The writer of this piece in the Telegraph has some very timely advice regarding what can be done to bring the rise in infections in hospitals under control. It seems that a good starting place is the use of bleach. She is a doctor who has experience in infection control. Dr. Jane makes some very interesting observations regarding the cleanliness of the wards in hospitals and why this issue has not been brought under control. It seems that the NHS are not using ward staff for the cleaning jobs, but they are paying contractors who have no real knowledge regarding the issue of bugs and cleanliness.
She points out that the microbiology departments of the hospitals are under-utilized even though there is a growing problem with the superbugs. The spores that cause the infection are killed by household bleach, or at least the hospital grade bleach. Why are the cleaners not using these products? She points out that she had a stay at the University Hospital and she was appalled over the cleaning standards, and how visitors are allowed onto the wards when the floors are still wet, allowing more bugs to remain in the ward.
It sounds like this problem can be controlled, but there has to be a return to the old standards of cleanliness. If the UK continues with the underfunding of its hospital system then the situation will only get worse. Perhaps this is a sign that socialized medicine is in melt-down.
Forget the Flowers, bring the bleach
October 19, 2007 at 10:14 am (Clostridum Difficile, Life, State of UK hospitals, hospital health and safety issue)
Miraculous survival of Australia’s smallest baby
October 18, 2007 at 5:22 am (Life)
Mario Xuereb
October 18, 2007
WHEN she was born, Elora De Bondi’s arms barely spanned the length of her mother’s finger.
The baby was born on January 29 weighing 319 grams, making her possibly the smallest baby born alive in Australia.
Before she was delivered 16 weeks’ premature, doctors at the Royal Women’s Hospital doubted she would live. But her mother, Adele, even after being told by doctors that they held no hope, never lost her own hope.
Ms De Bondi, 29, learnt that her pregnancy was in trouble during an ultrasound scan. Her baby was too small and her pregnancy would most probably end within a month.
“Basically, I was 20 weeks pregnant but the baby was about 17 weeks in size,” Ms De Bondi said yesterday.
Doctors gave her a course of steroids in the hope of stimulating Elora’s growth. Her lungs had scarcely developed.
After two weeks, doctors told Ms De Bondi that her placenta was dying and, with it, Elora.
Undeterred by the prognosis, Ms De Bondi demanded a caesarean section despite the risks of losing not only her child but her fertility and her own life.
Elora was born after only 24 weeks in the womb. She spent seven months in intensive care attached to ventilators.
Ms De Bondi, from North Balwyn, says Elora came close to dying countless times: she battled infections, renal failure and the stress of her surroundings. Many times doctors advised Ms De Bondi to switch off Elora’s life support. Her mother remained steadfast, trusting that her fragile daughter, who she had barely touched, would pull through.
After months in a critical condition, Elora grew to 4.4 kilograms. She left hospital on August 27, astounding doctors with her survival.
Elora’s pediatrician said her story was “miraculous but the journey is long and uncertain for extremely tiny babies”.
“Families, and the staff who care for such premature babies, have faced the most difficult decisions of survival and quality of life,” said Sue Jacobs, director of the Royal Women’s neonatal services.
Before Elora, the smallest surviving baby at the Royal Women’s was Adriana Cassar, born 13 weeks premature, at 374 grams, eight years ago.
Elora faces many hurdles. She is fed through a gastronasal tube and her immune system is weak. While her lung disease is expected to clear in childhood, doctors will wait at least two years before giving the all-clear.
Elora de Bondi is possibly the smallest baby born alive in Australia.
US firm plans to exploit frozen embryos
October 16, 2007 at 10:01 am (IVF cell bank, Life, embryonic stem cell research, frozen stem cells)
BBC NEWS | Health | IVF ‘cell bank’ plan criticised
The California based company StemLifeLine has announced a plan to store stem cells from spare IVF embryos. However, this plan has angered UK scientists. The theory is that cells banked from one embryo could provide treatment for a sibling threatened by serious disease in the future.Lord Robert Winston has hit out at the scheme stating that it is preying on parent’s fears about the future of their children.
