Steve Anthony: True Canadian Pharmacy

Around 500 pharmacists have now signed up to a training programme which would enable them to administer the swine flu vaccine.
The Health Service Executive has not yet indicated whether pharmacists will be involved in the planned flu vaccination programme.
However, the Irish Pharmaceutical Union (IPU) said it believed that it would be prudent to allow as wide a range of health professionals as possible to address the challenges that face us this !–more– winter.
A spokesperson said that the IPU would hope that pharmacists would be included in the plan for administration of the swine flu vaccine to the public in the coming months.
In Portugal, 40pc of all seasonal flu vaccines are administered by pharmacists. In the US, pharmacists have been involved in vaccinations since the mid-1990s, she said.

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p Time is running out, the doctors wrote. But health officials have told CBC News they are currently studying possibilities for rolling out the the vaccine, and expect to release recommendations within weeks. Noni MacDonald, senior editor of public health, said in their editorial. The earlier a vaccine is rolled out for those at high risk, the greater the chance to protect them, a CMAJ editorial says. Younger children have also been admitted to !–more– hospital at higher rates. Only by providing fast-track standard vaccine can high-risk groups be protected in a timely way, while the general public awaits the arrival of the adjuvant vaccine. No one at the Public Health Agency of Canada was available to comment on Monday. Having enough vaccine for every Canadian would make more sense if the pandemic virus were highly virulent for large proportions of the population. This approach is slower than providing the vaccine without adjuvant to high-risk groups to allow them to be immunized quickly, as the U. Using an adjuvant might make sense if results suggest that the vaccine is not effective without it, but if results show a good performance from fast-tracked vaccine without the adjuvant, Canada currently has no way to license such a vaccine quickly, the editors said. Canada’s approach to vaccinating people against swine flu is too slow to protect the most vulnerable, an editorial in Monday’s Canadian Medical Association Journal says. The pair stressed they are not suggesting sacrificing safety, but highlighting the need to adjust plans quickly depending on the results of safety and effectiveness trials that will start to be completed soon. Paul Hébert, editor-in-chief, and Dr. , Europe and Australia are doing, Dr. But given current evidence, it seems a poorer choice than providing coverage to high-risk groups as early as possible. Using an adjuvant requires a slower, more thorough licensing review process but ultimately allows more people to be immunized.
Complications such as severe acute lung injuries caused by the H1N1 pandemic strain have been mainly in adults, often First Nations people, those with chronic medical conditions and women late in pregnancy. To protect the public, health professionals need access to standard vaccines by early October and vaccine with adjuvant no later than mid-November, they suggested.
Health Canada has chosen to treat this pandemic virus like a new subtype, which requires more extensive review and a slower rollout than if it were considered a variant strain of H1N1, the editorial writers said. Health Canada has chosen to include an adjuvant — a substance used to stretch a vaccine’s active ingredient and boost immune response to the serum — in the Canadian version of the vaccine against the H1N1 virus. S. The earlier a vaccine is rolled for these high-risk individuals, the greater the chance to protect them before flu season peaks. It also reduces the burden on hospitals and scarce intensive care spaces, the editorial writers argued.

