RTs can do resuscitation

winnipegsun.com – Tom Brodbeck – Crisis at Seven Oaks
But the hospital couldn’t find a qualified ER doctor to fill the shift and had to make do with a family physician instead. Because family physicians are usually unable to handle more serious ER cases, the hospital also planned last night to divert all red and amber ambulance cases to other hospitals, Winnipeg Regional Health Authority spokeswoman Heidi Graham said.

An extra ambulance was added to last night’s shift to help handle the load, said Graham.

Meanwhile, the hospital had to staff the ER with a respiratory therapist to handle resuscitation cases because family doctors don’t do resuscitation, according to the WRHA.

Score one for the RTs!

Shower-borne Nontuberculous Mycobacteria

TheDenverChannel.com – Health – Showers May Be Giving Some Women Lung Infection
Doctors across the country are seeing an increase in a bacterial lung infection called non-tuberculous mycobacteria or NTM.

There are not enough studies out right now to show exactly how a person gets the infection but some doctors believe it is possible to get it from hot tubs or even by taking a shower.

It is a lung disease that doctors say starts from germs that reside in the water and soil. It is even possible to get it from hot, steamy showers.

One of the theories of NTM is that germs become air-born because of the mist from the hot water.

More about Nontuberculous Mycobacteria

Germany -> Vietnam RT Donations

Viet Nam News
The German Messer Industrial Gases Group’s Dr Hans Messer Foundation donated medical equipment valued at US$20,000 to the National Hospital for Obstetrics and Gynaecology’s Neonatal Department in Ha Noi yesterday.

The batch of five respiratory therapy or continuous positive air pressure (CPAP) machines, six phototherapy machines, three pulse oximeter monitors, three infant warmers and three incubators was presented by the group’s CEO, Stefan Messer.

The donation forms part of the Breath of Life programme of the non-governmental East Meet West (EMW) Foundation. The programme aims at reducing mortality rates among premature babies in Viet Nam. It is estimated that over 128,000 babies are born prematurely in Viet Nam each year and of those, 10 per cent suffer respiratory distress. About 12,000 babies will die and many more suffer brain damage from oxygen deprivation unless equipment, especially CPAP machines — standard equipment in developed countries — is available for intervention.

I like to see this kind of humanitarian donation.

Lung Cancer May Differ by Gender – Forbes.com

Lung Cancer May Differ by Gender – Forbes.com
Women may experience lung cancer in ways that differ from men, a new study finds.

Many women recently diagnosed with lung cancer have normal lung function and better results on lung function tests than newly diagnosed male lung cancer patients, say researchers reporting in the May issue of the journal Chest.

Some RT Jobs from Synergy Staffing

Position: Respiratory
Department/Area: Respiratory Therapy
Number of Openings: 15
Need Open: YES
Incentives Offered: NO
Shift: 12-hr shifts
Start Date: * ASAP
End Date: 3 months and 6 month assignments
Hiring Stage: Accepting profile/initial file submission
Certifications: AHA CPR
Comments/Requirements: PICU experience
Email your resume to info@synergystaffing.org

Lung Games in Virginia

This is a pretty cool idea:

Games Spotlight Healthy Lungs – News – Burke Connection – Connection Newspapers
This is the first Lung Games program in Virginia. “Our goal is to have these games throughout Virginia (at other lung rehab programs),” Montilla said.
Inova Fairfax has one of 23 lung rehabilitation programs in Virginia, Montilla said. Staff for it includes a pulmonologist, a nutritionist, a psychologist and several nurses and therapists.
Along with providing guided exercise to patients, the initial 10-week pulmonary rehabilitation program teaches patients how to use exercise machinery and medicines, and provide information about insurance policies for their disease. They also learn how to interpret their own pulmonary function data. Finally, they learn to control the panic that sometimes strikes when they have difficulty breathing.

Preoperative Pulmonary Risk Stratification for Noncardiothoracic Surgery

Summary for patients. Those Incentive Spirometry orders stand!

Preoperative Pulmonary Risk Stratification for Noncardiothoracic Surgery: Systematic Review for the American College of Physicians — Smetana et al. 144 (8): 581 — Annals of Internal Medicine
The authors found good evidence that the following patient factors increase the chances of pulmonary complications: older age, American Society of Anesthesiologists class II or higher, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, dependence on others for help with daily activities, and congestive heart failure. The authors also found good evidence that pulmonary complications are most common with aortic aneurysm repair, thoracic surgery, abdominal surgery, neurosurgery, vascular surgery, head and neck surgery, surgery lasting for more than 3 hours, emergency surgery, and general anesthesia. The only laboratory test result that predicted pulmonary complications was low serum albumin level (blood test that indicates poor nutritional status). The authors found good evidence that strategies to expand the lungs after surgery, such as deep breathing exercises, reduce the risk for pulmonary complications. They found fair evidence that selective use of a nasogastric tube (a tube passed through the nose to the stomach) for nausea, vomiting, or abdominal distention only reduces pulmonary complications after abdominal surgery. They found insufficient evidence to draw firm conclusions about the effectiveness of other strategies to reduce pulmonary complications.

MySpace group for Health Care Travelers

My buddy Hedgehog has a new group on MySpace called http://groups.myspace.com/HealthTravel for folks who are travelers in health care. If you’re an RT or other medical professional check it out.

Man Coughs Up Nail Stuck in Lung 35 Years

Man Coughs Up Nail 35 Years After Accident
His family rushing him to the hospital with a 105-degree temperature. There, doctors found the culprit, a small nail that had dropped down inside Hart’s body cavity and nestled inside his ribcage.

Doses of penicillin helped Hart heal, but since removing the metal would require major surgery and doctors suspected the nail would seal itself off in Hart’s body, the foreign object was forgotten for years.

“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” Hart said.

Years later, the nail turned up again on a doctor’s x-ray, but again, the unobtrusive item was left alone.

Then, three weeks ago, an internal camera captured an image of the nail during a routine doctor’s office visit. But it wasn’t in Hart’s ribcage area as he’d always thought — the object was actually in Hart’s lung. As Hart and his doctors made plans to remove the nail once and for all, natural physiology took over.

Apparently the mucociliary blanket is much tougher than I was led to believe.

ArtLung Blog : Archives : » Bronchoscope, 1993

Bronchoscope, 1993

If I’d have had rhonchi.com up and running last year I’d have posted this here too:

ArtLung Blog : Archives : » Bronchoscope, 1993

At UVa I was one of the Respiratory Therapists on the bronchoscopy team. Basically we assisted on bronchoscopies for patients who needed to have their lungs looked at with fiber-optics. I assisted on some odd ones. I remember one very critically ill patient, their circulation was supported heavily with vasopressors and I think he was an ARDS on top of preexisting pulmonary fibrosis—the inside of their lungs seemed to be filled up with black tar. Really terrible. I worked the night shift at UVa, so there were no “day in day out” bronchoscopies, it was usually people who were very sick. The Pulmonologists were all really cool, and it was fun to be in that assist role. They want saline, you have the saline ready. We maintained the bronch cart and assured we were ready for anything. It was actually quite fun, despite the seriousness of the job.