Is nursing still the caring profession?

Nurses are increasingly coming under attack. Patients groups say they are too busy to see to their basic needs such as eating and washing, while politicians have labelled them lazy and grubby.

What is happening to nursing?

Filipino nurses seeking US jobs down by 7%

"Many young Filipinos aspire to become nurse practitioners because of the lure of lucrative overseas employment. We must protect this hope and dream by seeing to it that flunkey schools and reviewers are shut down"

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Alzheimer's Patients On Experimental Drug Showed Improved Mental Skills After One Year

Patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease who were treated with the experimental drug Dimebon from US drugmaker Medivation Inc, showed improvement in key mental skills after a year compared to patients who took the placebo. The patients on the active drug showed clear improvements in memory, language, awareness of time and place, and a more complex process called "praxis", which means having an idea and then actually putting it into practice.

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VISA BULLETIN FOR MAY 2008

The visa bulletin for employment based-category for philippines for the month of may 2008 showed an 8-month jump from last april, from july 2005 to march 2006.

Click here for the visa bulletin

The H-1B Cap and the New OPT Rule

A couple of very important developments have occurred in the past few days that affect students on OPT and those who just recently filed for an H-1B petition for the upcoming fiscal year.

The first development is that USCIS has just announced that the H-1B cap has been reached. Although that is not a surprise, the big surprise is that the Masters cap of 20,000 has also been reached. At this point, USCIS has not released any numbers as to exactly how many regular petitions and how many Masters petitions were received.

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Sleep

Tips for Healthcare Professionals

• Sleep hygiene should receive as much attention as other aspects of health screening
• Incorporate sleep assessments in the healthcare history and in parental education
• Sleep histories may provide you with a clue regarding comorbidities or family dysfunction
• Asking the child about sleep patterns can stress the importance of healthful sleep habits

Extravasation: Prevention is the Best Treatment

Infiltration is the inadvertent infusion of non-vesicant solutions or medications into the surrounding tissue. Extravasation is the inadvertent infusion of vesicant solutions into the surrounding tissue. A vesicant is defined as a drug that is capable of causing tissue injury.

Dealing with extravasation

The best treatment for extravasation is prevention. When the extravasation occurs, commonly used antidotes may or may not work. According to the Oncology Nursing Society’s Chemotherapy and Biotherapy Guidelines and Recommendations for Practice, treatments using sodium thiosulfite and DMSO have shown very limited success. In some cases, the manufacturer has specific recommendations for treatment of an extravasation. When doxorubin extravasates, for example, the manufacturer recommends applications of cool packs to the swollen area. When vinca alkaloids extravasate, the recommendation is warm packs to the swollen area. In all cases of suspected or actual extravasation, the physician should be notified immediately and given specific information about the drug and drug concentration, as well as an accurate, detailed description of the appearance of extravasated area.Hospitals may have specific extravasation policies and procedures. It is the nurse’s responsibility to know the hospital’s policy. In some cases, the protocol may include subcutaneous steroid injections and/or application of steroid or Silvadene creams. In most cases, once the infusion has extravasated, the only thing that can be done is to monitor the site until tissue damage demarcation is complete. At this point, the site will be assessed for maximum tissue damage. In many cases, a split or full thickness skin graft may be required. In the worst case scenario, amputation above the injury may be required to remove the dead tissue or to stop the spread of the tissue damage.

Preventing extravasation

To help prevent extravasation, two myths need to be dispelled: The first is that a “new” IV device should be used for each vesicant infusion. A new IV site is not guaranteed to work better than an existing one. The second myth is that a peripheral IV catheter should be checked for a blood return prior to the infusion and during the infusion. According to Infusion Therapy in Clinical Practice, obtaining a blood return on a peripheral IV catheter is an inconclusive assessment tool and should not be relied on to determine if the IV catheter is properly seated within the vein. Obtaining a blood flash or obtaining no blood return from a peripheral IV catheter is not an indication of catheter placement within the vein.

The most reliable tests are flushing the catheter before and during the procedure with copious amounts of saline and observing the site for swelling. A complete assessment of the IV site prior to the infusion is essential. A free flowing bag of normal saline should be infusing for IV push or IV piggyback vesicant injections. The vein should be completely flushed with at least 20 mL to 30 mL of saline after the vesicant infusion is complete to prevent the vesicant from “tracking” when the IV catheter is removed. The site should be continually assessed for swelling, coolness, stinging, or burning. When in doubt, the IV device should be removed. Any patient complaint is an indicator that the catheter may be malfunctioning.

Oversupply of nurses plagues RP

MANILA, Philippines -- The Philippines has oversupply of nurses thisyear as “world-class schools” in the country continue to produce thousands of nurses and some diploma mill schools churn out countless of practical nurses.

University of the Philippines College of Nursing Dean Dr. JosefinaTuazon and Philippine Nurses Association National President Leah Paquiz disclosed that the oversupply of nurses is fast becoming the country’s problem even as deployment abroad may be the “first choice” for these graduates.

Tuazon explained that due to the numerous nursing graduates this year at 67, 728, hospitals have to get volunteer nurses -- a lot better because they are not paid -- to accommodate the fresh graduates.

High number of graduates of Practical Nursing, a two-year course that focuses on the basics of nursing, aggravates the unemploymentproblem, Tuazon stressed.

