Pulse Oximetry Enters Many Patient Settings

With the development of microprocessors and new data processing algorithms, pulse oximetry has reached new horizons in health care. Units have become less expensive, smaller, and more accurate.

Oximetry is used in almost every aspect of patient monitoring, including general anesthesia, conscious sedation, post-anesthesia care, intensive care, neonatal intensive care, newborn nursery care, delivery, patient transport, sleep studies, pulmonary function and exercise testing, sub acute care, and home care.

Oxygen levels can change drastically in a short period of time – basically on a breath-to-breath basis. This is why it is crucial to have an accurate and continuous reading to assist with patient care. Clinicians need assessment tools to make critical decisions, and quick intervention can be the most important determinate of patient prognosis.

more…

Clinical Trials on Medpedia

Search Clinical Trials >>

MEDPEDIA LAUNCHES
NEW CLINICAL TRIAL PLATFORM

Pushing Relevant Clinical Trial Info Out to Web in Proper Context.

 

The Medpedia Project today announced Medpedia Clinical Trials, a platform for patients and physicians to receive information about the thousands of clinical trials that are in process or about to begin. Other online sources already allow for searching clinical trials, but the Medpedia platform allows clinical trial information to be “pushed” or fed automatically to appropriate contexts. For instance, trial information can show up alongside a Medpedia article covering the same condition, it can appear in a personalized feed of someone interested in that condition, or in a patient community related to that condition. This free resource is available now on Medpedia at http://www.medpedia.com/clinical-trials

 

 

 

 

 

COPD and Denial: A Common Thread – Part 1

Jane M. Martin

Funny thing…I didn’t choose to write about this subject, denial. It chose me. When you work with, and listen – listen hard – long enough to people with COPD, you learn a few things. When I was researching my book, Breathe Better, Live in Wellness, and listening to the stories of people with COPD, people from all walks of life, all ages, from all over the country, I discovered that there was one common thread connecting every story. Denial.
But for me writing the stories wasn’t the end of learning about denial. It was just the beginning. Since I wrote the last word in that book, I’ve continued to hear people talk about denial, BC (their lives before COPD) and WC (with COPD). [Note how I don’t say AC, after COPD, because we’re just not ready to go there!] And it made me wonder if the patients I personally know, just those few, have experienced so much agony and so many tears working through denial, I can only imagine how many others out there are feeling the same way.

It is my hope that this series of shareposts will bring this monster, denial, out of the shadows, help you feel less alone – and light your way to live a full and happy life – WC!

more…

New Potential to Treat Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is defined by emphysema and/or chronic bronchitis. It destroys the normal architecture of the lung and inhibits the mechanical aspects of breathing, which prevents necessary gas exchange.

Patients suffer from coughing fits, wheezing, and increased incidence of lung infections. These symptoms are associated with changes in the architecture of the lung. The air sacs, which usually inflate with air during breathing as they loose their elasticity, becoming rigid and unable to inflate. The lung becomes inflamed and increases its mucus production, which further inhibits gas exchange, and prevents the patient’s ability to be physically active.

Although COPD is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, there is currently no cure for the disease. Providing patients with concentrated oxygen therapy and instruction on breathing techniques increases survival rates.

In a new study published in Disease Models & Mechanisms (DMM), collaborative findings by European researchers demonstrate that an antioxidant protein, sestrin, triggers molecular pathways that induce some of the critical lung changes associated with COPD. By genetically inactivating this protein, they were able to improve the elastic features of the lung in a mouse model of emphysema. These authors believe that by inhibiting the antioxidant sestrin protein, they prevent the accelerated degradation of elastic fibers within the lung. This suggests that patients with COPD could benefit from treatment with drugs that block sestrin function.

more…

Lung Flute Gets FDA Clearance

View Video >>

Today, there is great news for COPD patients! Medical Acoustics LLC announced that the Therapeutic Lung Flute®, a medical device designed to help COPD patients clear secretions from their respiratory tract, has received FDA clearance. This means the the device will be available as soon as February, 2010.

The Lung Flute is a simple, hand-held reusable device that works by introducing low frequency sound waves into the lungs, supplementing a patient’s own mucus clearing ability. With regular use, it is a safe and effective, low cost alternative to maintaining respiratory health.