Stem cells are the master cells that are capable of growing into a wide variety of different tissues, and scientists believe that one day these stem cells can be harnessed to fight such diseases as Parkinson’s Disease and Alzheimer’s Disease. To date, there has not been any successful treatment developed from embryonic stems cells.
Whilst the Californian company claims that one day these cells “might be useful”, Lord Winston has hit back stating that:
“There is no scientific evidence to sustain the notion that this will be a useful procedure. I would be horrified if anyone tried to do this in Britain.”
Professor Stephen Minger, from Kings College, London, also spoke against the purpose of this company with the following comment:
“My worry is that this is a commercial service that is being promoted to companies when the science is not really there to justify it.
It is like trying to run before you can walk, and the fact it is being done for commercial purposes makes it worse.”
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The death of so Many patients could have been avoided
October 14, 2007 at 10:17 am (Clostridum Difficile, Life, State of UK hospitals, hospital health and safety issue)
C.diff death scandal could have been avoided
By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor
Last Updated: 3:06am BST 12/10/2007
Commentary
This is by far the worst single outbreak of a hospital infection and the fact at least 90 people probably died as a result is a scandal.
Clostridium difficile is a common hospital infection and poses a far greater threat to health services than the more notorious MRSA.
It is extremely infectious and the spores can live on surfaces, door handles, lavatory seats, bed rails and the like for days or weeks.
Hospital hygiene practices play an enormous role in preventing an outbreak emerging from a single infected person.
However, a clean hospital will still have problems with infections and gimmicks such as doctors wearing short sleeves and no ties can only go so far.
Good nursing care is essential so it is vital that hospitals have enough staff.There needs to be the time and space for cleaners to decontaminate beds between patients.
This is where Government targets are said to have hampered infection control measures because the pressure has been on to admit people from A&E before their four hour waiting time is up and to get patients in for surgery and off the waiting lists.
Doctors have also been too willing to prescribe broad spectrum antibiotics and at Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust patients at risk of C.diff were given unsuitable medication that made it easier for the bug to take hold.
Using antibiotics sparingly means it takes longer for the organism to become resistant to the drug which makes it more difficult to treat.
Some degree of resistance is inevitable and hospitals will never be completely clear of infections.
What makes this case so horrifying is the sheer scale of it and the lack of action by mangers despite repeated warnings from staff and patients.
The fact some people came into the hospital with entirely curable conditions, only to contract C.diff and die is utterly tragic and should never be repeated.
A Scandal erupts in UK hospitals – hundreds of patients die from Clostridium Difficile bug
October 14, 2007 at 10:03 am (Clostridum Difficile, Life, State of UK hospitals, hospital health and safety issue, pro-life)
The UK government has released a report concerning the deaths of hundreds of people who have died in hospital as a result of contracting what is known as the super bug Clostridium Difficile. These deaths are the direct result of some extraordinarily poor health practices on the wards of hospitals in the U.K. Is it a matter of staff being stressed out because of too much work, or is it a matter of poor training in the first place? Certainly there should be no excuse for the discovery of dirty sinks in a ward:
Case studies: Wretched death of C.diff victims
By Gordon Rayner, Stephen Adams, Lucy Cockcroft and Laura Clout
Last Updated: 3:07am BST 12/10/2007
Families of some of the 331 patients whose deaths have been linked to Clostridium Difficile in Britain’s worst hospital superbug outbreak welcomed the findings of yesterday’s Healthcare Commission report which disclosed the scale of the scandal.
A sink in a cleaning room at Maidstone Hospital
Several of the relatives spoke to The Daily Telegraph to share their experiences of the shocking conditions, to expose the chronic understaffing which many say is to blame, and to express the devastation of seeing a loved one die in such circumstances.
FLORRIE FIELD
A healthy 86-year-old who worked part-time in a clothes shop, Florrie Field contracted C.diff at the end of March this year after being admitted to Maidstone Hospital with an eye infection.