“There is no local demand or positions for practical nurses withinthe Philippine Health Care Delivery system particularly in the light ofthe oversupply of nurses and subsequent unemployment of graduatenurses,” PNA’s Paquiz revealed in a written statement distributed tothe media recently.

Schools offering Practical Nursing have mushroomed in the countryovernight as they promise overseas employment that may await thegraduates of this two-year non-degree course. The promise of work abroad, however, is not true as foreign employers prefer the four-year college-degree nurses who passed the Licensure Board Exams, Paquizadded.

The farthest thing that these practical nurses can reach is become nurse assistants, Tuazon noted.The PNA likewise asked the Commission on Higher Education (CHEd) ofthe Department of Education to put a stop to other schools’ offering the Practical Nursing program.

The PNA “strongly objects to the institution of the PracticalNursing program and vehemently rejects the proposed ladderization ofthe nursing curriculum,” the PNA statement said.The PNA president also disclosed that United States, home to almost250,000 Filipino nurses in the past years, stopped issuing work visas this year because the quota requirement for migrant workers has already been reached. There were 21,000 Filipino nurses seeking employment in the US in 2007.

The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration deployed a totalof 13, 525 licensed nurses around the world in 2006. Of this number,12, 263 are females and 1, 261 are males.

Saudi Arabia employed some 5,600 Filipino nurses, the highest so far of all Middle East countries in 2006.

Japan has 1.1 million Filipino nurses and licensed caregivers in 2005.

Source: Inquirer.net

What nurses want

The health care industry’s continued reliance on paper astounds Lillee Gelinas, vice president and chief nursing officer at VHA Inc., an alliance of hospitals and non-acute-care facilities.

Gelinas was making rounds at a major hospital recently when she came upon a familiar sight: a nurse struggling with a huge pile of paper files. A work shift had just ended, and Gelinas assumed the nurse was catching up on the day’s charts. Instead, the nurse told her she had come in on her day off to manually gather data for review by the hospital’s quality committee, which was meeting the following day.

“We have a nursing shortage going on,” Gelinas said. “Is that the best use of people’s time?”

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registration of new nurses (December 2007 Nurse Licensure Examination passers)

The Professional Regulation Commission (PRC) will begin the registration of new nurses (December 2007 Nurse Licensure Examination passers) on March 24, 2008 at the PRC office in Manila.To facilitate an orderly registration, successful examinees are advised to observe the following registration schedule

ABA, Adrian A. to ALE, Quinessa S. (March 24)
ALEGADO, Jane A. to AQUINO, Tristan L. (March 25)
AQUINO, Xenia Joy L. to BALBIN, Anna Irish Y. (March 26)
BALBIN, Jon Nelson C. to BELLO, Martin II R. (March 27)
BELLO, Mecca Angela Q. to BURGOS, Roland A. (March 28)
BURI, Karen Anson R. to CAPUNDAN, Gretchen M. (March 31)
CAPUNO, Ann Naciancina V. to CIANO, Setrina N. (April 1)
CIELO, Leonida P. to DALAYGON, Casedil D. (April 2)
DALERE, Daryl Dave T. to DELA CRUZ, Uzzielle D. (April 3)
DELA CUADRA, Eunice Mae P. to DURA, Clair M. (April 4)
DURAGO, Neniel Kate B. to FAJARDO, Stephanie R. (April 7)
FAJARDO, Vergel S. to GAMAD, Charliselle A. (April 8)
GAMAD, Honesto Jr. G. to GRANIL, Romyr Jane A. (April 10)
GRANITO, Hazel Grace L. to JABONILLO, Joyce S. (April 11)
JACA, Flora Mae G. to LANGAMON, Emerald P. (April 14)
LANGBAYAN, Gibran A. to LOPEZ, Joann N. (April 15)
LOPEZ, John Michael C. to MALLARI, Florian Edgar A. (April 16)
MALLARI, Francis Ian Q. to MEDINA, Jeden Marneleh A. (April 17)
MEDINA, Julie Jane D. to NANGLIGAN, Marilyn D. (April 18)
NANI, Al-Nash A. to ORDANZA, Ma. Angelica E. (April 21)
ORDEN, Janice M. to PARUNGAO, Melvin A. (April 22)
PARUNGAO, Nalla L. to PULIDO, Eduardo C. (April 23)
PULIDO, Pamela E. to REYES, Jera R. (April 24)
REYES, Jerome Anthony D. to SALAMAT, Sharlene Ann G. (April 25)
SALAMATIN, John Lester R. to SEMIC, Jiesylmay T. (April 28)
SEMILLA, Florence Erika B. to TACDORO, Shiela B. (April 29)
TACIO, Herbert D. to TONO, Emelou S. (April 30)
TONOG, Joeky Z. to VESAGAS, Rainier M. (May 1)
VETUS, Ralph Joshua I R. to ZUNIGA, Woodrow Rafael III M. (May 5)

Study says fasting may reduce chemo side-effects

A few days of fasting might help protect patients from some of the unpleasant and dangerous side-effects of cancer chemotherapy.

They said mice given a high dose of chemotherapy after fasting thrived while half of a group of well-fed mice died, they reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The researchers stressed that people should not try this on their own yet but said the findings might lead to a way to use chemotherapy to more effectively kill tumors while sparing healthy cells.

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