What a Difference a Year Makes

This was our corporate headquarters last year at this time (following "Snowmageddon"). This year, it's 54 degrees here in New Lenox, Illinois. Mother Nature sure likes to keep us on our toes, doesn't she?

Diabetes-Related Amputations Dropping

According to a new report, foot and leg amputations in diabetics over the age of 40 dropped an astounding 65 percent between 1996 and 2008. The reasons? Improvements in blood sugar control, foot care, diabetes management and an overall decline in cardiovascular disease.

However, the study pointed out that nontraumatic lower-extremity amputations (NLEA) continue to be disproportionately high among people over the age of 75, blacks and men.

To learn more, click here.

Non-Stop Hiccups: Warning Sign of a Heart Attack?

We've all heard the typical signs of a heart attack - chest pain, difficulty breathing, nausea, dizziness, sweating. Do we need to add hiccups to the list?

According to a case study in the January issue of the American Journal of Emergency Medicine, non-stop hiccups were the only warning sign of a heart attack in a 68-year-old man. The man went to the ER after hiccuping every four to six seconds for four days. He had no other health complaints, so after examining him the doctors gave him a muscle relaxant and another drug to ease hiccups and sent him on his way.

The drugs failed to stop his hiccuping and he was back in the ER two days later. Because he was an older man with several risk factors for heart disease, including diabetes, smoking and high blood pressure, he was given an EKG, which revealed several heart rhythm abnormalities. Subsequent blood tests revealed high levels of a protein that is released when the heart muscle has been recently damaged, confirming the diagnosis of a small heart attack.

Hiccups are an extremely rare and highly unusual sign of a heart attack. In fact, cases like this one are so few and far between that the last documented one happened more than 50 years ago. The study's authors explained that when a heart is not getting enough oxygen because less blood is flowing through a diseased artery, this can irritate the nerves of the diaphragm and cause hiccuping. They also pointed out even when hiccuping is present during a heart attack, it is usually accompanied by other concerning symptoms.

Click here to learn more.

Professional Medical Supply, Inc. Receives LTC LINK Elite Supplier Award

Professional Medical Supply, Inc. is proud to announce that it has earned an "Elite Supplier" distinction for the 8^th Annual LTC LINK Meetings. This award is given to the suppliers that participated in LINK 2011 and ranked in the top 25% of suppliers based on provider scores for their ability to be consultative, innovative, and address providers’ specific needs.

“This seal identifies Professional Medical Supply, Inc. as a progressive thought leader in long term care and senior living, and as an organization that understands how to build partnerships with clients,” said Bailey Beeken, LINK Conference Director and Vice President for Lincoln Healthcare Events.

LTC LINK brings top executives from large long term care and senior living provider organizations together with executives from leading suppliers for peer-to-peer education, networking and consultative meetings centered on generating actionable business improvement ideas. LINK suppliers represent over 35 product/service categories, with participation from innovative industry leaders and emerging companies.

The LINK program offers educational sessions, including case studies from the LINK Spirit of Innovation Award winners, roundtable discussions and innovation focus groups.

LINK is exclusively for top level long term care and senior living provider executive teams from organizations with revenue over $30 million.

Don’t Let Winter Weather Wreak Havoc with Resident Skin

The weather outside has certainly been frightful lately – and it can do a number on the already-delicate skin of your residents. As we age, our skin is likely to become drier due to the natural loss of oil glands, which help keep skin soft. Combine this with the drier air created by indoor heating, and you have the perfect recipe for dry, flaking or cracking skin.

 What can you do to keep your residents – and yourself – comfortable? Here are eight ideas:

1.       Ask your supplier rep or a dermatologist which products they would recommend to deliver extra moisture to skin that is battered by the winter elements.

2.       Moisturize resident skin more often with a product that creates a protective layer on the skin to help retain moisture.

3.       If residents will be going outside, apply sunscreen to their faces and hands (if they’re exposed). Winter sun, when combined with glare from snow, can still damage skin.

4.       The skin on our hands is thinner and contains fewer oil glands, which makes it harder to keep hands moisturized in the winter. When your residents go outside, make sure they’re wearing gloves (and remember that wool gloves can cause irritation to the skin).

5.       If residents come back into the building wearing wet socks or gloves, remove them immediately to reduce the likelihood of itching, cracking, sores or even eczema flare-ups.

