RedScrubs
The Resource for Medical Professionals

Anticoagulants, better known as blood thinners, were the target of an alert put out by the Joint Commission recently. Diane Cousins, vice president of the Advancement of Patient Safety of the US Pharmacopeia, stated that in the last seven years 70,000 medication errors have involved blood thinners with 26 resulting in death. Heparin and warfarin have been among the top ten offenders.

Do you have good posture? If you answer “no,” you’re not alone. Look around, and you’ll see that I’m right. Most people have a sort of hunched over posture. The head hangs forward and the shoulders are curved to the front. This is the result of years and years of slouching. Chronic slouching allows the pectoral muscles to tighten and the muscles of the upper back to weaken. These changes make it incredible difficult, if not impossible, to stand up straight.

According to the report from the Trust for America’s Health and the Robert Wood Foundations 2008 report, adult obesity rates have increased in 37 states this past year. Rates rose in 24 states for two consecutive years and for a third consecutive year in 19 states. No state saw a decrease.

This report shows that the preventive programs that are being adopted are either not being utilized, implemented properly or are just plain not working. The report calls for the federal government to partner with state and local governments, businesses, communities and schools to create and implement a realistic comprehensive National Strategy to Combat Obesity.

A recent study shows that the health benefits of probiotics may extend beyond the gastrointestinal system (G.I) to the entire body. Data from this study indicate that the anti-inflammatory and pathogen protection benefits of the probiotic Bifidobacterium infantis 35624 may have multi-faceted benefits.

Inflammatory responses are key parts of the immune system’s battle against invaders. The normal response to infection is rapid and effective; however the immune response may cause damage to healthy tissues, occasionally resulting in organ failure according to the study.

You would think that anyone could have guessed that children who play video games that involve jogging, swinging, and kickboxing would burn more calories than those children who played games while seated. Well, it took a real-life research study to prove that those active video games that require kids to move around help them to exercise and to burn calories.
In this study, lead researcher Alison M. McManus from the University of Hong Kong’s Institute of Human Performance counted the calories burned by kids playing a variety of video games, and found that kids can burn up to 451 percent more calories per minute playing action and running games. That’s a significant amount of calories that would not have been expended had the child sat in front of the television screen. In addition, playing video games while seated also gives children the opportunity to snack on greasy chips and drink sugar-laden soda. That’s hard to do when you’re jumping around.
Despite these findings, parents need to have rules about how many hours a day children can play video games and watch television. Just because you give a kid an active video game set-up, he or she still needs to socialize, to do homework, to read, to go to public events, to eat healthful foods, and to sleep in order to grow into a positive contributor to our society.