U.K. Hospitals Issue Doctors' Dress Code

U.K. Hospitals Issue Doctors' Dress Code
By RAPHAEL G. SATTER – 3 days ago
LONDON (AP) — British hospitals are banning neckties, long sleeves and jewelry for doctors — and their traditional white coats — in an effort to stop the spread of deadly hospital-borne infections, according to new rules published Monday.
Hospital dress codes typically urge doctors to look professional, which, for male practitioners, has usually meant wearing a tie. But as concern over hospital-borne infections has intensified, doctors are taking a closer look at their clothing.
"Ties are rarely laundered but worn daily," the Department of Health said in a statement. "They perform no beneficial function in patient care and have been shown to be colonized by pathogens."
The new regulations taking effect next year mean an end to doctors' traditional long-sleeved white coats, Health Secretary Alan Johnson said. Fake nails, jewelry and watches, which the department warned could harbor germs, are also out.
Johnson said the "bare below the elbows" dress code would help prevent the spread of Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA, the deadly bacteria resistant to nearly every available antibiotic./.../

Atlas Desenvolvimento Humano de São Paulo

São Paulo, 13/09/2007Software reúne indicadores sociais de SPPrefeitura e PNUD lançam programa com mais de 200 dados socioeconômicos sobre o município de São Paulo e suas microrregiões-->
RAFAEL SAMPAIO da PrimaPagina
O PNUD e a Prefeitura de São Paulo lançam, na sexta-feira, um banco de dados eletrônico e gratuito com mais de 200 indicadores sociais sobre o município e suas microrregiões. O software agrupa informações como analfabetismo, desigualdade de renda, renda per capita, acesso a esgoto e esperança de vida, cria mapas e gráficos, ordena e classifica indicadores.
Chamado Atlas do Trabalho e Desenvolvimento de São Paulo, o programa foi elaborado nos moldes do Atlas do Desenvolvimento Humano do Brasil, lançado em 2003. Ele traz dados em nove áreas, como educação, renda, trabalho, habitação, vulnerabilidade e desenvolvimento humano, com base nas informações dos Censos de 1991 e 2000 para cada grande área da cidade. No total, são 31 subprefeituras, divididas em 96 distritos e 454 microrregiões — as Unidades de Desenvolvimento Humano, que agrupam sensores censitários semelhantes, de modo a destacar as disparidades internas da maior metrópole do país, que tem 1.524 km² e em 2000 contava com 10,434 milhões de habitantes.
O Atlas traz, para todas essas unidades, o IDH-M (Índice de Desenvolvimento Humano Municipal, uma adaptação do IDH aos indicadores regionais brasileiros. “O Atlas vem colaborar com a descentralização administrativa e com a adoção de políticas públicas localizadas, que são diretrizes tanto do PNUD, através dos Objetivos do Milênio, quanto da gestão municipal, com a missão de articular melhor as subprefeituras”, afirma o economista Juarez Nunes Mota, da Secretaria Municipal do Trabalho, um dos autores do Atlas.
Mota afirma que, entre 1991 e 2000, os bairros centrais ficaram mais ricos e se distanciaram da periferia em termos de riqueza. Cresceu a disparidade social dentro da cidade. “A desigualdade se acentuou entre áreas centrais que são ricas, como Pinheiros, e as regiões periféricas, como Guaianazes”, diz o economista. Ele avalia que os dados serão usados no planejamento futuro dos investimentos públicos, para estimular o desenvolvimento socioeconômico das regiões mais pobres do município

Thomas Malthus - encyclopedia article about Thomas Malthus.