Read More Of This Article By Deborah Leader, RN At About.com

Caregiver’s Information Line

The COPD Foundation is proud to announce the launch of a new information line, dedicated to the caregivers of individuals with COPD. The COPD Caregiver’s Information Line offers support for the caregiver seeking information, assistance, or even just a talk with a fellow caregiver. Expanding on the work already begun by the COPD-International’s Internet Caregiver’s Forum, the new information line takes the concept a step further, offering numerous resources to its callers in their quest to provide quality care for their loved ones.

More Information Available>>

COPD International

The Caregivers Forum>>

Get Help for Asthma at the Free Asthma Guide Online

Are you wondering what bronchial asthma is? Did you recently have a chest x ray and were you diagnosed with asthma? Do you have a child that has been diagnosed with acute or chronic asthma? Do you want to know more about treatment emphysema options, stages of the condition, or about the different types of breathing issues that some people deal with? Check out the Asthma Guide online where you can get facts for free! The Asthma Guide online will instruct you about the pathogenesis of various disorders, the main emphysema symptoms, late stage developments, treatment methods, and so much more. Go to the site and start learning more about bronchitis treatment methods, homeopathic medicine for chronic breathing conditions and more.

more…

Moxifloxacin May Be Better for COPD Outpatients According to New Research Published in the International Journal of COPD

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) affects a large number of subjects worldwide and is characterised by a progressively rising epidemiological, clinical and socio-economic impact. The objectives of treatment are to decrease the burden of the disease through relief of symptoms, improvement of exercise tolerance, and prevention and treatment of exacerbations.

Original research to investigate the long-term impact on health related quality of life (HRQL) of the antibiotic treatment of exacerbations of COPD in general practice, has been released in a new research paper, available from Dove Medical Press.

The investigation, comparing the effect of treatment of COPD exacerbations with moxifloxacin (400 mg/day for five days) and amoxicillin/clavulanate (500/125 mg three times a day for 10 days) on HRQL, is authored by Marc Miravitlles, Carles Llor, Jesús Molina, et al on behalf of the EVOCA Study Group, in Barcelona, Spain.

The EVOCA study was a prospective, observational, multi-centre study of a cohort of patients with COPD followed in primary care over a two-year period.

THIS ARTICLE  from PR-inside.com is available in it’s entirety in the International Journal of COPD.

Gene mappers untangling common cold mysteries

A close-up of the common cold virus.

A cure for the common cold has eluded scientists since the dawn of mankind.

Common colds — also known as human rhinovirus — affect billions of people worldwide every year and have more than 100 different, but related, strains. Each of these strains can cause a variety of symptoms in sufferers.

Doctors say that variety is what makes the common cold so hard to understand and so hard to treat.

Last year, researchers from the University of Maryland and the University of Wisconsin-Madison announced that they had taken the first step in finding a cure for rhinovirus by mapping each strain’s entire genome.

Now, those same scientists have found some interesting things about all those different strains.

“We continue to see a new virus that appears to come from two viruses,” said Dr. Stephen B. Liggett, co-leader of the project and a professor of medicine and physiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “So a person can become infected with two viruses, and a third unique virus is formed.”

Why those mutations develop is still a major question, but Liggett says most of them don’t cause any harm. “It’s really more about why they develop … because many are not very strong, but in some cases, they are,” he said. “So we need to better understand them.”

When the different strains of the common cold were mapped early last year, researchers were looking for ways to develop diagnostic tests and eventually possible treatments.

Since the completion of the mapping, researchers have been working on a diagnostic test for the virus.

Originally, the test was expected to cost about $2,000, but they have perfected the technique and found they can develop a much cheaper test for about $20. That means a test for the cold may one day be common in doctors’ offices.

A fast and inexpensive test is good news for asthmatics and people who have chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, for whom colds can be life-threatening.

“Fifty percent of the exacerbations that occur in patients who have these two diseases are due to a rhinovirus infection,” Liggett notes. “So it’s that group of people we are targeting. Those would be the first group we’d like to help.”

more…

Clinical practice differs from guidelines in antibiotic therapy for COPD

There are significant deviations between practice patterns and guidelines regarding the use of antibiotics in patients with acute exacerbations of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (AECOPD), research shows.

“According to the 2005–2007 annual guidelines by the Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD), antibiotics may be indicated on the basis of either the clinical history (increased sputum purulence accompanied by increased sputum volume and/or increased dyspnea) or the need for mechanical ventilation,” explain Joshua Farkas and Harold Manning from Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center in Lebanon, New Hampshire, USA.

But they add: “There is limited information about clinicians’ adherence to guidelines for antibiotic use during inpatient management of AECOPD.”

more…