QUICK STAT (SHORT, TIMELY, AND TOPICAL)

Mortality Patterns Between States With Highest Death Rates And States With Lowest Death Rates

A Data Brief from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) in September 2019 indicates that the average age-adjusted death rate for the five states (AL, KY, MS, OK, WV) with the highest rates (926.8 per 100,000 standard population) was 49% higher than the rate for the five states (CA, CT, HI, MN, NY) with the lowest rates (624.0). Age-specific death rates for all age groups were higher for the states with the highest rates compared with the states with the lowest rates. Age-adjusted death rates were higher for non-Hispanic white and non-Hispanic black populations, but lower for the Hispanic population in states with the highest rates than in states with the lowest rates. The age-adjusted death rates for chronic lower respiratory diseases and unintentional injuries for the states with the highest rates (62.0 and 65.5, respectively) were almost doubled compared with the states with the lowest rates (31.0 and 35.8).

Comparing Retail Clinics With Other Sites Of Care

According to an article published in the September 2019 issue of the journal Medical Care, with primary care transforming from care delivered exclusively in a physician's office to care that can be delivered in multiple sites and through different means, such as virtually and in retail settings, it is important to critique what is being gained from this primary care transformation and what, if anything, is being lost. For instance, entrepreneurs, policymakers, and officials at pharmacy and hospital chains may believe that the retail clinic model of primary care should include complex service delivery. Yet, the current body of research does not furnish enough information about whether this belief is founded in reality. As long as much of what is known for evaluating retail clinic care involves proprietary data controlled by advocates of retail clinics, uses more simplistic assessments of cost and quality, and leaves out the patient experience, there remains much that is unknown about this type of primary care.

HEALTH TECHNOLOGY CORNER

The Use of Small-Scale, Soft Continuum Robots To Navigate In Cerebrovascular Areas

An article published on August 28, 2019 in the journal Science Robotics describes the development by Massachusetts Institute of Technology engineers of a magnetically steerable, thread-like robot that actively can glide through narrow, winding pathways, such as the labrynthine vasculature of the brain. In the future, this robotic thread may be paired with existing endovascular technologies, making it possible to guide the robot remotely through a patient's brain vessels to treat blockages and lesions quickly, such as those that occur in aneurysms and stroke. The latter is the number five cause of death and a leading cause
of disability in the United States. If acute stroke can be treated within the first 90 minutes or so, researchers believe that patients' survival rates could increase significantly. A hope is that designing a device to reverse blood vessel blockage within a so-called “golden hour” potentially could result in the avoidance of permanent brain damage.

The Use Of “Phyjamas” In Health Care

The Ubicomp 2019 Conference on September 11-13, 2019 in London featured a presentation by researchers at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst who developed physiological-sensing textiles that can be woven or stitched into sleep garments they have dubbed "phyjamas." They designed a new fabric-based pressure sensor and combined that with a triboelectric sensor, one activated by a change in physical contact, to develop a distributed sensor suite that could be integrated into loose-fitting clothing like pajamas. They also developed data analytics to fuse signals from many points that took into account the quality of the signal arriving from each location. They report that this combination allowed them to detect physiological signals across many different postures. By performing multiple user studies in both controlled and natural settings, they showed that they can extract heartbeat peaks with high accuracy, breathing rate with less than one beat per minute error, and predict sleep posture perfectly.

UNCERTAINTY IN RELATION TO EXISTENTIALISM

Indicates the importance of conducting more research on the topic of uncertainty, an incompletely understood phenomenon. Read More

PRESIDENT’S CORNER—ASAHP MEMBER FOCUS

Susan Hanrahan offers her thoughts on the upcoming ASAHP Annual Conference from the standpoint of speakers, a leadership panel, and the Business Meeting, along with updated information about the Association’s Institutional Profile Survey. Read More

AVOIDING A GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN

Describes legislation involving appropriations for fiscal year 2020 that begins on October 1, 2019 and action underway to reduce pharmaceutical costs. Read More

 

HEALTH REFORM DEVELOPMENTS

Discusses questions pertaining to enactment of proposed Medicare For All Legislation. Read More

 

DEVELOPMENTS IN HIGHER EDUCATION

Summarizes finalization of stricter rules for student loan claims and trends in the ratio of the Pell Grant to total price of attendance and federal loan receipt. Read More

AVAILABLE RESOURCES ACCESSIBLE ELECTRONICALLY

  • Hospital Concentration Index

  • Reducing Inequities In Healthy Life Expectancy

  • Investing In Interventions That Address Non-Medical, Health-Related Social Needs Read More

BALEFUL IMPACT OF WORKPLACE INCIVILITY ON HEALTH

Mentions how dissimilarity in political identity can relate to reducing the quality of interpersonal interactions and subsequent well-being of workers. Read More

 

“BURNOUT” AND EARLIER SOMATIC PHENOMENA

Refers to a possible relationship between burnout in the 21st century and neurasthenia in an earlier century. Read More

 

THE ROLE OF ACCIDENTS ON THE PATHWAY TO INJURY AND DEATH

Examines factors pertaining to death and injury of adolescents from motor vehicle accidents and adult mishaps stemming from attempts to remove an avocado pit with a knife. Read More