If a patient is ready to accept help with their alcohol problem it’s the first step in an important and long journey. A willing and strong 3^rd party can be the much needed first step of support that helps someone get back to sober living in Dallas, or wherever you are located. Professional help always starts with a detox program and is the best way forward.

During detox, a person’s dependence on alcohol can be managed with medications, so that the person’s withdrawal symptoms are minimized. Medications can also help to reduce the risk of seizures, which can occur in the most severe cases of withdrawal.

Detox can take place in a hospital, or in a residential rehab facility. Once detox is complete, the individual can then go to an inpatient or outpatient rehab facility to complete the alcohol addiction treatment process.

Inpatient of Outpatient Rehab?

Inpatient rehab is best for people who need medical monitoring for detox and who need intensive therapy at the beginning of the recovery process. Inpatient care provides close 24-hour supervision by trained and licensed staff. The rehab staff monitors progress and provides support and motivation to encourage the person to complete the program.

Outpatient rehab allows patients to rest at home while attending therapy sessions at a clinic or treatment facility. The availability of therapy for those who are working is an important consideration for many people. Outpatient rehab works for those who are able to sustain a commitment to recovery in their daily lives without requiring close supervision.

Of course, the more severe the addiction, the more intensive the treatment needs to be. Inpatient rehab offers the most intensive care, as it is designed for people who need to focus on the addiction entirely. Outpatient care is more suitable for people who are able to balance their addiction treatment with their professional and personal lives.

What to expect after treatment?

Once alcohol has been removed from the body, the patient can begin to adjust to living without it. This is a process that is likely to take a long time. It may be more difficult for people who have been addicted to alcohol for a long time.

The patient may experience cravings for alcohol as they adjust to sobriety. In order to reduce the odds of returning to drinking, the patient must learn the skills needed to avoid and deal with the triggers that lead them to drink.

What about relapse?

Some of the most common behaviors that lead to relapse include spending time with people who drink, going to bars or parties where alcohol is served and having alcohol in the home. In order to avoid these triggers, the patient can participate in activities that are not likely to expose them to situations where they are likely to drink. These may include attending self-help meetings, getting a job that requires a lot of time away from home and spending time with supportive people who have not been drinking.

Final thoughts

It is important to remember that alcohol addiction is not a sign of weakness, but rather a disease that causes people to behave in ways that are harmful to themselves and others. For this reason, many doctors do not recommend that people with this disease be punished, but rather that they be given the opportunity to get the help that they need. Remember this when trying to help your loved one back to sobriety.

Servier, an international pharmaceutical group, with World Heart Federation (WHF), the principal representative body for the global cardiovascular (CV) community, and Global Heart Hub (GHH), the principal association for patients with CV disease, will launch “Use Heart to Act Now on Angina” on April 20. This worldwide campaign aims to raise public awareness about the symptoms of angina, which are often underestimated. The official launch of the campaign will take place during a webinar run by WHF President, Prof. Fausto Pinto, on April 20 at 14:00 CEST. The webinar will leverage learnings from the prolonged Covid-19 pandemic, emphasizing that now, more than ever, it is necessary to continue to focus on heart health and that consulting your doctor promptly is key to positive health outcomes.

Angina affects more than 100 million people globally

Angina is a manifestation of chronic coronary syndrome (CCS) which includes an imbalance in the demand and supply of oxygen in the heart muscle. CCS itself is a multifactorial disease, meaning that

angina can be triggered by different mechanisms, such as the obstruction of coronary arteries with plaques through coronary artery disease (CAD), microvascular disease, and spasms.

More than 100 million people globally are affected and the huge impact of angina on the quality of life of patients includes consequences such as disability, job loss, and depression. As angina manifests in a variety of ways, the symptoms may be hard to recognize, and risk being attributed to stress, menopause, or digestive issues.

The incidence and prevalence of patients with angina is expected to increase in the coming decade as a result of an aging population, the obesity epidemic, the greater use of life-prolonging therapies, and better management of acute coronary syndromes.

“Use Heart to Act Now on Angina” is a worldwide campaign to improve disease awareness, facilitate timely detection of angina patients, and implement optimal angina management. 

Angina patients often remain underdiagnosed and undertreated. It is essential for early warning signs to be recognized in time by both health professionals and patients alike.

