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Harmful medical practices, like inappropriate prescribing of opioids and racial and income-based discrimination in clinical settings, can vary across medical practices and individuals. Patients may find that even common primary care health services, like getting a chest x-rays or a referral to a heart or lung specialist, can differ widely depending on your doctor or clinic location. These variations in medical practice can have serious consequences for the quality, equity and cost of one s health care; however, it s unclear whether these disparities can be attributed to individual differences, from one doctor to another or to changes in your doctor s individual practice over time, perhaps in response to shifts in clinical guidelines or advancements in diagnostic technologists. Is it person-to-person variation or variation over time? A group of Israeli researchers sought to answer this question in a retrospective cohort study using a decade of data from the largest health c
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Saliva sampling could be a similarly sensitive, less costly alternative to nasal swabs for COVID-19 testing
Nasopharyngeal swabs are the primary sampling method used for detection of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), but they require a trained health care professional and extensive personal protective equipment. Saliva-based sampling for detecting SARS-CoV-2 has the potential to address many barriers associated with nasopharyngeal swabs. Authors from McGill University summarize evidence comparing the sensitivities for detection of SARS-CoV-2 infection between nasopharyngeal swabs and saliva samples. They found that saliva sampling to be a similarly sensitive and less costly alternative that could replace nasopharyngeal swabs for collection of clinical samples for SARS-CoV-2 testing.
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Conditions are ripe for transforming the U.S. mental health care system, with scientific advances, the growth of Medicaid and political consensus on the importance of improving mental health creating the possibility that goals once thought out of reach may be possible, according to a new RAND Corporation study.
Broad changes will be needed to improve how Americans receive mental health care, such as integrating behavioral health care into general health care settings, providing supportive housing to the homeless and promoting comprehensive mental health education.
Federal mental health parity legislation is one recent promising development that aims to put coverage for mental health treatment and general health care on equal footing, but researchers say that more effort is needed to enforce the law.
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VIDEO: The MCM ward (450 m2 or 15m X 30m) accommodates four negative pressure bed rooms, nurse station, locker room, and treatment room. view more
Credit: KAIST
A team from KAIST has developed a low-cost and ready-for-rapid-production negative pressure room called a Mobile Clinic Module (MCM). The MCM is expandable, moveable, and easy to store through a combination of negative pressure frames, air tents, and multi-function panels.
The MCM expects to quickly meet the high demand for negative pressure beds in the nation and eventually many other countries where the third wave of COVID-19 is raging. The module is now ready to be rolled out after a three-week test period at the Korea Cancer Center Hospital.