Healthcare information and the rural primary care doctor

Health inequity and improper dispensing of social justice is a huge topic of which one aspect is healthcare information and access to it. Access to health information is a ‘prerequisite for meeting the Millennium Development Goals’, and lack of knowledge and information, especially in resource-poor settings, impedes the delivery of quality healthcare and contributes to many preventable deaths worldwide. Three out of four doctors responsible for care of children in district hospitals in seven less developed countries reported inadequate knowledge in managing common childhood illnesses such as childhood pneumonia, severe malnutrition and sepsis. A review concluded that information deficiency exists ‘right across the health workforce’ and can be associated with provision of suboptimal care

Open Access: The changing face of scientific publishing

The debate on open access to scientific literature that has been raging in scholarly circles for quite some time now has been fueled further by the recent developments in the realm of the open access movement. This article is a short commentary on the current scenario, challenges, and the future of the open access movement

Letter to the Editor

Occupational exposure to pathogenic microbes as a result of needles stick injury is associated with significant risk to health care professional’s career, health, families and also the patients.  OBJECTIVES:  To establish the incidence of needle stick injury (NSI) among health care workers (HCW) of a tertiary care centre. To study risk factors for getting NSI and to determine barriers in seeking care after NSI in above mentioned setting. To assess awareness, acceptability and availability of post exposure prophylaxis (PEP) in the tertiary care centre. MATERIAL AND METHODS: A cross- sectional study was conducted among HCWs of MM Institute of Medical sciences and Research, Mullana. A total of 300 health care workers were selected for the study by simple random sampling method.  A self designed, semi- structured interview schedule was used to collect data from the participants by interview method. RESULTS:  80.5% of HCWs reported having had one or more NSI in their career, maximum among the nursing staff (94.2%). The average number of NSIs was found to be 1.85 per HCW per year (±2.29 SD). 17.8% of HCWs had a NSI involving a high-risk patient. (61%) of the NSI were from a hollow-bore type of needle. Most of NSIs were while recapping a needle after use (27%)  or bending the needle for  breaking it before disposal (20%). Majority of the NSI were not reported to the hospital administration. 72% of the respondents had heard about PEP and less than 10 % of them knew about the availability of PEP services in the hospital. CONCLUSION: Training of HCWs regarding safety practices needed to avoid NSI should be  an indispensable ongoing activity at the hospital . Besides health promotion, there should be setting up of an adequate surveillance mechanism in every large hospital and also of facilities for prompt response and treatment of NSI