'Urgent action' needed to help thousands of patients waiting for organ transplants
Health leaders have warned of a “sharp” decline in organ donations, with “urgent action” now required to help 8,700 people waiting for a transplant. Source link
All posts tagged: Patients
He battled high-risk leukaemia at age 7. Now he’s a doctor helping to treat cancer patients
Despite the notoriously demanding rigour of medical school, Dr Chng said his personal experience was a constant reminder not to view patients as a sum of their symptoms. “A lot of times when we are busy, we start to think of patients by their locators, like which bed they are in, or it’s the patient with this condition. There are still times that I might fall into this (pattern).” Dr Chng has strong memories of family and family friends being very involved and rallying around him during his own battle with cancer, even donating platelets to help in his treatment. These first-hand experiences, he said, continue to shape the way he now approaches medicine as a practitioner. “I understand the fear of the unknown, the weight of uncertainty, and the relief that even small acts of kindness can bring.” He strives to understand why patients might feel unhappy about the treatment process and empathise with the fatigue they and their families may grapple with throughout the complex journey of recovery. “It’s not something you can …
WHO flags growing health workforce gap as workers and patients age
GENEVA: The World Health Organization warned on Friday (Sep 18) of a gap in the medical workforce around the world in the 2030s, with a quarter of doctors set to retire in the next decade. “In many countries, both our populations and health workers are ageing at the same time. This can intensify the projected global shortage of 11.1 million health workers by 2030,” the WHO said in a statement accompanying a major report on workforce trends based on data from over 100 countries. By 2030, 67 countries are projected to lack sufficient staffing to maintain the standards of medical treatment they currently enjoy, it said. To maintain the current density of medical staff to the population, an additional 832,000 health workers are needed, and this could increase reliance on foreign health care workers in poorer countries, the report said, potentially impacting healthcare standards there. Higher income countries, including many in Europe, are set to be the hardest hit since they have a higher share of older healthcare workers, the report said. In these countries, …
Rethinking rimcazole as a revolutionary treatment for canine cancer patients
Kyrexa’s research has transformed the use of the drug rimcazole from a potential failure into a promising cancer treatment for both dogs and humans Kyrexa described in the preceding articles how dogs with cancer shone a light on a longstanding programme of work – deep-rooted in sound science, which had stalled due to a technical hurdle. The series of articles tells the story of how Kyrexa’s new line of thinking revived the prospect of rimcazole as a safe and effective drug for patients with cancer – be they animal or human patients – contrary to what the laboratory studies had taught to that point. Preliminary clinical studies in dogs with advanced cancer have demonstrated that rimcazole is indeed safe and has promising anti-tumour efficacy. It is now on a regulator-endorsed pathway to approval as a licensed medicine for dogs with cancer. This final article explains how the action of rimcazole on a molecule called the dopamine transporter – previously considered to be an unwanted side-activity of rimcazole – has turned out to be key to rimcazole’s …
Patients died in ‘suffocating’ heatwave conditions on NHS wards, nurses say | UK News
Patients died and others deteriorated in “suffocating atmospheres” because of the summer heat on NHS hospital wards, a survey has found. The poll of 2,471 nurses uncovered incidents of cancer patients dripping with sweat during chemotherapy, and in one case maggots in a wound. The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) survey said the record-breaking heat had affected patient care and resulted in poorer outcomes. It has called for more government investment so hospitals can cope in warm weather. One children’s ward in Yorkshire reached 44C, according to a nurse who was surveyed. You need javascript enabled to view this content Enable javascript to share Share Nurses ‘collapsing’ at work due to heatwave Another nurse in the North West said the situation was “horrendous” with patients “suffering more from the effects of heat than the actual reason they are in hospital”. Another said patients fainted, and others suffered dehydration, particularly older people. The survey uncovered reports of people with heart failure and respiratory conditions, who seemed to fare worse because of the heat. Image: Pic: iStock …
Life-extending drug for breast cancer patients now on NHS in England | UK News
