Monthly Archives: November 2010

Some food safety questions from the US that may be of interest locally

November 30, 2010 – 4:03 pm

Thanks to the Food Chain Intelligence consultancy for allowing Croakey to cross-post this article. It raises some interesting issues about food safety, in the light of inquiries by the Food and Drug Administration in the US, and also includes some stomach-turning history of food poisoning outbreaks, that affected dogs as well as humans. It is [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in Food, public health | Tagged , , , | Comments (1)

Health advice for the new Victorian Government (and a killer question)

November 30, 2010 – 12:10 pm

What will the change of government in Victoria mean for national health reform? No doubt it’s a question plenty are pondering. I’ve asked several Croakey contributors for how they would advise the new government around health reform, and what questions they’d like to see journalists asking about health matters. I will post their responses as [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in health reform, primary health care, tobacco control | Tagged , , , , | Comments (2)

Join us in the KFC Scholar Twitter comp (the other one…)

November 30, 2010 – 11:08 am

KFC has been running a Twitter competition for high school students in the US, in which contestants are asked to tweet why they deserve a $20,000 KFC scholarship to go to college. Apparently, KFC has had 2,800 applications and a winner will be announced any day. But Croakey will not let this competition die. Not [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in Food, Media-related issues, public health | Tagged , , | Comments (3)

Some recommended viewing for e-health summit: If air travel worked like health care

November 30, 2010 – 9:19 am

Minister Nicola Roxon’s two-day e-health summit starts in Melbourne today and you can watch the webcast here. Some background about who is speaking etc can be found in this report from The Australian’s IT section. Meanwhile, thanks to Scott White from GP Access for alerting Croakey to this painfully entertaining clip, “If air travel worked [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in e-health, health reform | Tagged , | Comments (3)

At last, a national suicide prevention strategy for Indigenous Australians

November 29, 2010 – 2:58 pm

The Federal Government recently released its response to the Senate committee’s report, The Hidden Toll: Suicide In Australia. The Government’s response to each of the report’s recommendations is detailed from page 57 onwards. Senator Rachel Siewert, who chairs the Senate Community Affairs Reference Committee, which prepared the Hidden Toll report, has welcomed the news that [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in health financing and costs, Indigenous health, mental health, prevention, public health | Tagged , , , , , | Comments (4)

What do Australians think of nurse practitioners?

November 26, 2010 – 7:33 am

Some years ago, I interviewed a nurse practitioner working in a metropolitan hospital who described how she had good support from the medical colleagues with whom she worked – but had also suffered quite a bit over the years from the resistance of organised medicine to nurse practitioners. She had had to put up with [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in health reform, health workforce, nurses and nursing | Comments (7)

How does Australian TV cover health in the developing world?

November 25, 2010 – 11:17 pm

How does Australian TV cover the health issues of developing countries? And why does this matter? Read on… Michelle Imison writes: Despite rumours about the demise of traditional media, TV news and current affairs are still influential in shaping our social and political agenda for health. Of course, most of the stories they feature are [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in global health, Media-related issues | Tagged , , | Comments (1)

Victorian voters should be demanding better leadership on health spending

November 25, 2010 – 11:03 pm

Victorians will be voting on Saturday. It’s well past time for some serious conversations about how health spending is being divvied up, suggests Trevor Carr, chief executive officer of The Victorian Healthcare Association (which represents the state’s public health sector). Trevor Carr writes: Public healthcare in Victoria consumes some 27 per cent of the entire [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in health financing and costs, health reform, Hospitals, primary health care | Tagged , | Comments (2)

Will national health reform improve health care safety?

November 23, 2010 – 7:57 pm

For those who still have an appetite for health reform reading (are there any of you still standing??), here is some more… The Parliamentary Library has just published this digest of the bill that is curiously named National Health and Hospitals Network Bill 2010 but is really about establishing the Australian Commission on Safety and [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in adverse events, health reform, quality and safety of health care | Comments (2)

Beware the personal testimonial when it comes to prostate cancer screening

November 23, 2010 – 7:28 pm

Simon Chapman, professor of public health at the University of Sydney, writes: Last week’s publication of my book, Let Sleeping Dogs Lie? What men should know before getting tested for prostate cancer (free download here), has provoked a stream of testimonials from men who had their prostate cancer found via a PSA test, had it [...]

By Melissa Sweet | Posted in cancer, men's health, public health, quality and safety of health care, screening, tests | Tagged , | Comments (4)