Therefore Servier, the World Heart Federation, and WHF’s Member organization, the Global Heart Hub are forging a path in the fight to address the urgency of angina symptoms, its potential consequences, and necessary care. “Use Heart to Act Now on Angina” is a new joint initiative that brings together the latest medical perspectives and patient views in order to ensure that we take angina seriously.

Elsa Steo, WomenHeart Ambassador 2021, stated: “I was really lucky. I saw a new, young doctor who took my symptoms very seriously, and did an EKG. He didn’t have a lot to compare to, but he didn’t like what he saw, so he sent me directly for blood tests and arranged an appointment with a cardiologist. After further investigation, they found I had three blocked arteries, one of which was 100% blocked. To this day, I can’t be grateful enough to my primary care doctor for reacting so quickly.”

Available in six languages (Arabic, Chinese, English, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish), the international awareness campaign “Use Heart to Act Now on Angina” will be deployed on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Instagram throughout April to September 2021.

Samuele Doratori, Head of Cardiovascular, Global Medical and Patient Affairs at Servier:
“During the COVID-19 pandemic, an excess mortality resulting from cardiovascular diseases has been reported. As a health actor deeply involved in cardiovascular diseases, this crisis has reinforced our responsibility in providing relevant medical education for the management of these conditions, such as angina. Servier’s participation in this awareness initiative, conducted with WHF and the GHH, shows the Group’s strong mobilization to improve the lives of patients with chronic cardiovascular diseases.”

Fausto Pinto, World Heart Federation President: “Cardiovascular disease presents itself in many ways, including, angina. Symptoms of angina often go unheeded, can vary widely, and often manifest differently in men and women. WHF welcomes partnerships such as this one which are crucial for pooling knowledge and deploying experience to help beat cardiovascular disease – the world’s number one killer – claiming more than 18 million lives around the world each year.”

Neil Johnson, Director, Development & Strategy, Global Heart Hub: “Angina is a clear symptom of an underlying heart problem, and that’s why the Global Heart Hub wants to empower patients to Use Heart, connect with their health care provider and Act Now on Angina. We need to increase public awareness of angina, and encourage early detection and diagnosis, so that optimal management can be achieved and the impact on quality of life can be minimized.”

LEAP HR: Healthcare is your unique opportunity to plug into a community of strategic HR leaders from the most forward-thinking healthcare organizations across the globe, at a time when HR has never played a more vital role for employees and patients.

Step inside 40+ stories of how new, time-saving thinking is accelerating organizational agility and resilience across clinical and non-clinical healthcare workforces.

Take Part, & Leave Able to:

• Find the urgent clinical talent your hospitals and medical centers need: Learn how Adventist HealthCare cut time to clear from six weeks to five days as new ICUs opened up
• Rethink how to take care of your caregivers: Discover how Intermountain Healthcare rooted all its new people strategies in 2020 back to the insight it received from its caregivers
• Eliminate differences for your diverse employees and patients: Find out how Spectrum Health designed a catalyst for future change and the creation of a new DE&I movement across the organization
• Provide more opportunity to your employees on the lowest wage: Discover how Orlando Health has enabled team members on the lower end of the pay roll to be on a clear pathway to professional and personal growth
• Fill vital talent supply gaps and build a more agile workforce: Hear how Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center transformed the way it inspired its clinical workforce to fill critical open positions and keep up with organizational scale
• Transform the healthcare leadership experience: Uncover how Moffit Cancer Center built an adaptable leadership experience program to enhance inclusion of ideas and diversity of approach, and build a safe space for its leaders
• Breakaway from traditional HR models to transform the healthcare associate experience: Unpick the scalable, four-pronged approach behind how Mercy Health re-invented HR based on forward-thinking experience methodology

Smiths Medical, a global medical device manufacturer, announced today that Parkview Health, based in Fort Wayne, Indiana., has integrated its PharmGuard® Infusion Management System with its electronic health record system to establish bi-directional interoperability across all hospital in its health system. Connected through their Epic electronic health record (EHR), this integration will enable smart pump programming and auto documentation to improve patient safety.

Smart pump programming and bi-directional interoperability simplifies nursing workflow and improves medication administration by allowing EHR to communicate directly with an infusion pump at the bedside. Clinician orders can be sent from the EHR to the pump, providing an extra level of safety for patients and care teams. This enables infusion program settings to be automatically checked against the EHR to ensure the correct medication, concentration, rate, dose and duration have been selected for the patient.

