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US IVF Baby has a natural baby of her own

Examiner Bio Fertility News Info 101: First US IVF baby has baby of her own
August 7, 1:11 PMSalt Lake City Fertility ExaminerLibbii Armstrong-BrownPrevious
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Elizabeth Carr delivers baby boy.
Photo: David Comeau
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Fertility News Info 101: IVF chromosome tests could be a waste of money
Fertility Info 101: Polluted Air Stops IVF Babies In 1981, America's first 'test-tube' baby, Elizabeth Carr, was born. On Thursday, 5 August 2010, Elizabeth gave birth to a son, Trevor.

Elizabeth's mother had suffered through three ecptopic pregnancies and was sadly informed that she would most probably never be able to conceive a child naturally.

Although there had recently been a successful IVF birth in England, there hadn't yet been one in the USA and Doctor Howard Jones wanted to change that and, along with his wife Georgeanna, began an IVF program in Norfolk, Virginia.

Even though Elizabeth's parents currently lived in Massachusetts, IVF was still illegal in that state and so they had to travel to Virginia instead.

Soon after the Carr's welcomed their baby daughter into the world in 1981. And now, almost 29 years later that same baby has had a baby of her very own.

Elizabeth is quick to admit that her son was conceived naturally and was born naturally too.

Rather than have her story overly-publicized, Elizabeth opted instead to write her own story in which she states:

I follow the same principle my parents did: If my story helps couples or families learn about in-vitro fertilization, then the loss of privacy is worthwhile. People who have fertility issues deserve to know they can have healthy, normal babies.

According to the most recent data available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, fertility treatments led to the birth of nearly 60,000 babies in 2007.

If you would like to know more about IVF in Utah, you can contact the doctors at the Reproductive Care Center.



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A new Ariane Rocket launched to Serve NileSat 201 Satellite to serve Africa and MidEast

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Our Passion is to reach our Individual and Collective Potential 4 Excellence & Success-Always!

Satellites launched to serve Africa and Mideast

Thursday, 05 August 2010

August 5, 2010 -- An Ariane rocket launched two satellites into orbit on Wednesday to provide telecommunications forAfrica and the Middle East, European space officials said.   The Ariane-5 rocket blasted off from the European Space Agency's launch centre in Kourou, French Guiana on the northeast coast of South America. The NILESAT 201 satellite was designed to help Egyptian operator Nilesat provide telecommunications throughout the Middle East and north Africa. It was built by Thales Alenia Space, a joint venture company owned by France's Thales SA and Italy's Finmeccanica. The RASCOM-QAF1R satellite for pan-African operator RascomStar-QAF will provide telecommunications in rural Africa and urban African centres. It was also manufactured by Thales Alenia Space. "Certain countries like mine are waiting for much in (telecommunications) connections between distant centres," Thierry Savonarole Malevombo, the Central African Republic's post and telecommunications minister, said after the launch. "We are now in a position to bridge the digital divide," said Toure Hamadoun, Secretary General of the International Telecommunications Union. Wednesday marked the 38th consecutive successful launch of an Ariane rocket.  (Reuters)

 

As Americans Get Obese, Africans get Malnourished! where is the Justice?

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Our Passion is to reach our Individual and Collective Potential-Always!


RE: Disparity in Nutrition:  Americans Obesity and Africans Malnutrition


The Globe demands a Nutrition Justice where every one is optimally nourished. Both obesity and Malnutrition are not fair to those who suffer them.


Please read on


Dr BMJ


By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Editor

WASHINGTON | Tue Aug 3, 2010 3:32pm EDT

(Reuters) - More than 72 million U.S. adults, or 26.7 percent, are obese, up 1 percent in two years, the U.S. government reported on Tuesday.

Obesity has become "a major public health threat" and is steadily worsening, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported.

"We need intensive, comprehensive and ongoing efforts to address obesity," CDC director Dr. Thomas Frieden said in a statement.

"If we don't more people will get sick and die from obesity-related conditions such as heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and certain types of cancer, some of the leading causes of death."

The CDC examined data from the national Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, which surveys 400,000 people and asks about height and weight, among other things.

Looking state-by-state, the CDC found that 30 percent of adults in nine states are now obese. In 2000, no states reported obesity rates of 30 percent or more.

Height and weight are used to calculate body mass index or BMI, the medically accepted way to measure obesity.

A BMI of 25 or more makes someone overweight and obesity begins at a BMI of 30.

A 5-foot-4 inch tall person who weighs 174 pounds (79 kg) or more or a 5-foot-10 inch (1.8 meter) tall person who weighs 209 pounds (95 kg) or more has a BMI of 30, and is considered obese.