Doctors told her family that the chronic diarrhoea she suffered after being given anti-biotics was just a reaction to the drugs. She was sent home after two weeks.
It was only when she collapsed at home and a GP visited her that C.diff was diagnosed. She was taken to the Kent and Sussex Hospital for treatment but died on May 27.
Her daughter, Brenda Charlton, said she saw staff at Maidstone Hospital failing to wash their hands or change aprons as they went from patient to patient. Three times they told Mrs Field to wet her bed, saying they didn’t have time to take her to the bathroom or bring a bedpan.
Mrs Charlton’s husband Tony, 63, said: “You would have thought someone at the hospital would have recognised the symptoms, but there was a failure of procedure and it wasn’t noted.”
RANJIT GOSAL
John Gosal is planning to sue Maidstone Hospital for a catalogue of errors which he says led to the death of his mother from C.diff.
Ranjit Gosal, 71, who was being treated for ovarian cancer, caught the bug in May last year and died the following June after what her son describes as “shambolic” treatment, including doctors prescribing antibiotics that made her condition worse.
Mr Gosal said: “The conditions in Maidstone Hospital were appalling. There was dust everywhere and it smelled. One patient who had diarrhoea was on the ward with just a curtain separating her from the other patients.
“Though the hospital was in the middle of the outbreak, they didn’t check my mother had C.diff and it was only diagnosed after she died.”
JOSEPH NIXON
The 87-year-old Dunkirk veteran died a wretched death last July after catching C.diff at Maidstone Hospital.
His daughter Jackie said the former officer with the Metropolitan Police was appalled by the conditions at the hospital where “hour by hour his soul was being stripped”.
Mr Nixon, who caught the superbug after a bowel operation, asked his daughter: “What have I done to deserve being trapped in this awful place?”
Mrs Nixon, who took her father home to die, said there was little the nurses could do because the wards were so chronically understaffed.
“I ended up having to change my father’s bed for him the whole time because otherwise he would be left lying in his own soiled sheets for three to four hours at a time,” she said. “Keeping hospitals clean is basic. But there aren’t enough nurses to do it properly.”
DOREEN FORD
After being given chemotherapy at Maidstone Hospital for a tumour under her arm, Doreen Ford, 77, a retired civil servant, was told she did not have to go back to the hospital for six months.
But Mrs Ford had been given a blood transfusion as part of her treatment, during which she contracted C.diff. She died five weeks later, in October last year. Her family was unaware she had the superbug until they saw it on her death certificate.
Her stepson Steve Stroud, 55, said: “When we asked the hospital about the C.diff she had contracted there was a bit of a silence there.
“They didn’t seem to want to talk about it. We had to have our house fumigated to kill off the C.diff spores which can last for six months, but we were told the disinfectant which was used in our house is 100 per cent effective, so we wanted to know why the hospital wasn’t using the same chemicals. They wouldn’t answer.”
Mr Stroud’s wife, the former Bucks Fizz singer, Cheryl Baker, later called for Maidstone Hospital to stop admitting patients likely to be vulnerable to the C.diff bug.
MARY HIRST
Having broken her hip in a fall, Mary Hirst, 83, was told by doctors at Maidstone Hospital that she would be home in a week.
But shortly before she was due to be discharged she began suffering from diarrhoea, and seven weeks later, on May 24 last year, she died, having contracted C.diff and MRSA.
Her daughter, Jackie Stewart, said: “She used to be fighting fit. She looked after a three-bedroom semi, did the gardening and hadn’t seen a doctor in years.
“Everything was going well, the hip was fixing, then four days after her operation to mend her hip we were told she had diarrhoea. As far as we knew that’s all she had. We were not told that she had C.diff.
“She was left in her own soiled sheets and was sobbing because nobody had cleaned her up. Her treatment was appalling. She was not being fed properly, not being cleaned, and there was only one commode between six patients. She didn’t die of a broken hip, she died of hospital neglect.”
Mrs Stewart said she was considering suing Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust. She said she was “not surprised” by the Healthcare Commission’s revelation of so many deaths from C.diff.