A life-extending drug will be made available on the NHS to patients in England with a specific type of incurable breast cancer, after an initial decision to reject the treatment was reversed. Enhertu can give patients close to seven extra months to live on average, compared with those who had chemotherapy. It is the first licensed targeted treatment for patients with HER2-low breast cancer that cannot be removed surgically or has spread to other parts of the body – also known as metastatic breast cancer. The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) said the drug would be available from Thursday for around 1,000 women with HER2-low advanced breast cancer. In 2024, NICE rejected the drug for widespread use for the NHS in England, saying the treatment was “not cost effective”. However, it reversed that decision after a “commercial solution” had “been agreed”, following changes to its methods as part of a pricing agreement between the UK and US. Enhertu – also know as trastuzumab deruxtecan and made by Daiichi Sankyo and Astra Zeneca – …
The type of exercise that could help cancer patients live for longer
Get the Well Enough newsletter with Harry Bullmore for tips on living a healthier, happier and longer life Get the Well Enough email with Harry Bullmore Get the Well Enough email with Harry Bullmore Cancer patients who integrate structured physical activity into their routine medical treatment could live for longer and have more time free of disease, research indicates. According to researchers, physical activity offers potential advantages that “extend beyond its traditional role in improving quality of life”. The comprehensive review, conducted by specialists in Taiwan, examined 21 separate trials across Asia, Australia, Europe, and North America, encompassing more than 8,400 individuals. Participants were aged between 47 and 64, with breast, bowel, and pancreatic cancers representing the most widespread diagnoses. The findings demonstrate that individuals incorporating an exercise regimen into standard care faced a 23 per cent lower risk of mortality and were 17 per cent less likely to experience a cancer recurrence before death compared to non-exercisers. Further evaluations revealed these patients also had a 26 per cent reduced risk of dying from cancer …
‘It makes you feel helpless’: patients and doctors cast doubt on standard treatment for endometriosis | Endometriosis
“It’s really frustrating to be in this cycle of continuous surgery. It makes you feel helpless,” says Natalie Greenwood, of a condition that affects her so badly she is “non-functioning most of the time because of the constant fatigue”. Greenwood, 36, needs to have an operation every few years to limit the impact of the endometriosis that gives her chronic pelvic pain, as well as extreme tiredness and brain fog. She says the trouble with depending on surgery is not just having an invasive procedure and then having to recover afterwards. It’s more that the benefit gained – the relief from persistent pain – is brief. She is not alone in her lack of belief in surgery and hormonal medication being effective for chronic pelvic pain. A study has found that dual approach, which is the NHS’s usual way of treating the condition, does not improve quality of life for female patients. Greenwood was diagnosed with endometriosis 13 years ago, after leaving university. It is a condition in which tissue similar to the lining of …
Minimally invasive laser surgery may offer new hope for brain tumor patients
A prospective registry of 787 patients treated with laser interstitial thermal therapy, or LITT, found that survival was strongly associated with how completely tumors were ablated and, for some lesions, how small they were when treated. Among patients with newly diagnosed glioblastoma, those with at least 91% tumor ablation had a median overall survival of 2.1 years, compared with 0.36 years for those with 90% or less ablation. LITT also offered short hospital stays and generally preserved function, but the registry was observational, complications still occurred, and the results do not prove that laser therapy is superior to standard open surgery. For many people facing glioblastoma, every treatment choice carries fear and urgency. This aggressive brain cancer often brings open-skull surgery, chemotherapy, radiation and a difficult prognosis. A large new study now suggests that a minimally invasive laser procedure may help selected patients live longer and recover faster. The analysis found that survival depended strongly on two factors: how much tumor the laser destroyed and how early doctors treated some lesions. For patients and families, …
Patients left with 'horrific' disabilities after surgery at hands of disgraced doctor, inquiry told
Patients of disgraced brain surgeon Sam Eljamel were left with “horrific” disabilities following his operations, a former MSP has told an inquiry. Source link