The survey found 2.4 million more people admitted to being obese in 2009 than in 2007, a 1.1 percent increase. And the CDC said this is almost certainly an underestimate, as people often say they are taller and weigh less than they actually do.

"Recent estimates of the annual medical costs of obesity are as high as $147 billion. On average, persons who are obese have medical costs that are $1,429 more than persons of normal weight," the report reads.

Blacks were the most likely to be obese, with 36.8 percent of U.S. black adults having a BMI of 30 or more -- more than 41 percent of black women.

More than 30 percent of Hispanic adults were obese.

As in previous surveys, Mississippi had the most obese people and Colorado the fewest.

The federal government and some states have been moving toward using legislation to help people to exercise and eat healthier foods.

New York and California have been considering a tax on sweetened soft drinks to defray the cost of treating obesity-related diseases. President Barack Obama has made reducing obesity a priority, assigning his wife Michelle Obama and cabinet secretaries to tackle childhood obesity in particular.

"People in all communities should be able to make healthy choices, but in order to make those choices there must be healthy choices to make," the CDC's Dr. William Dietz said.

"We need to change our communities into places where healthy eating and active living are the easiest path."

(Editing by Vicki Allen)

Gender Inequality- Ethiopia's Challenge in the New Millennium

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The World Bank’s country policy and institutional assessment (CPIA) rating is conducted annually and one of the factors that determine how much money each country is granted. Ethiopia performed best in its economic management, writes TAMRAT G. GIORGIS, FORTUNE STAFF WRITER.

WB Rating Slams Ethiopia’s Gender Inequality Country fares above average but stands lower than its peers in region

The World Bank has made public its annual assessments of the policies and institutional qualities of member countries eligible for grants from the International Development Association (IDA), an organisation in the World Bank Group. Known as Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA), the rating is conducted under the watchful eye of the chief economists of the regions. CPIA ratings constitute one third of the factors determining how much of the IDA’s annual seven billion dollars will go to each member country. Apart from the CPIA ratings, the World Bank also considers factors such as a country’s population size and record of utilising grants, in deciding how much money to contribute to that country. “We have only so much to give to all the countries under the IDA,” said Shantayanan Devarajan, chief economist of the World Bank for Africa region. “That is where selection comes [in]. But if we are to base our selection only on population size, India would take all the grants earmarked under the programme [and the] Maldives would get nothing.” Seeing as countries with higher population sizes are constrained by their CPIA ratings, the Bank has a policy of not granting an amount of less than seven million dollars to any small country, according to the chief economist. However, many countries are in the middle of this matrix. The CPI assessments are first compiled by a team of experts at a country level, before being sent to World Bank headquarters for review by chief economists from the six regions the bank is working in. Members of country teams always favour higher ratings for the countries they work on, according to the chief economist. “[However], we want to look at policies not intended for implementation, but [which] are actually being implemented and bear results,” Devarajan told participants of the meeting. The assessments are then sent to regional experts at the central departments who compare countries’ scores with each other. The final ratings, however, are decided at a meeting of experts from different regions, networks and central departments of the World Bank. In 2004, the Bank reviewed the set of criteria used to judge countries; subsequently the criterion was downsized by four, to only 16. Moreover, the Bank’s management decided to begin disclosing these ratings on August 9, 2004. For over four decades the World Bank has been very reluctant to disclose the content of these assessments. There were very few officials with access to these documents in the countries’ offices of the Bank, according to a staff member from the Bank’s office in Addis Abeba. “It [was] a profound shift,” Devarajan said. However, there appears to be a good reason for the Bank officials to have kept the assessments confidential seeing that many political leaders, whose countries are subjects of the review, do not like them. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, views the CPIA ratings as an ideological instrument of western neoliberals, interested only to impose the Washington Consensus, a list of policy manuals prescribed by the World Bank, including fiscal discipline, liberalisation of the financial sector, and privatisation. Devarajan and his colleague had a three-hour debate with Meles in Addis Abeba in June 2009; they parted after agreeing to disagree, according to reliable sources. Their attempt to persuade Meles that aid works better in recipient countries where there are good policies in place and the institutions to implement these policies are strong did not fly high with him. “He wants to be judged by the results his policies produce, not by the means that allow him to reach the end,” Devarajan told Fortune. This appears to be the message the Ethiopian government wished to send through its representative attending the meeting. “We want the assessment to be more result orientated,” Hashim Ahmed, macroeconomic advisor to the government, told the meeting. “The results are what matter at the end. Look at how well we performed in meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).” Meeting the MDGs does not stop the World Bank from passing judgment on the quality of a country’s policies and the strengths of its institutions. The latest judgment, for 2009, was revealed last week. Ethiopia’s overall rating in the assessment, which comprises four categories and 16 sub-categories, stands at 3.4 points out of six. It is one decimal point above the average for countries borrowing from the IDA, but three decimal points lower than Kenya, and four decimal points below Rwanda and Tanzania. Ethiopia performed best in its economic management, where it scored 3.7 points for its macroeconomic management and the quality of its fiscal and debt policies. The lowest point, like most IDA borrowers, is registered in structural policies such as trade, the financial sector, and its business regulatory environment. Ethiopia’s rating of 3.2 points is lower than the average borrower by two decimal points. The Bank’s assessment sees resource mobilisation by the Ethiopian financial sector as “modest and below potential,” and emphasises that long-term finance is unavailable from private banks. “The coverage of [the] national land registration system is still not able to furnish the market with details of available land,” according to the assessment. “The use of land as collateral by investors is still not practical with banks as the market value of land is difficult to determine.” However, none of the ratings were as controversial as the Bank’s conclusion on gender issues. Ethiopia’s social inclusion policies for gender equality scored three points, lower by four points from the average borrower and five points below Rwanda and Tanzania, although equal with Kenya. “We are not happy with the rating on gender,” Hashim told Fortune. “Women’s empowerment and girls’ education take time, even generations.” Hashim raises issues of women suffrage in the United States, which was enacted in 1960s. “Even today, for every one dollar an American male makes, a woman gets only 72 cents,” he said. “Rating on gender ought to be taken within context of culture, history and laws.” While the government is not happy about its ratings on gender equality, neither are delegates from non-governmental organisations. The World Bank lacks acknowledging improvements made on the gender front and in areas of environmental protection, said Meshesha Shewarega (PhD), executive director for Christian Relief and Development Association (CRDA), the largest consortium representing 304 NGOs in Ethiopia. The existence of laws that empower women and the enrolment of girls in elementary schools have increased, said Meshesha. By the bank’s own admission female participation in schools from first to eighth grades improved from 84pc in 2006, to 85pc the following year, and 91pc in 2009. “So much has been achieved in bridging the gap over the past five years, and in meeting MDGs in areas of gender and health provisions,” Meshesha told Fortune. “All these have not been properly credited.” These were the sort of acknowledgments that enabled Ethiopia to get the points it did. In their absence, its ratings, particularly compared to other countries, would have deteriorated further, Devarajan argues. Despite these ideological objections, the assessment for 2009 is complete and has already contributed to the decision of the IDA to grant Ethiopia one billion dollars in loans in the current fiscal year. The revealing and influential documents are available on the Bank’s website, www.worldbank.org

