the gut. Research examining this issue has found that although most people require significant adversity to become depressed — the death of a loved one, say, or getting fired — roughly 30 percent of people with first-time depression and 60 percent of people with a history of depression develop the disorder following relatively minor misfortunes. But no one knew why.

Researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine have found in a Phase II trial that a gene therapy developed at Mount Sinai stabilized or improved cardiac function in people with severe heart failure. Patients receiving a high dose of the therapy, called SERCA2a, experienced substantial clinical benefit and significantly reduced cardiovascular hospitalizations, addressing a critical unmet need in this population. The data are published online in the June 27 issue of the American Heart Association journal Circulation.

Stepladders, a household product used by thousands of people every day, are a surprisingly common cause of injury. In 2009, more than 187,000 Americans visited the hospital after sustaining stepladder injuries, many of which resulted from a fall. A recent human factors/ergonomics study explores how improved design and user behavior can decrease the likelihood of future accidents.

Doctors at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis are performing a new procedure to treat atrial fibrillation, a common irregular heartbeat.

New research by the University of Warwick and Humboldt university shows that the frequency of wars between states increased steadily from 1870 to 2001 by 2% a year on average. The research argues that conflict is being fed by economic growth and the proliferation of new borders.

The global economic recession of 2008-09 has been followed by a decline in fertility rates in Europe and the United States, bringing to an end the first concerted rise in fertility rates in the developed world since the 1960s, according to research published today.

Johns Hopkins University graduate students have invented a device to reduce the risk of infection, clotting and narrowing of the blood vessels in patients who need blood-cleansing dialysis because of kidney failure.

The device, designed to be implanted under the skin in a patient's leg, would give a technician easy access to the patient's bloodstream and could be easily opened and closed at the beginning and end of a dialysis procedure.

The prototype has not yet been used in human patients, but testing in animals has begun.

Cardiovascular disease (CVD), driven by the global pandemics of obesity and diabetes, poses a daunting challenge to clinicians in the 21st century. Despite progress, there is still much to be done to improve the control of dyslipidaemia, a key risk factor. In Europe, as many as one-half of patients are inadequately treated.1,2 The first European guidelines specifically focused on managing dyslipidaemias offer new hope.3,4 Experts from the European Atherosclerosis Society (EAS) and the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) worked together to develop these guidelines.

OAK BROOK, Ill. – Researchers may have discovered one reason that African Americans are at increased risk for heart attacks and other cardiovascular events.

According to a new study published online in the journal Radiology, African Americans have increased levels of non-calcified plaque, which consists of buildups of soft deposits deep in the walls of the arteries that are not detected by some cardiac tests. Non-calcified plaque is more vulnerable to rupturing and causing a blood clot, which could lead to a heart attack or other cardiovascular event.

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — With the threats of cybercrime, cyberterrorism and cyberwarfare looming over our hyper-connected world, the best defense for the U.S. might be a good offense, says new research by a University of Illinois expert in technology and legal issues.

Law professor Jay P. Kesan warns that an active self-defense regime, which he terms "mitigative counterstriking," is a necessity in cyberspace, especially to protect critical infrastructure such as banking, utilities and emergency services.

Individuals with diastolic dysfunction (an abnormality involving impaired relaxation of the heart's ventricle [pumping chamber] after a contraction) appear to have an increased risk of death, regardless of whether their systolic function (contraction of the heart) is normal or they have other cardiovascular impairments, according to a report in the June 27 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.