6.       Consider placing several small humidifiers throughout the building. These help to put more moisture into the air, which helps prevent the skin from becoming dry.

7.       To keep residents’ feet moisturized, seek out a lotion that contains petroleum jelly or glycerine.

8.       Keep in mind that super-hot baths and showers can break down the lipid barriers in the skin, leading to moisture loss.

To learn more, click here.

Robotic Baby Designed to Ease Depression in Elderly

Japanese scientists - who have already brought us a robotic nurse that looks like a giant bear - have now created a robotic "baby" to help ease the depression that can plague the elderly.

Dubbed "Babyloids," the robots are currently being tested in Japanese nursing homes, where they've been shown to improve stress and depression in residents who interact with them in eight-minute intervals, for a total of 90 minutes per day.

If they make it to market, the companionship of a Babyloid won't come cheap. Manufacturers expect they will sell for $1,250 each.

Click here for a video of the Babyloid in action.

For-Profit Nursing Home Jobs Outpacing Nonprofits

While job growth in the nonprofit sector has blossomed over the past 10 years, that's not the case in long-term care, according to a new study.

The study, conducted by researchers at The Johns Hopkins University Center for Civil Society Studies, found that more than half of the nonprofit jobs in the U.S. are in the healthcare field. The majority of those (37 percent) are at hospitals. Healthcare clinics and nursing homes combine to account for the other 20 percent.

Between 2000 and 2010, nonprofit job growth in healthcare saw an average annual increase of 2.1 percent. For-profit jobs, on the other hand, saw a decline of 0.6 percent per year.

Click here to learn more.

FDA: J&J Could Face Penalties for Not Reporting Insulin Pump Failure

The FDA has warned Johnson and Johnson (J&J) that it could face penalties for not reporting incidents in which the company's insulin pumps have failed.

According to a letter from the FDA, J&J should have reported incidents where device failure could have led to injury, including diabetic ketoacidosis. They also noted that J&J failed to develop a system for making adequate medical device reports. The letter was drafted following a site visit in 2011.

To learn more, click here.

Study: Some Healthcare Workers Use Gloves as Substitute for Proper Hand Hygiene

A British study has found that healthcare workers who wear gloves while treating patients are less likely to wash their hands in between patients, suggesting that they might be substituting glove use for additional recommended hand hygiene protocols.

The researchers observed more than 7,000 patient contacts in 56 ICUs and geriatric care units in 15 different hospitals. They found that proper hand hygiene compliance - both changing gloves and washing one's hands - happened only 47.7 percent of the time.

The study noted that hands can be contaminated by "back spray" of bodily fluids when gloves are removed and that some germs can get through latex gloves.

To learn more, click here.

Online "Mortality Calculators" Now Available

A team at the University of California at San Francisco has developed an online assessment tool that allows clinicians to predict mortality for older adults.

The tool, available at ePrognosis.org, helps doctors predict an older adult's life expectancy in order to help prevent over-treatment and over-testing. There are 16 different calculators to choose from on the site, based on whether the person in question is living at home, in a hospital or in a LTC facility. Users can also enter variables such as age, health conditions, cognitive status and functional ability.

To learn more, click here.

Study: Turn Off Decorative Fountains to Avoid Legionnaires' Disease

The researchers behind a new study are urging healthcare facilities to shut down their indoor fountains to help stop the spread of Legionnaires' disease.

The study was conducted following an outbreak of Legionnaires' disease, a respiratory illness, in southeast Wisconsin. The outbreak was eventually tied to a decorative fountain in a hospital lobby. Legionnaires' disease is spread through the inhalation of contaminated water sources.

The disease's severity makes it especially risk for people who have compromised immune systems, such as the elderly.

To learn more, click here.

Iowa Considering LTC Sex Offender Rule

Terry Brandstad, the governor of Iowa, plans to ask the state legislature to pass a bill that would require notification of sex offenders moving into long-term care facilities.

If the bill is passed, residents, staff and community members would be notified when a sex offender is committed to a care facility. It would be enforced by the Department of Inspections and Appeals.

According to a 2005 Government Accountability Office report, there are close to 700 sex offenders living in long-term care facilities nationwide. Approximately 55 of those live in facilities in Iowa.

To learn more, click here.

Tips for Safe Oxygen Storage and Use

If oxygen is being used by residents in your facility, then you know that it does a wonderful job of helping to manage the symptoms of a number of medical conditions, including COPD, congestive heart failure, lung cancer, emphysema and occupational lung disease. However, oxygen can also be hazardous when not handled and used properly.