Interoperability can eliminate 75% of infusion-related medication errors.1 In addition, it can help to enhance clinical workflow and ensure timely and accurate documentation of all medication in the EHR.

“Safety is a top priority at Parkview Health and, by implementing this technology, we are pleased to add another layer of safety, accuracy and efficiency for our patients and care teams,” said Rebecca Mahuren, medication safety integration nurse, Parkview Regional Medical Center.

PharmGuard® Infusion Management System also reduces the number of steps a nurse must complete to program a pump, allowing them to spend more time with patients and less time with technology. This functionality helps nurses and other medical professionals to easily, quickly and accurately deliver the medication patients need.

“At Smiths Medical, we are dedicated to constantly improving both clinician and patient safety by connecting care, whether through our infusion pump systems, our hypodermics or our ventilators, in what continues to be an extremely demanding environment for all due to the global COVID-19 pandemic,” said Dr. Wilson P. Constantine, president of the Americas, Smiths Medical. “The successful EHR integration with Parkview demonstrates our ongoing commitment to enabling patient safety by reducing administration errors and delivering patient flow automation, which can free up clinicians to spend more time with their patients.”

About Smiths Medical

A leading supplier of specialized medical devices and equipment for global markets, focusing on the medication delivery, vital care and safety devices market segments. For more information, visit www.smiths-medical.com.

About Smiths Group

A global technology company that has been operating for nearly 170 years, delivering products and services for the medical technology, security and defense, general industrial, energy and space & commercial aerospace markets worldwide. Smiths Group plc employs c. 23,000 colleagues in over 50 countries and is listed on the London Stock Exchange. For more information visit www.smiths.com.

Epic is a registered trademark of Epic Systems Corporation.

Tomah Health Community Foundation leaders are excited about a special nonevent designed to support future health care professionals.

The philanthropic organization sector of Tomah Health has held nonevent fundraising efforts that has raised more than $70,000 to support future health care providers over the last 13 years.

The foundation’s annual educational scholarship program funds three scholarships worth $1,500 each to students planning to have a career in healthcare.

When this first started our nonevent, we saw it as an opportunity to do something a little different, while continuing the work of the hospital foundation,” said organization president Pete Reichardt in a release. “With continued COVID safeguards, our nonevent guarantees that you don’t have to worry about showing up to an event and social distancing; all you have to do is consider a donation for a great cause that benefits our future health care.”

If you’ve long suffered from hearing loss, then hearing aids are a gift of technology. Now you can finally enjoy what everyone else you do – the gift of sound. With this comes so many other happy effects like listening to music, hearing voices, and even conversing. Life truly becomes better.

But, before these, you’ve first got to go through the process of selecting one. Especially if this is your very first time purchasing a hearing aid, even with the help of a specialist, the options can still be overwhelming. Hearing aids come in all forms, sizes, technology levels, and colors. So, you can’t just barge right into a shop that sells one and picks one at random. Think of this as an investment for a more comfortable life, so all the more that you’ve got to get this right.

To maximize its promising benefits, you’ve got to choose the right hearing aid for you. This article gives you tips on how to successfully achieve this.

1. Bring A Friend or Family Member

Don’t shop alone. If possible, bring your spouse, a family member, or a friend. Especially when you’re still window shopping and you’re listening to the explanations of each seller as to the hearing aids they have, there must be others listening with you. They can lend you their ears – literally at that when you can’t use yours yet.

2. Find A Good Provider

A hearing aid is an investment for your future, so you can live comfortably, and provide a solution to your hearing problems. You can’t expect to enjoy its maximum benefits when the quality of your hearing aid is inferior.

Most importantly, remember that throughout the course of using your hearing aid, you’ll be dealing regularly with your hearing aid provider. You wouldn’t want to keep visiting one that’s not friendly and is very difficult to deal with. Moreover, imagine the horror when your device is still under warranty and the shop where you bought it from has already closed!

With such an important device, there’s no room for you to downgrade your standards when looking for a good provider.

Plus, quality stores and providers may even give you ways to save, like a promo and discount code! If you don’t have to pay full price for your hearing aid, why miss out on that offer?

3. Understand How Hearing Aids Work

Before you decide on using a hearing aid, it’s also very important that you first understand how it works. That way, you can be more convinced about the viability of getting one. Also, when you understand its parts and function, it’ll be easier for you to determine if there’s a problem or not.

