August 18th, 2011 by Paul Auerbach, M.D. in Health Policy
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Sichuan earthquake rescue workers carrying an injured person. In light of the widespread media coverage of natural disasters, such as the earthquake in Haiti and the tsunami in Japan, the public and medical professionals are aware of the anticipated immediate medical needs in these kinds of emergencies. However, it is less well known that after the initial management of life- and limb-threatening injuries, there may be an enormous need to provide care to persons with chronic illnesses. This is because they are displaced from their homes, become exposed to adverse environmental and socioeconomic hardships, lose access to healthcare, are deprived of their sources of medications, and so forth.
Some of my colleagues were allowed to enter Japan after the tsunami, and their observations agree with this assessment, which was also confirmed in a recent paper, “Chronic health needs immediately after natural disasters in middle-income countries: the case of the 2008 Sichuan, China earthquake,” authored by Emily Chan and Jackie Kim (Eur J Emerg Med 2011;18:111-114). The authors considered physical, social and public health preparedness. Read more »
This post, Chronic Health Needs Must Be Addressed After A Natural Disaster, was originally published on
Healthine.com by Paul Auerbach, M.D..
July 27th, 2011 by CodeBlog in Book Reviews, Interviews
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Well, not my heart.
I was contacted awhile ago and asked if I wanted the chance to read and review Tilda Shalof’s new book, Opening My Heart. (Amazon link, but NOT an affiliate link – I live in California and due to a new law, Amazon has cut all ties with us).
I had the chance to include a story in a book that Tilda edited a couple of years ago called Lives in the Balance. So I had fond memories 🙂
I’ll say up front that I enjoyed the book. I had a range of emotions while reading it – frustration, worry, happiness. Frustration because although Tilda is a very experienced ICU nurse, she doesn’t take her own health seriously at all. I read with disbelief as she described her incredible denial of the obvious need to treat the heart condition she was born with.
I was amused at her doctor’s and husband’s reactions when she tried to tell them that if anything went wrong with her surgery, she didn’t want to be kept alive on machines. She explained that she used to have a dog and her husband absolutely refused to euthanize the miserable thing. I liked this passage in particular: “To Ivan, love means never stopping love or giving up. This is what families say. They can’t let go because of love. I hope no one loves me this much, ICU nurses often say to one another.”
Amen, sister.
Tilda writes about Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at code blog - tales of a nurse*