Priority Focus Area: Managing Communication and Informaton

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Priority Focus Areas

The Priority Focus Process is a data-driven methodology that consistently uses pre-survey information about

healthcare organizations to create priorities for reviewing standards compliance, thus lending consistency to the Survey process.

Pre-survey information is gleaned from data in your organization’s application for accreditation, your organization's past survey findings, our Quality Monitoring System database of complaints and non-self reported sentinel events, any ORYX core measure data, and certain external data, if available.

External data consists of publicly available data that are applicable to the accreditation program(s) being surveyed, such as HCAHPS for Hospitals, Nursing Home Compare, Home Health Compare, and failed laboratory proficiency testing data from CMS.

Priority Focus Process Summary Report

This summary report contains results for your organization. For a User’s Manual on the Priority Focus

Process, and a Definitions Guide on the Priority Focus Areas and Clinical/Service Groups, please refer to the

Joint Commission Connect Extranet site. These documents are located under the Priority Focus Process

link, by clicking on the link for Reference Documents.

Priority Focus Process Reports are updated quarterly and pull in data up to 3 years back from the date the

tool is run, except for laboratories which pull in data up 2 years back.

The Priority Focus Process brings consistency to the survey process for organizations having similar pre-survey data for the early part of their surveys as surveyors use the Priority Focus Areas and Clinical/Service Groups depicted in this report.

However, based on initial findings, surveyors will broaden or change focus appropriately. Organizations performing their own standards compliance assessment for their Periodic Performance Review and/or other quality improvement activities can use this information to enhance their evaluations, as well.

2 Staffing

2 Rights & Ethics

2 Patient Safety

1 Infection Control

1 Assessment and Care/Services

2 Information Management

2 Communication

2 HH- Home Personal Care/Support Services

1 HH- Home Health Services

Priority Focus Areas Clinical Service Groups

Assessment and Care/Services

Assessment and Care/Services for patients/clients/residents comprise the execution of a series of processes including, as relevant: assessment; planning care, treatment, and/or services; provision of care; ongoing reassessment of care; and discharge planning, referral for continuing care, or discontinuation of services.

