IATROGENESIS

A Special Report


Dozens of British children who developed narcolepsy as a result of a swine flu vaccine could be compensated after the high court rejected a government appeal to withhold payments. Six million people in Britain were given the Pandemrix vaccine made by GlaxoSmithKline during the 2009-2010 swine flu pandemic. But the jab was withdrawn after doctors noticed a sharp increase in narcolepsy.
The Guardian, 17th February 2017

Iatrogenesis is an illness caused by medical treatment or examination. It is even known to be a cause of death. It has been around for centuries but only now and then it will make news. Book of Tales has a rather satirical but also very informative article on Iatrogenesis. Read >>

Research published on Thursday 16 October 2014 suggest that the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK spends £2.5 billion a year treating patients harmed by avoidable errors made by hospital staff.
The independent study found that each year, almost 800,000 patients - 1 in 20 of all those admitted to hospital in England - are affected by such errors. Patients suffer bedsores, blood cloths, drug errors and infections.


BREAST CANCER
The downside of screening
Read more  >>


PROFESSOR SIR DAVID MACKAY IN HOSPITAL
An unbelievable but true Tale
Professor Sir David MacKay, a former chief scientific adviser
to the Department of Energy and Climate Change in the UK and a Cambridge University academic, was admitted to hospital for stomach cancer. In his blog he wrote:

"For me, sleep is so crucial for health, but in our ward everyone has to be checked three times in the night for blood pressure and oxygen saturation and pulse so I have never had more than one quarter of a night's sleep in the last six days in hospital.

The ward is always full of lights going on and off, doors opening, special mechanic beds that make fizzing electrical noises and clunks for hours on end, and an army of crucial machines, each with their own bleeps, pings and Klingon photon torpedo sounds.

Yesterday morning I spent ten minutes crying like a soggy jelly with the nurses who had come to give me my 6am injections, just crying with the cumulative sadness of being stuck in a sweaty bed and unable to sleep for (at that point) five nights."

On day 9 in hospital Professor Sir David Mackay died age 48.


"...that folk may view what admonishing chances
befell other folk
and may therefrom take warning..."

Intro to the Arabian Book of Tales 'A Thousand and One Nights'


A PAIN IN THE BACK
Widely used anti-inflammatory drugs such as Ibuprofen offer little more than a mild relief when it comes to back pain a comprehensive review has found. While the drugs offered little to no benefit back pain sufferers taking them were 2,5 times more likely to suffer from gastrointestinal problems.
The Guardian, 17th February 2017


Book of Tales also features a section with eye-opening Topical Tales relating to Health & Medicine >>

More Book of Tales' Specials  >>


Honesty Box  >>


You are in our News Café reading the Health Special.
© Brigitte Franssen 2018
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