For instance, there are some problems with a hearing aid that don’t necessarily need the help of a hearing specialist to fix. Especially for the minor issues, you can do these yourself. But you’ve also got to learn how to identify the bigger problems, that’s a call for you to check first an online hearing test and have it fixed or adjusted by the hearing instrument specialist.

All types of hearing aids work in the same way. It comes with a small microphone that works to collect sounds from the environment. This collected sound is then converted by an amplifier through the computer chip. That way, the signals are sent to your brain, for it to process them. That’s how you’re able to hear!

4. Match the Features with Your Lifestyle

The advancements in technology have also brought new features in hearing aids today. Some of these features might come in handy for you, while others, you might find unnecessary. The key is to balance the features that you need most, depending on your lifestyle.

For instance, if you’re the type who loves to go out regularly, works in a noisy environment, and fancies loud music, then you’re better off using a hearing aid with the ability to reduce background noise, and enhances speech. If you’re usually just at home and the noise is minimal, then you don’t need to have this feature.

Apart from your lifestyle or hobbies, you should also match the features of your hearing aid with your work environment. Some work environments are noisier than others, so this is something you’ll want to factor in as well.

5. Choose A Style You Like

Hearing aids don’t have to feel unfashionable. With the right style, some of these are even less visible than others! With so many options to choose from, you’re guaranteed to find one that truly meets your style preferences.

Here are some of the most common styles of hearing aid that are out in the market today:

• Mini CIC or Completely-In-Canal (CIC)This type of hearing aid fits perfectly in the ear canal. This is best used for those who suffer from hearing loss which can be mild to moderate. The advantages of this hearing aid include being the least visible type, the smallest, and less wind noise to pick up.
• In-The-Ear (ITE). Two ways to custom-made this type of hearing aid: one fills up the outer ear, and the other fills the lower part of the ear. This type is best used for patients who suffer from moderate to severe hearing loss. This kind of hearing aid may hold other features that aren’t available in the smaller models, and may also be easier to handle.
• Receiver-In-The-Ear (RITE) or Receiver-In-Canal (RIC). These types are closely similar to the behind-the-ear (BTE) type of hearing aid that have a receiver or speaker sitting on the ear canal. However, rather than using tubing, there’s a tiny wire that connects the piece behind the ear to the receiver or the speaker.

6. Get Tested

Buying a hearing aid isn’t a decision for you to make by yourself. Before you’ll purchase one, you’ll first need to get tested and assessed by a hearing specialist. That way, a diagnosis can be made whether or not you suffer from mild, moderate, or severe hearing loss. This is needed to narrow down the options of hearing aids you can choose from.

Conclusion

With these tips, now you’re ready to head out shopping for a hearing aid from a trusted specialist. This is a big milestone in your life, so it’s not something for you to take lightly. Take the time to go through the process carefully with ease and with thorough research. That way, you know for certain that your chosen hearing aid is the one that you truly need and prefer. Most importantly, you don’t have to go through this process alone. A hearing specialist will be necessary, not just to help assess your hearing needs and match them with the appropriate device, but also to fine-tune your hearing aid for your benefit and comfort.

Healthcare tech & ridesharing company Roundtrip has rolled out its platform with the American Cancer Society (ACS), specifically its ‘Road to Recovery’ program in order to enable cancer patients to connect to the treatment they need. The goal is to reduce the overall cancer mortality rate by 40% by 2035.

Together, Roundtrip and ACS will work to ease the stressful process of transportation coordination and allow patients to focus on what is most important – their care and recovery.

Roundtrip is a simple, comprehensive patient ride ordering software that connects patients with non-emergency medical transportation (NEMT). Roundtrip supports all levels of transport: volunteer drivers, rideshare, taxi, medical cars, wheelchair vans, stretcher vehicles, ALS/BLS ambulances, all payers, and all trips delivered when and where they are needed.

“The American Cancer Society is excited to leverage Roundtrip’s cutting-edge technology to assist patients in getting to life saving treatment,” says Chuck Westbrook, Senior Vice President of Cancer Control Programs and Services at the American Cancer Society. “We are confident that our patients and volunteers will benefit from this new transportation solution that helps patients overcome barriers to timely and high-quality care.”