New York City workers may be facing layoffs. Libraries are bracing to lose financing, and caseworkers are girding for bigger loads. Now add to the list of victims of citywide budget cuts nursing positions at small schools, public and private.

According to preliminary estimates by the mayor, the move would affect 146 schools

[Read Entire Article HERE] via New York Times

There is an old saying among some doctors — do not let your friends and family schedule a surgery in July. July is the month when graduates, fresh out of medical school, report to residencies in teaching hospitals. Anecdotally, at least, it’s been a time when medical errors peak. A new study decided to see if the so-called “July Effect” was real. Researchers from the University of California at San Diego investigated more than 62 million U.S. death certificates between 1979 and 2006. Of those, 244,388 deaths were caused by a medication errors in a hospital.

[Read Entire Article HERE] via ABCNews

Eva Markvoort narrated an unvarnished blog about life with a terminal disease. This was an artistic outlet for her to reflect near the end of her life.

“Hello to the world at large,” she said in the video. “To my blog, to my friends, to everyone. I have some news today. It’s kinda tough to hear, but I can say it with a smile.” Propped in a hospital bed, Markvoort sat surrounded by her family. “My life is ending.”

[Read the full story HERE]

New Island Hospital, one of Long Island‘s two remaining stand-alone community hospitals, is joining Catholic Health Services.

The move, which will be formally announced Tuesday, will help protect the 203-bed nonprofit in Bethpage from the buffeting economic climate, said the hospital’s chief executive, Dr. Aaron Glatt.

“When you’re a small ship, you’re much more vulnerable to a big squall,” said Glatt, who pointed to Gov. David A. Paterson‘s recent budget proposal to cut $1 billion in health care statewide as an example.

Glatt said the hospital, which has 800 employees, is in good financial shape – a comeback from the late 1990s when it had been in bankruptcy. That made it attractive to other health care systems. North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System and NuHealth, which includes Nassau University Medical Center, had also been talking with the hospital.

“Integration is a sign of the times,” said Kevin Dahill, president of the Nassau-Suffolk Hospital Council. “It makes a great deal of sense.”

Glatt said the board of directors voted unanimously Wednesday to join Catholic Health Services because it most closely aligned with New Island’s mission to serve its community of 300,000 to 400,000.

Christine Hendriks, spokeswoman at Catholic Health Services, said New Island was attractive to the Catholic network because of its location and financial stability. The network, which includes five other hospitals, three nursing homes, and a home care and hospice network, has about 23 percent market share on the Island.

“Our other hospitals are east and west,” Hendriks said. “They [New Island] provide a nice link.”

The hospital must follow Catholic Health Services’ ethical and religious directives on health care, which preclude abortion, sterilization or contraceptives. But Glatt said that would have little impact at New Island, which doesn’t have an obstetrics service or outpatient gynecology clinic and doesn’t offer abortions or routine gynecological care.

In 1996, the hospital, then known as Mid-Island Hospital, went into bankruptcy. In 1999, it was renamed and put under the joint sponsorship of Winthrop-South Nassau University Health System and Catholic Health Services. The affiliation sparked controversy among community groups because the hospital would no longer provide abortion or contraceptive services. In 2005, the arrangement ended and the hospital was on its own.

The only remaining stand-alone hospital on Long Island is Long Beach Medical Center, Dahill said.

January 23, 2010 By RIDGELY OCHS ridgely.ochs@newsday.com

The nursing job market in New York state, long thought to be recession-proof, is starting to feel the effects of the economic downturn, according to a study.

Job opportunities for newly trained registered nurses are dwindling at a time when nursing schools are churning out more and more RNs, according to The Center for Health Workforce Studies at the University at Albany, which released a report earlier this month.

…

The job market for nurses will heat up again as the economy improves, according to Moore. “The nursing shortage is not over by a long shot,” she said. More nurses will be needed as the population ages, she said.

About 9,300 people graduated from RN education programs in New York in 2009, 9 percent more than 2008, according to the study. It was the seventh consecutive year the number of RN grads increased.

[Read Entire Article HERE] via syracuse.com

GENEVA – The World Health Organization on Monday slammed as “irresponsible” critics who claim swine flu is a fake pandemic created for the benefit of drug companies.

The U.N. health agency said the outbreak of a new strain of H1N1 influenza in North America last year had all the scientific characteristics of a pandemic, adding the WHO was never improperly influenced by the pharmaceutical industry that has benefited from huge government orders for vaccines and anti-viral drugs.

“The world is going through a real pandemic. The description of it as a fake is wrong and irresponsible,” the WHO said in a strongly worded statement Monday.

[Read Entire Article HERE] via msnbc.com

A nursing school with Ann Arbor ties survived the 7-magnitude earthquake that struck Haiti Tuesday, early reports indicate.

The professional nursing school, Faculty of Nursing Science of the Episcopal University of Haiti, is 20 miles west of Port-au-Prince and 10 miles west of the epicenter of the quake, in the town of Leogane.

[Read Entire Article HERE] via annarbor.com

Nursing students are twice as likely to smoke as the general population, according to a new study. Researchers in Italy surveyed 812 new nursing students. They found that 44 percent of them smoke, a rate twice as high as the general population, they said in a news release.

Another 12 percent said they used to smoke.

“When health professionals smoke it makes it more difficult for them to encourage patients to stop,” said professor Anna Maria Tortorano of the University of Milan.

[Read Entire Article HERE] via wisn.com [ABC]

The state Health Department is requiring that all direct care workers and those with whom they have contact be vaccinated for seasonal flu and the H1N1 virus, also known as swine flu.

“Although we encourage registered nurses to get a vaccination, we believe it should not be mandatory,” said Mark A. Genovese. “By itself, it’s an extreme measure and it won’t prevent the spread of influenza.”

[Read Articles HERE, HERE and HERE]

By Richard Sisk and Erica Pearson
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS

Saturday, September 5th 2009

Nurses across the state are demanding medical masks that effectively protect them from swine flu.

A day after scientists said health care workers who come in close contact with flu patients should wear an N95 respirator, the New York State Nurses Association rallied its 37,000 members.

In an open letter to State Commissioner of Health Richard Daines, the association called for respirators to be standard in New York, saying airborne germs are a “clear hazard for workers.”

[Read Entire Article HERE]