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p In contrast, Grand Chief Sydney Garrioch of the Manitoba Keewatinowi Okimakanak said only two of 30 communities in his northern territory have a plan for dealing with the swine flu pandemic.
Shawn Atleo, the newly elected national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, said it’s time to turn the immediate H1N1 crisis into a broader discussion of the desperate circumstances that many First Nations communities face. In these patients, the !–more– virus directly infects the lung, causing severe respiratory failure, WHO saidDr. The majority of infections were mild, along the lines of illnesses caused by normal flu. Research shows the H1N1 virus replaced normal in most southern countries during their flu season. The federal pandemic plans for remote and isolated northern communities, Turner said, have guidelines created [that] do not fit, and use a language that is full of false assumptions and hints of colonial bureaucracy. Elsewhere, the World Health Organization said Friday that swine flu infections have reached a peak in the Southern Hemisphere. But several native leaders described their frustrations from trying to deal with the pandemic when they lack running water, face overcrowded housing and insufficient funding. Aglukkaq told a parliamentary committee hearing in Ottawa that 90 per cent of 600 First Nations communities have a plan. The pandemic is now set to shift back north, where a second wave will put a strain on health care facilities, the UN health agency said.
Gail Turner, the director of health services for the Nunatsiavut government and chairperson of the national Inuit committee on health, said Inuit are vulnerable because of geography, weather and sickness from other diseases, since it’s not always possible to fly people who are severely ill from swine flu to larger hospitals. Doctors worldwide are reporting a very severe form of the disease in young and otherwise healthy people. Aglukkaq noted that aboriginal communities in Canada are younger on average than other communities, with a higher number of pregnant women and people with diabetes, which make them more vulnerable to severe disease from the H1N1 virus. Manitoba Grand Chief Ron Evans accused the Crown of ignoring its fiduciary responsibilities for health care. David Butler-Jones, Canada’s chief public health officer, said all families should have basic supplies on hand, such as Tylenol for flu symptoms, a thermometer to check for fever, soap and water and potentially hand sanitizer. But Manitoba Grand Chief Ron Evans said the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs was continually stonewalled by tight-fisted financial decisions that ignore Crown fiduciary responsibilities for health care. Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq and a First Nations chief had widely divergent views Friday on the state of flu pandemic preparedness plans for aboriginal communities. Federal health officials responded that they have offered public health guidance to Indian and Northern Affairs, which is responsible for water on First Nations communities. The department makes a distinction between access to water and access to drinking water, since any water can be boiled for handwashing purposes, said Shelagh Jane Woods, director general of Health Canada’s First Nations and Inuit health branch. The H1N1 pandemic virus has rapidly established itself and is now the dominant influenza strain in most parts of the world, WHO said in a statement.
Flu levels have returned to normal in most southern countries, but remain elevated in South Africa and Bolivia, said WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl. Countries should plan for growing demand on hospital intensive care units from a second wave of the pandemic, WHO urged. Infections also seem to be starting earlier than normal in Japan, he said. The pandemic will persist in the coming months as the virus continues to move through susceptible populations. But a second wave of flu in northern countries such as Canada will put a strain on health-care facilities such as intensive care units, the UN health agency said. When Opposition MPs asked why the federal government is not contributing to pandemic kits for First Nations in Manitoba, Aglukkaq responded by asking whether purchasing soap should be federal responsibility, and that medical supplies are available from nursing stations.

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p Water dousing, which differs from waterboarding, can include repeatedly dousing detainees with water or immersing them in cold water at intervals over a time period of up to six hours. S. Based on the research included in the Transport Canada manual, the CIA memo recommends that detainees be placed in water ranging from 5 to 15 C for up to 60 minutes at a time. The previously top-secret CIA memos were turned over to the American Civil Liberties !–more– Union as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Newly declassified CIA documents, which were released by the U. The interrogation method should be stopped if there is evidence of hypothermia, the memo states. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Canada’s Foreign Affairs department says it’s aware of reports that Transport Canada material has been used by the CIA. An image that appears in Transport Canada’s Survival in Cold Waters: Staying Alive guide shows readers how to position themselves while waiting for rescue in cold water. interrogators to set limits on dousing detainees with cold water, according to documents released this week. A survival manual produced by Transport Canada was used by U. S. It’s very upsetting, he said. S. A CIA manual, intended for medical officers monitoring the interrogation of suspects, describes 20 methods of interrogation. It added the detainee could be allowed some time to warm up and then be placed back in the water. Though it is impossible to control how Canadian publications are used, it is incumbent on the Canadian government to express that it is very upset to see that this information was used this way, Neve said. Christine Collins, president of the Union of Canadian Transportation Employees, said it is appalling and unacceptable to learn that a Canadian government document was used to help facilitate the interrogation of the detainees. The Transport Canada publication titled Survival in Cold Waters: Staying Alive was used by CIA interrogators to set limits on dousing detainees with cold water. Materials that were meant to help ensure that people can better survive when they are immersed in cold water was in fact being used in this program to ensure that cold water could be used to inflict the maximum pain and suffering possible, said Alex Neve, head of Amnesty International Canada. The 92-page Transport Canada document, which is available online, was written for seafarers and boaters and outlines conditions that can induce hypothermia and lead to death. This is a regrettable use of a publicly available document intended to save lives, the department said in a statement to CBC News. To take this type of document, which is clearly intended to save lives, to see the information manipulated in this manner, needs to be addressed, Collins said. These standards are derived from submersion studies, and represent two-thirds of the time at which hypothermia is likely to develop in healthy individuals submerged in water, wearing light clothing, according to the CIA memo. Water dousing — which the manual said could be combined with nudity, stress positions and slaps — was ranked fifth most severe on the list of methods. He said it is disturbing to think his work may be used to cause pain. Manitoba professor Gordon Giesbrecht’s research on cold water survival helped form the CIA manual. The 2005 CIA manual refers to the Transport Canada publication Survival in Cold Waters: Staying Alive to set the limits on cold water exposure. In our opinion, a partial dousing … would therefore be safe to undertake within these parameters, the CIA memo said. The Canadian government should express its condemnation of the use of Canadian safety expertise for the interrogations, Collins said. administration, indicate the Canadian-made handbook was used to fine-tune cold-water interrogation techniques on high value prisoners being held at prisons, including the U.