“They seemed to be taking bodies away every five minutes,” she said.
Every single case that has been highlighted in this story involves an elderly patient, and it is almost as if the staff at these hospitals were deliberately not caring for these elderly patients. I would not like to think that this was true, but it seems that there is a pattern to this neglect. Leaving patients in soiled sheets is downright disgusting. Refusing to take them to the toilet is an abuse of the elderly patient. The staff at these hospitals have been behaving in a very abusive way towards elderly patients. They try to hide behind the mask of not having enough staff to cope on the wards. Does the buck stop with the hospital? Does it go further and implicate a lack of proper government funding? Or is it pointing to the flaw of having a totally public hospital system that relies upon government funding, where there is not enough funds being allocated in the right way so that elderly patients receive the correct form of care? Or is it a case of hiring third world staff who do not know enough about personal hygiene, thus risking the lives of patients who are being admitted to hospital wards that are being kept in third world conditions?
Two anniversaries this weekend
October 8, 2007 at 3:26 am (Life)
It was a sudden realization that I remembered that we have reached the third anniversary of the death of my good friend Margaret Davis. We first met Margaret and Dennis when we attended a meeting that was designed to stop the local council allowing a hotel to be opened in the main shopping area of Castle Hill,Sydney. We belonged to the same parish and as we sat there waiting for the meeting to begin we got talking to each other. Margaret and Dennis had been married for more than 60 years when Margaret passed away as a result of a stroke. She was very dedicated to the Divine Mercy and so it was fitting that she should die on the feast of St. Faustina. I can remember the funeral service and the tribute given to Margaret by our parish priest at the time, and his expression of how we were all going to miss Margaret. It is true, because I used to tease her because she was so slow with walking (she had fractured her hip) and on the Sunday I would be always calling out “come on Margaret, hurry up”. We used to always sit behind Margaret and Dennis every Sunday, and then when I attended Saturday Mass, I used to sit in front of them. It was a wonderful friendship with an elderly couple.
This weekend was also the first anniversary of the death of another good friend, Dr. Frank Orioles. Frank was a very faith-filled man from an Italian background. He passed away as a result of secondary bone cancer as a result of having cancer of the kidney. I watched as Frank struggled against his cancer and yet he continued to come each day to daily Mass. Another good friend, Vince, decided that Frank was not well enough to drive himself to the church, and so Vince devoted himself to picking up Frank every morning. If Frank was not there, then I would ask where he was. There is little that I can say about Frank, but I have a lot of endearing memories, especially memories concerning his sense of humour.
I met Frank in Castle Hill because he was a member of the same family group. Over the years this family group endured a lot together. The original group went through the children receiving first Holy Communion, Confirmation, and marriages. Then the son-in-law of one member passed away from stomach cancer – he was only 32. On the very next day my grandmother passed away after a series of heart attacks – she was just shy of 99. Frank’s mother passed away, and then the brother of one of the group members suddenly passed away as a result of a heart attack (I knew John from daily Mass). Other members also lost family members. The group was there when my father suffered a stroke and then he died, and I am grateful to Frank for his concern, especially in answering my questions, and 18 months later my sister died from primary bone cancer. Other members lost mothers and fathers, but in all we were able to give each other support at those times of loss of family members.
Even when Frank was so very sick, he always enquired about my health. He knew that I had not been very well, and he always maintained concern. If I missed the daily Mass for any reason, I would get a phone call from Frank asking me if anything was wrong. That was Frank Orioles. A gentle man who put himself out for others.
The first anniversary of Maureen’s death
May 7, 2006 at 2:03 am (Life)
Today I commemorate the first anniversary of my sister’s death that came about as the result of undiagnosed bone cancer. The past year has been very hard because of the anger the whirls up inside when I hear about the neglect of doctors who dismissed her complaints as being nothing. One doctor told her to go home and drink plenty of fluid, despite the fact that Maureen had gone to this doctor because she could neither eat nor drink.