Oxygen is not flammable, but fire needs it in order to burn. In an oxygen-rich environment, any fire that starts will burn faster and hotter. Increased oxygen also lowers the temperature at which things will ignite, including hair, clothing, plastic, skin oils, furniture, etc.

The tips below were provided by the FDA with the goal of minimizing the risk of fire when oxygen is in use.1

• Do not allow smoking or burning candles around oxygen.
• Store oxygen in a clean, dry location that is out of direct sunlight.
• Keep oxygen tank post valves, regulators, gauges and fittings away from all combustible substances, including oil, grease, lubricants and rubber.
• Have properly trained staff members handle the operation, cleaning, repairing and transfilling of oxygen equipment.
• Designate special tools for use on oxygen equipment and mark them "Use with Oxygen Equipment Only."
• Make sure that any components added to the regulator do not block the regulator vent holes.
• Use plugs, caps and plastic bags to protect equipment that is not in use.

Additionally, your facility should display "No Smoking" signs anywhere that oxygen is in use and avoid taking residents who use oxygen to the beauty shop because of the potential hazard caused by sitting under hair dryers while wearing oxygen.

To learn more, click here.

Reference
1 U.S. Food and Drug Administration. FDA and NIOSH Public Health Advisory: Explosions and Fires in Aluminum Oxygen Regulators. Available at: http://www.fda.gov/MedicalDevices/Safety/AlertsandNotices/PublicHealthNotifications/ucm062286.htm. Accessed January 4, 2012.

Novartis Recalls Excedrin, Bufferin, Others Over Broken and Mislabeled Pills

Novartis Consumer Health is voluntarily recalling lots of Excedrin, No-Doz, Bufferin and Gas-X Prevention over concerns that the bottles could contain stray tablets, capsules or tablets of other Novartis products or contain broken or chipped tablets.
Inadvertently taking mixed products could cause consumers to receive a higher or lower strength of a product than intended. It could also lead to overdose, interaction with other medications or an allergic reaction.

The affected bottles have expiration dates of December 20, 2014 (for Excedrin and No-Doz) and December 20, 2013 or earlier (for Bufferin and Gas-X).

To learn more and view impacted product lots, click here.

Defying the Odds, Stephen Hawking Will Turn 70 This Weekend

Renowned physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking will turn 70 years old this Sunday - 49 years after being diagnoses with Lou Gehrig's disease. Most people with the disease die within a few years of diagnosis and only 10 percent of patients survive longer than a decade.

Hawking, the author of A Brief History of Time, is almost entirely paralyzed and has been wheelchair-bound since 1970. He relies on a computer and voice synthesizer to speak.

Lou Gehrig's disease, also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, attacks motor neurons, which control the muscles. Patients commonly suffer muscle weakness and wasting, become paralyzed and have problems talking, swallowing and breathing.

To learn more about Hawking's life and work, click here.

HHS Releases Final Quality Measures for Medicaid Beneficiaries

The Department of Health and Human Services has published its final core set of quality measures - 26 in all - for adult Medicaid beneficiaries. The measures can be used voluntarily by healthcare providers and insurers to track care delivery among adults enrolled in Medicaid. They can also be used to monitor and improve quality.

The measures are contained in six major categories:

1. Prevention and health promotion
2. Management of acute conditions
3. Management of chronic conditions
4. Family experiences of care
5. Care coordination
6. Availability of care

Click here to read the full final rule.

American Dietetic Association Announces New Name

Hasta la vista, American Dietetic Association. Hola,  The Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. The organization has officially changed its name, effective January 1.

According to Sylvia Escott-Stump, the Academy's president, "Protecting the public's health is the highest priority of the Academy and our members, and our new name complements our focus: the nutritional well-being of the American public."

The group had been known as the American Dietetic Association ever since its founding in 1917.

To learn  more, click here.

Is a New Disinfection Option In the Air?

Canadian researchers have discovered a new disinfection method that could have implications for healthcare facilities. The research team, based out of Canada's Queen's University and Medizone International, found that pumping an ozone and hydrogen peroxide vapor gas mixture into a room sterilized all of the room's surfaces.

The researchers noted that the disinfection method's biggest implication is preventing infectious disease in healthcare settings.

To learn more, click here.