Para os interessados em população e desigualdade na distribuição de riquezas...
Thomas Malthus - encyclopedia article about Thomas Malthus.: " Rev. Thomas Robert Malthus, FRS (February 13, 1766 – December 23, 1834), usually known as Thomas Malthus, although he preferred to be known as 'Robert Malthus', was an English demographer and political economist. He is best known for his pessimistic, false, but highly influential, views on population growth, which overlooked the potential for improvements in food-production technology, city water supplies, etc. "

Niccolo Machavelli

Niccolò Machiavelli offered a famously dim view of human nature in The Prince. People are so "ungrateful, fickle, [and] false," he wrote, that a ruler should comfortably abandon conventional morality in dealing with them. He should slay deposed rulers and their families, recognize that friendship "yields nothing," and, beneath a veneer of compassion and honesty, master treachery and deceit. In short, because man is evil, leaders must know "how to do evil."

Preparing Poster Presentations

Top 10 tips for preparing your posterCongratulations! You have been invited to present your poster at Forum 11.
Poster Sessions will be held in the Jiuhua Convention Center and Resort each morning from 30 October to 1 November 2007 during the coffee break from 10:00 to 10:45.
Following, you will find top 10 tips for preparing your poster:
1) Please do not mount the text of your full paper, or PowerPoint presentation, as a poster.
2) Title Display the title in big lettering so it is clearly visible. Forum 11 participants will be given your name and the title of your abstract; it will be easier for them to find you!
3) Headings Use headings to bring your main message(s) across. The more important the point, the larger the type.
4) Content When planning the content of your poster, ask yourself what is the basic information you would need to know about this project if you were a viewer. This is the text you should clearly state.
5) K.I.S.S.Keep It Simple and Stupid! Don't complicate your text and visuals. Limit the amount of text; keep it brief and to the point. Viewers will not bother to read a lot of text. Don't try to cover too many points. Avoid being too technical and full of jargon.
6) Visuals
Alongside the text, use visuals to 'tell your story'. Use photographs, graphs, maps, etc. Make sure they are related to the text. And once again, keep it simple! If the graphs are too complex, they will not be understood, and disinterest viewers.
7) Colours
Black type is best. Use two or three additional muted colours to highlight key texts or themes consistently.
8) Visual guides Use white space creatively to help define the flow of information. Arrows, hands, numbers and symbols can clarify sequence.
9) 'Speech' Before the poster session, make sure you have a brief summary of your project well rehearsed as some participants will want a quick 'guided tour' of your poster.
10) Marketing
You can provide details during coffee breaks
Have copies of the poster available for distribution
Provide pre-printed abstracts/full paper with your contact information
Bring a good supply of visiting cards

References:
http://www.aaanet.org/
www.pitt.edu/~etbell/upj-space/PosterGuide.htm
www.iscb.org/ismbeccb2004/poster_session.html
www.asp.org/education/howto_onPosters.html
www.ncsu.edu/project/posters/NewSite/CreatePosterFocus.html

In a Half-Century Life Expectancy for Americans Climbs Eight Years - in Infectious Disease, Public Health from MedPage Today

Medical News: In a Half-Century Life Expectancy for Americans Climbs Eight Years - in Infectious Disease, Public Health from MedPage Today: "ATLANTA, Sept. 13 -- In the past 50 years, life expectancy has risen to the point that many American born in 2005 can expect to live to the age of about 78, which is eight years longer than for those born in 1955 when Eisenhower was president. According to the latest report form the CDC's National Center for Health Statistics the average live expectancy for a white American born in 2005 is 78.3 years and for black American born in 2005 average live expectancy is 73.2 years. But at the same time, preliminary figures also indicate an increase in the U.S. infant mortality rate from 6.79 per 1,000 live births in 2004 to 6.89 in 2005. The CDC said, however, that the increase was not statistically significant. "

Noroviruses -- Challenges to Control

NEJM -- Noroviruses -- Challenges to Control
Acute infectious gastroenteritis is an extremely common illness, second in frequency only to acute respiratory illness among North American families. Although it had long been suspected that such illnesses were caused by viruses, it was only after clinical and laboratory studies were carried out over the past three decades that causative viruses were identified.1,2 Among the most prominent are a novel group of viruses originally referred to as Norwalk-like agents — named after Norwalk, Ohio, where an outbreak of illness was caused by the prototype agent — and now called noroviruses