We take a look at how the global pandemic began, how it spread, and how countries responded. The COVID-19 pandemic came to light on 31 December 2019 with an alert to the WHO China office, and the speed with which ...
More »Author Archives: Conor Burke
Tuberculosis vaccine to be given to healthcare workers in fight against COVID-19
Australian infectious disease researchers are trialling a vaccine against COVID-19 on healthcare workers. Professor Kathryn North, director of the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI), today announced the multi-centre randomised controlled clinical trial of a tuberculosis vaccine to test whether it ...
More »Norm’s story: Biography service helps palliative patients reflect
Norman wasn’t having a bar of it. Talk to a stranger about his life? No way. What did he want to tell someone all of his secrets for? "My life is very boring," he told his wife of 25 years, ...
More »Pandemic highlights need for planning and protection: opinion
The global COVID-19 pandemic has widespread and insidious consequences that in many instances go beyond personal health and the ramifications of which may not yet be fully known. For some the impact may be as minor as struggling to buy ...
More »Nurses among 14 COVID-19 cases at medical centre in Japan
Two nurses at a medical centre in Japan’s Oita prefecture have tested positive to COVID-19, bringing the total number of cases at the facility to 14, Kyodo newswire says. The nurses who work at the Oita Medical Centre, one in ...
More »How do healthcare workers protect themselves against COVID-19?
Grey’s Anatomy actress Ellen Pompeo late last week shared an Instagram video explaining to her 7.2 million followers that while many citizens are able to follow government advice to self-isolate to avoid contracting COVID-19, nurses and other healthcare workers don’t ...
More »Games tech to help health professionals identify suicidal ideation
Curtin University is utilising games technology to create web-based video simulations aimed at helping mental health experts identify and better communicate with people contemplating suicide. As the World Health Organization points out, suicide is the second leading cause of death ...
More »Saliva tests reveal level of meth use in ED
There’s a good chance that nurses at the Royal Melbourne Hospital who encountered a threatening patient in the emergency department were dealing with someone who had taken methamphetamine. Researchers from the University of Melbourne and Melbourne Health tested saliva from patients ...
More »Researchers issue cancer overdiagnosis warning
Australian researchers have renewed concerns that people are increasingly being diagnosed with cancers that will do them no harm if left undetected or untreated, following new research into five cancer types. Lead author Professor Paul Glasziou, from Bond University, looked at data ...
More »Quit smoking for better outcomes after surgery: WHO
Nurses and other health professionals are being urged to encourage patients to give up tobacco before undergoing surgery. The call comes with a new World Health Organization Tobacco Knowledge Summary, led by the University of Newcastle (UNE) and the World ...
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