Assessment and Care/Services are fluid in nature to accommodate a patient’s/client's/resident's needs while in a care setting.

While some elements of Assessment and Care/Services may occur only once, other aspects may be repeated or revisited as the patient’s/client's/resident's needs or care delivery priorities change.

Successful implementation of improvements in Assessment and Care/Services rely on the full support of leadership.

Sub-processes of Assessment and Care/Services include:

• Assessment

• Reassessment

• Planning care, treatment and/or services

• Provision of care, treatment and services

• Discharge planning or discontinuation of services

Infection Control

Infection Control includes the surveillance/identification, prevention, and control of infections among patients/clients/residents, employees, physicians, and other licensed independent practitioners, contract service workers, volunteers, students, and visitors.

This is a system-wide, integrated process that is applied to all programs, services, and settings.

Sub-processes of Infection Control include:

• Surveillance/identification

• Prevention and control

• Reporting

• Measurement

Priority Focus Areas

Priority Focus Areas (PFAs) are defined as processes, systems or structures in a health care organization that

significantly impact the quality and safety of care. They can be used to guide assessmet of standards compliance in

relation to the patient/resident/client experience.

Home Care Accreditation Program Home Care Accreditation Program

Home Care Accreditation Program

Communication

Communication is the process by which information is exchanged between individuals, departments, or organizations. Effective Communication successfully permeates every aspect of a health care organization, from the provision of care to performance

Improvement, resulting in a marked improvement in the quality of care delivery

and functioning.

Sub-processes of Communication include:

• Provider and/or staff-patient/client/resident communication

• Patient/client/resident and family education

• Staff communication and collaboration

• Information dissemination

• Multidisciplinary teamwork

Information Management

Information Management is the interdisciplinary field concerning the timely and accurate creation, collection, storage, retrieval, transmission, analysis, control, dissemination, and use of data or information, both within an organization and externally, as allowed by law and regulation. In addition to written and verbal information, supporting information technology and information services are also included in Information Management.

Sub-processes of Information Management include:

• Planning

• Procurement

• Implementation

• Collection

• Recording

• Protection

• Aggregation

• Interpretation

• Storage and retrieval

• Data integrity

• Information dissemination

Human Resource Management: Staffing

Effective Staffing entails providing the optimal number of competent personnel with the appropriate skill mix to meet the needs of a health care organization's patients/clients/residents based on that organization's mission, values, and vision.

As such, it involves defining competencies and expectations for all staff (the competency of licensed independent practitioners and medical staff are addressed in the Credentialed Practitioners priority focus area for all accreditation programs);

Staffing includes assessing those defined competencies and allocating human resources necessary for patient/client/resident safety and improved patient/client/resident outcomes.

Sub-processes of Staffing include:

• Competency

• Skill mix

• Number of staff

Rights & Ethics

Rights & Ethics include patient/client/resident rights and organizational ethics as they pertain to patient/client/resident care.

Rights & Ethics addresses issues such as patient/client/resident privacy, confidentiality and protection of health information, advance directives (as appropriate), organ procurement, use of restraints, informed consent for various procedures, and the right to participate in care decisions.

Sub-processes of Rights & Ethics include:

• Patient/client/resident rights

• Organizational ethics pertaining to patient/client/resident care

• Organizational responsibility

• Consideration of patient/client/resident

• Care sensitivity

• Informing patients/clients/residents and/or family

Patient Safety

Effective Patient Safety entails proactively identifying the potential and actual risks to safety, identifying the Underlying cause(s) of the potential, and making the necessary improvements so risk is reduced.

It also entails Establishing processes to respond to sentinel events, identifying cause through root cause analysis, and making necessary improvements.

This involves a systems-based approach that examines all activities within an organization that contribute to the maintenance and improvement of patient/client/resident safety, such as performance improvement and risk management to ensure the activities work together, not independently, to improve care and safety.

The systems-based approach is driven by organization leadership, anchored in the organization's mission, vision, and strategic plan, endorsed and actively supported by medical staff and nursing leadership, implemented by directors, integrated and coordinated throughout the organization's staff, and continuously re-engineered using proven, proactive performance improvement modalities.

In addition, effective reduction of errors and other factors that contribute to unintended adverse outcomes in an organization requires an environment in which patients/clients/residents, their families, and organization staff and leaders can identify and manage actual and potential risks to safety.

Sub-processes of Patient Safety include:

• Planning and designing services

• Directing services

• Integrating and coordinating services

• Error reduction and prevention

• The use of Sentinel Event Alerts

• The Joint Commission's National Patient Safety Goals

• Clinical practice guidelines

• Active patient/client/resident involvement in their care