Today is also the day in which Maureen entered into Eternal Life. I sincerely believe that Maureen is destined for a place in heaven, for no matter what shameful things she did during her life, there were also the things that showed that underneath she had a good heart and was motivated in the right direction. Also, my sister received the Last Rites and all of her sins were forgiven by God.
My sister had struggled with Bulimia Nervosa, but she had treatment and in the end she had another child, Paris, after she had returned to a more normal state. She worked as a nurse’s aide and she loved working with the elderly. This is the one who took in her nieces when they were thrown out of home by their father. She cared for my grandmother and she used to go there to help Nana with things such as her hair. When Nana was placed in a nursing home, Maureen continued her regular visits, and this continued right up until Nana passed away only a short time prior to her 99th birthday.
Maureen was too young to die, for she was only 52 years of age at the time of her death. Perhaps, if the doctors had taken her seriously, instead of pushing her away and telling her that nothing was wrong, she might be alive today, and I would not be sitting here worrying about Paris and Renee. I worry about Paris because she is only 15 years old and she has started dressing like a Goth. In this respect, Renee is not proving reliable in her guardianship of her sister.
So, at this point in time, rather than mourning my sister’s untimely death, I celebrate her life and all the good things that can be remembered about her existence. How many have looked after the elderly to the point of doing their mending? That was my sister.
The meaning of Life in St. John’s Gospel
April 19, 2006 at 10:57 am (Life)
As a Christian (Catholic) I am very drawn to St. John’s Gospel because it spells out the spiritual meaning of Life. St. John’s Gospel is a very rich tapestry of meanings. Every single sentence has so much meaning that it is difficult not to find something new each time a Gospel story is examined. There are several themes or motifs where the “life” is expounded in St. John’s Gospel, and one of the most outstanding, and probably the most argued, is St. John chapter 6. It is in the discourse at Capernaeum that we see Jesus telling His disciples: “I am the Bread of Life”.
To better understand the discourse at Capernaeum, we need to place ourselves amongst those who were the hearers of Jesus. We need to place ourselves with the people who had been present for the Eucharistic miracle that had taken place the previous day. We need to feel the excitement of the crowd as they realised exactly what had taken place, and how Jesus had performed a miracle for them. By placing ourselves amongst the crowd we can take note of the atmosphere, and learn why the Jews refused to believe what they were hearing.
It is not my intention to examine the whole of this chapter because that will make me digress from the real meaning of life, for in this case, Jesus is talking about Eternal Life, and that without Jesus there is no Bread of Life, or as I understand, grace.
The word “grace” represents the breath of life that is given to our spirits when we are first baptized and welcomed into God’s family. It is the means by which we are purified so that we can enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. Without grace, that is without that purity, we cannot enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. We receive grace from the Holy Spirit, who proceeds from both the Father and the Son.
We need God’s grace to help us to make the right and moral choices throughout our lives. When we sin, especially those small sins, we lose a little bit of grace. Each time we lose grace our consciences become dulled until we reach the point where we cannot distinguish good from evil.
Take for example the Schiavo case where we still do not know the truth about Theresa’s collapse. The husband had already been guilty of bashing Terri, as evidenced by her work colleague as well as family members who had noted the bruises on her arms. In other words, a sin had already been committed, for it is a sin to treat one’s spouse in that way. Now, assuming that there had been an argument and that Terri had collapsed because of an attempt to strangle or restrain her, then one can see how that sin is compounded by the panic not to be caught.
Yet, this is only the starting point: what if this man was already guilty of having lovers behind his wife’s back? If this was the situation then his conscience was already becoming dulled as a result of his sin of adultery. So is it any wonder that he turned his back on his wife whilst she was helpless and paraded his women before her?
However, the sin was then compounded by the deception involved in taking out a lawsuit against Terri’s doctors falsely claiming that they had failed to diagnose her non-existent bulimia. The truth is, he lied during that lawsuit. A jury should have dismissed the case for compensation, but they felt sorry. This is the man who perjured himself by falsely claiming that he intended to look after Terri until death. It is now very clear that he was going to finish off Terri once he got the compensation money. This yet further evidence of a dulled conscience. Thus we have the situation where in the end this man advocated for his wife’s death because he was done with using her to get money.