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p Instead, say the researchers, insoluble fibre can be ineffective or worsen IBS symptoms. Irritable bowel syndrome is a chronic condition of the intestines that affects 13 to 20 per cent of Canadians, according to the Canadian Society of Intestinal Research. The majority of doctors provide dietary lifestyle advice targeted at increasing the fibre content of the daily diet by adding insoluble fibre, reads the study. During the study, they were !–more– asked whether they had adequate relief from IBS symptoms. The study was published online Aug. During the study, symptom severity in the psyllium group was reduced by 90 points, versus 49 points in the placebo group and 58 points in the bran group. Soluble fibre is the best line of defence in alleviating symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome, Dutch researchers say. That means Canadians suffering from the bowel condition should be eating more soluble fibre-rich foods such as oatmeal and oat bran, legumes, beans, nuts, peas, lentils and fruits. Insoluble fibre includes wheat bran, whole-grain foods such as whole-wheat or multigrain bread, whole-wheat pasta, brown rice and the leaves, skins and seeds of vegetables and fruits, according to the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Canada. It is characterized by abdominal pain, bloating, constipation, diarrhea or multiple symptoms in tandem. They studied 275 IBS patients between the ages of 18 to 65 for three months. Scientists at University Medical Centre in Utrecht, Netherlands, discovered that when participants in a two-year study consumed 10 grams of wheat bran (an insoluble fibre), 10 grams of psylium (a soluble fibre) or 10 grams of a placebo (rice flour), soluble fibre relieved the most symptoms. The study found that study participants who dropped out early were most likely to be taking bran supplements, their chief complaint being that their irritable bowel syndrome worsened. 27 in the British Medical Journal.

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p So far, the findings showed the laboratory technique works, and how similar the process is to normal human retinal development, said ophthalmology Prof. Normally in human development, embryonic stem cells differentiate into more specialized cell types about five days after fertilization. We continue to be amazed at how deep we can probe into these early events and find that they mimic those found in developing retinas, Gamm said in a release. !–more– Perhaps this is the way to close the gap between what we know about building a retina in mice, frogs and flies with that of humans. The goal of the research is to eventually repair damaged retinas from cells grown from a patient’s own skin. David Gamm, who led the study in this week’s issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. In the study, the researchers took skin cells, turned them back into cells resembling embryonic stem cells, and then triggered retinal cell types to develop.
The study used human stem cells from skin known as induced pluripotent stem cells. S. researchers say. The retina develops from early nervous system cells. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison medical school said they have successfully grown multiple types of retina cells from two types of stem cells. Different types of retina cells have been grown from human stem cells taken from skin, U. The retinal cell types included photoreceptors, light-sensitive cells that absorb light and transmit an image as an electrical signal to the brain, the team said.

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p The committee taking the government to court is alleging that amalgamation has taken away the only health authority that was working legally in French. The group taking the New Brunswick government to court over last year’s health reforms is getting support from the Montfort Hospital, an Ontario institution that faced a similar fight a decade ago. Gérald Savoie, the hospital’s executive director and an Acadian from Campbellton, will retire in !–more– October but he said he wants to help the Committee for Equality of Health in French win its legal battle against provincial government reforms. We’re talking about people who govern a health-care institution, that their first and upper-most [concern is] to make sure that the French language is preserved, he said. The Montfort battle has been an inspiration for us from the beginning. The Montfort experience is being used as an example for the legal battle that’s being fought in New Brunswick against the Liberal government’s decision to reduce the number of regional health authorities to two from eight. We’re talking about governance. Dr. The commission later proposed to merge it with another hospital and make it bilingual. Hubert Dupuis, the committee’s president, said he appreciates the support from the Ottawa francophone hospital. It’s the very, very similar battle. I think the Franco-Ontarians have shown us the way, Dupuis said. The organization has recruited Michel Bastarache, a retired Supreme Court of Canada judge and expert in linguistic cases, to assist in the case along with Michel Doucet, a law professor at the Université de Moncton. Savoie was executive director of Montfort Hospital in 1997 when a commission set up by former Ontario premier Mike Harris government first proposed to close it down. The Montfort hospital is a French institution in Ottawa that went to court 10 years ago to fight for its survival.

