February 7, 2023 · 7:00 AM
From DailyMail:
Last year, more than 10,000 people in Canada – surprisingly that’s over three percent of all deaths there – ended their lives via euthanasia, an increase of a third in the previous year. And it’s likely to keep rising: next year, Canada is set to allow people to die exclusively for mental health reasons.
Only last week, a jaw-dropping story emerged of how, five years into an infuriating battle to obtain a stairlift for her home, Canadian army veteran and Paralympian Christine Gauthier was offered an extraordinary alternative.
A Canadian official told…
health news
Do private, for-profit clinics save taxpayers money and reduce wait times? The data says no
There’s a lot of talk these days about an increased role for private health-care clinics in Canada, sparked in part by Premier Doug Ford’s plans to significantly increase the number of Ontario surgeries done in for-profit clinics.
Despite promises from Ford and others that it will streamline services and solve the issue of long wait times, health-care professionals that CBC News interviewed say there are nuances and that such happy outcomes are not borne out by the data.
In fact, data from BC and from other countries suggests private, for-profit surgery clinics will likely increase the true cost to taxpayers…
US Life Span Falling Behind Our Peer Countries
March 6, 2023 · 7:29 AM
From NPR:
The average life expectancy for Americans is shortened by over seven months [in 2021]according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
That decrease follows an already big decline of 1.8 years in 2020. As a result, the expected life span of someone born in the US is now 76.4 years — the shortest it has been in nearly two decades.
But we still have the best healthcare system in the world, right? Not if you judge it by life expectancy. From Health System Tracker:
Life expectancy in the…
Tales From Cbs News HealthwatchHealth News
But on a dry, hot day, these winds can collect up embers and dump them into tinder dry savannah and forest, destroying crops, … Three years ago I was briefly dating a main college teacher who occurred to be a part-time animal rights activist. The expertise made me make a decision I’ve been living with ever since. A new study titled “The relationship between age and sex companion counts through the mpox outbreak in the UK, 2022” and published within the journal PLOS ONE shows the number of sexual partners we have changes as we age—and there … 1st Canadian…
Ontario rolls out programs to boost health staffing
KITCHEN, Ont. — Ontario Health Minister Sylvia Jones says the province is starting three programs aimed at bolstering staffing in the health-care sector.
A $40-million fund to encourage health-care providers to better connect patients to services, a program to allow internationally trained physicians to work more quickly, and a nursing mentor program were all previously announced but are now launching.
The announcement comes as hospitals across the province grapple with a shortage of nurses that has led to dozens of temporary ER closures – the arbitrator who sets hospital nurses’ new contract says there are 9,000 registered nurse vacancies.
The…
Lisa Marie Presley’s death puts the rare risk of bariatric surgery in the spotlight
The cause of Lisa Marie Presley’s death, revealed Thursday to be a small bowel obstruction, has cast new attention on the rare risks and long-term complications of bariatric surgery.
The Los Angeles County medical examiner’s office determined that the obstruction was caused by adhesions — buildups of scar tissue that cause organ tissue or walls to stick together — that Presley developed after he had bariatric surgery years ago.
A treatment for severe obesity, bariatric surgery induces weight loss by modifying the stomach or small intestine to reduce how much food the stomach can hold.
Presley, the only child of…
Fixing the family doctor shortage in Canada
Whether you have a family doctor or you’re looking for one, chances are you have had to endure long wait times to see them or find them.
Last year, the Angus Reid Institute reported there were six million Canadians without a family doctor, and a third of them said they had been searching for more than a year.
And even for those who are part of the lucky group who has one, their wait time probably ranges from days to weeks to get an appointment.
Danielle Martin, a family physician and chair of the department of family and community medicine…
News of replacement for First Hospital brings hope
Nearly a year ago, families and vulnerable individuals in our area had the rug cruelly pulled out from under their lives.
On a bright summer day the Commonwealth Health System informed this community that First Hospital in Kingston would be closing in just under three months time.
The impending closure of inpatient mental health facilities naturally dominated the conversation, but after the initial shock set in the larger scope of this devastating news became clear: Along with the hospital we would be losing a range of related services.
“They include Community Counseling services, outpatient assessments, evaluation and treatment for individuals…