One sin always begets another sin, and this is the real meaning of spiritual life and spiritual death. Sin causes spiritual death. It was through the sin of Adam and Eve that death first entered into the world. One can ask: Does Scripture mean physical death, or does it really mean spiritual death? When the snake told Eve “you will not die”, the snake meant physical death, but when God said “you will die”, God meant spiritual death.
An unspiritual person is one who is dead to the presence of God. This is the person whose mind is so dulled that he or she can no longer discern God in his or her life. Yet, we must never think that there is no hope for that person, because that is never God’s intention.
The words: “I am the Bread of Life, whoever comes to me shall not hunger. Whoever drinks from me shall not thirst” are words packed with meaning. When Jesus said that we mus eat His Flesh, the Jews turned away in disgust because they recognized that Jews meant that they were to literally “chew” on His Flesh. The real meaning of this statement was revealed at the Last Supper when Jesus took the bread, gave thanks and said “Take and eat, this is My Body that is given up for you and for all” (paraphrased), and He took the cup of wine and said: “This cup is the blood of the new and everlasting covenant in My Blood” (paraphrased). This is the moment that is repeated at every Catholic Mass as we are constantly reminded and we remind God what His Son did to save us from the debt due for our sins. To eat of the Body of Christ is to share the Eucharist with all who are present at the Mass. To eat and share in the Eucharist is the gift of grace that we receive from God so that we too will have Eternal Life as promised in the discourse of St. John Chapter 6.
What is the meaning of Life?
March 29, 2006 at 7:46 am (Euthanasia, Life, Terri Schiavo)
Is there any way in which we can answer something so philosophical as the meaning of life? I do not believe that there is one correct meaning because the word "Life" has many and varied meanings. However, to me the most significant meaning is Life equals the Holy Spirit within or Grace. When Scripture speaks of Life, it is not just what happens to our bodies, but the destination of our eternal souls. Are we on a journey that leads to Eternal Life, or have we made the choice to follow the path that leads to Eternal Death?
In our madcap world we have come to undervalue the actual word "Life", because some no longer recognize the role of God in our lives. Instead of recognizing that all life is precious, there are many who choose to ignore what it means to give birth to life as they make babies in the womb something that is a commodity to be thrown away.
We have come a long way since the decision of Roe vs. Wade. At the time that this case was decided most women who fell pregnant had their babies and either kept them and raised them, or they had them adopted out. Now it seems that when a teenager finds herself pregnant it is automatically assumed that she will want a termination. There is something very wrong when society has reached such a dismal point.
When a woman aborts her child within the womb she is removing something that belongs to her, but also does not belong to her. She is taking away a life that was granted to her by God, the creator. From the moment that her boyfriend's sperm has reached her egg and fertilized it, a new life has begun in earnest. Why then should doctors and nursing staff be offering abortions? Whatever happened to that oath to uphold life?
The decision of Roe vs. Wade has had other more severe consequences. It has, as predicted by many, led to the push for euthanasia on demand. The medical profession had surreptiously taken upon itself the role of deciding who had the right to live and who had a quality of life, according to the bioethicist definition, that meant that a person had no right to exist.
The end result of this push for euthanasia on demand has been the implementation of the Groningen Protocol in Holland, and cases such as Schindler vs. Schiavo, where a woman, who was not dying was put to death in what has been a test case for euthanasia on demand in the USA. There had been other cases prior to that of Terri Schiavo, but in this case the litigants went right to the top of the Supreme Court.
Terri was deemed not to have a quality of life because she was brain damaged. Her husband abused her psychologically for close to 15 years, parading his women before her, and locking her up so that she could not enjoy having visitors of her own choice. Her life was ended in a brutal fashion because her estranged adulterous husband lied about her wishes. Terri's life meant nothing to him.