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p Researchers from the Laval University and McGill University, as well as Inserm in France, Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and University College Dublin in Ireland also helped to conduct the study. In the five-year study of 1,758 children born in Quebec and their mothers, 15 per cent of preschoolers suffered from atypically high levels of depression and anxiety, researchers reported in the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry. Supporting !–more– mothers who are depressed or have infants with difficult temperaments through cognitive behaviour or talk therapy and parenting training could help, Côté said. The signs can be spotted as early as the first year of life, the researchers found. ‘Difficult temperament at five months was the most important predictor of depression and anxiety in the children. Feelings of depression and anxiety are a normal part of a child’s develoment that increase over the preschool years, the researchers said. ‘
— Sylvana Côté, study author
For the study, mothers were interviewed about whether the child was nervous, high strung or tense, fearful or anxious, worried, less happy than other children or had difficulty having fun. The questions are considered a reliable way of determining whether children are at risk for depression and anxiety. While children who are hyperactive always attract attention, those with high levels of depression and anxiety may be discrete and quiet. Infant temperament and a mother’s history of depression were important predictors of atypically high depressive and anxiety problems during preschool years, the researchers found, after controlling for low education and maternal antisocial behaviour. Infants and preschoolers often appear to have a carefree life but a study suggests almost 15 per cent may have high levels of depression and anxiety. But even the youngest children can be taught how to express and deal with their emotions better, Côté said. These risk factors can be helped by interventions, said study author Sylvana Côté, a professor at the University of Montreal’s department of social and preventive medicine. The study was funded by Quebec’s ministry of health, the Fond québécois de la recherche sur la société et la culture, the Social Science and Humanities Research Council and the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, Sainte-Justine University Hospital Research Center and the University of Montreal. People should be aware of these signs and symptoms for children who may be at high risk, she suggested. Child psychiatrists have suggested teaching coping strategies to help older children showing anxiety. We found that children with difficult temperaments and maternal depression were the most important risk factors. One limitation of the study is that genetics were not taken into account. It’s abnormally high levels of depression and anxiety that are of concern.

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p The mental health court, to sit once a week in Dartmouth starting Nov. Nova Scotia’s special court designed for people with mental illness who come into conflict with the law will open this fall. Judith McPhee, the chair of the government committee that helped create the court, said people who appear before a judge in the Halifax region may request that their case be moved to this new court. 2, will divert some people away from the criminal justice !–more– system and into treatment programs. Landry said this won’t be an easier ride for anyone. Hopefully we’ll start to collect those cases.
Provincial court Judge Bill MacDonald will hear the cases recommended by a mental-health court team, including mental-health clinicians and lawyers. This is about accountability, both to the individual and to the system, and I think that that’s critical to know, he said. Attorney General and Justice Minister Ross Landry said the court will examine the accused and their illnesses, not just their alleged crimes. Hyde died in jail about 30 hours after he was arrested for an alleged assault and stunned with a Taser during a struggle with Halifax police at the station. There are people out there who have fallen through the gaps in the process or the cracks in the floor, Landry said. The defence, Crown or police may also suggest cases, McPhee said. The provincial justice system’s handling of the mentally ill has been scrutinized during an inquiry into the 2007 death of Howard Hyde, a schizophrenic.

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p John’s to be treated, but a medical flight wasn’t available for nine hours. In the meantime, Meaney’s son had the medical procedure performed in St.
Boyd Rowe is the chief executive officer of the Labrador-Grenfell Regional Health Authority. Meaney said that’s not good enough. Just take for example, she said, there was a car accident, and somebody needed surgery right away, there’s nobody here. John’s, says hospital officials need a better !–more– backup plan for their own emergency situations. He had a lot of difficulty swallowing, she said. He normally would be treated by the general surgeon at the hospital, however, Meaney said she was told the physician was away for the week because of a family emergency. A woman in Labrador whose son needed immediate surgery but had to wait hours to be flown to St.
Meaney said the doctor told her the problem was an abscess on her son’s tonsils that was getting worse. A decision was made to fly her son to St. I can tell you that it was a very stressful time here, Rowe said. There should always be somebody on standby where we can have somebody in here. Meaney said she understands why the surgeon wasn’t available, but also said the hospital authority must come up with a plan to make sure the area doesn’t face the same situation again. We were just not able to acquire the services of a temporary replacement. He couldn’t speak, he could just barely breathe. He said officials made extensive efforts, across the province and the country to find a temporary replacement, but he said they were unsuccessful. John’s and she said he’s recovering fine. Jackie Meaney of Wabush took her son, Howie, to the hospital in nearby Labrador City Saturday because he wasn’t doing very well. The general surgeon at the Labrador City hospital was back to work by Monday.

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