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Drug Crimes In Canada Cause Continuing Problems For Small Communities
The Narconon drug rehab program has noticed a trend of many drug addicts being involved with drug related charges due to their addiction. "You can have the everyday functioning addict who is battling a drug addiction, and just one day gets caught by police for possession of a small amount," comments Nick Hayes, a representative of Narconon Trois-Rivieres. "This is an all too common situation for many people who are involved in a drug addiction." More people are using illicit drugs in Canada, in fact Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, Canada, where the Narconon drug rehab program is located, is one of the leading cities in Canada for drug crimes. "There are so many youth in Trois-Rivieres who are addicted to different drugs like speed, ecstasy, marijuana, and even cocaine. These teens get caught up with the law and start heading down the wrong path at a very young age," says Nick.

Legislation Needed To Boost HIV/AIDS Efforts In Solomon Islands, Health Official Says
Isaac Muliloa -- national coordinator of the HIV and sexually transmitted infections unit at the Solomon Islands" Ministry of Health -- recently said that a lack of national HIV/AIDS laws is hindering efforts to address the disease, the Solomon Times reports. Recent World Health Organization estimates said that the number of HIV cases in the Solomon Islands could reach 350 by 2010. Muliloa said that legislation is needed to address continued discrimination against HIV-positive employees in the workplace. He added that the HIV/AIDS and STI unit is relatively new in the health ministry, as is the Solomon Islands" National AIDS Council. According to Muliloa, officials are continuing to work toward implementing policies. The Times reports that the Solomon Islands does not have laws in place criminalizing the intentional transmission of HIV (Solomon Times, 5/27).
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Alzheimer's Society Puts Best Foot Forward With Dunwoody
This Friday 26 June, Alzheimer"s Society representatives and sports personality Micky Quinn will join Richard Dunwoody, in his quest to walk 1,000 miles in 1,000 hours.
Mental Health

New Data Proves Effectiveness Of Medtronic Insertable Cardiac Monitor In Detecting AF, Most Common Heart Rhythm Disorder

Atrial fibrillation (AF) is the most common arrhythmia, affecting an estimated 7 million people worldwide, including 4.5 million in the European Union1,2. Data presented today as a Hot Line session at the EUROPACE 2009 congress on the XPECT clinical trial, sponsored by Medtronic, Inc. (NYSE: MDT), shows that the Medtronic Reveal® XT Insertable Cardiac Monitor (ICM) reliably identifies patients with AF (sensitivity of 96.1 percent) and correctly confirms the absence of AF in patients (negative predictive value of 97.4 percent). It is widely known that AF is an independent risk factor for stroke, increasing risk approximately five-fold3. Several recent studies have indicated that the correlation between AF episodes and symptoms is poor, meaning that patients may be symptom-free during AF, or experience AF-like symptoms not related to AF4,5. Current methods for detecting AF, such as Holter monitors and 24-hour event monitors, have limited effectiveness, even if performed repeatedly, given the transitory nature of the monitoring6,7. XPECT (Reveal XT Performance Trial), involving 247 patients at 20 sites, was conducted to quantify the accuracy of continuous monitoring, achieved via the Reveal XT insertable cardiac monitor, for detecting and documenting AF through continuous monitoring. Professor Gerhard Hindricks of the Heart Center at the Universitç¤tsklinikum in Leipzig, Germany, serves as principal investigator for the XPECT trial and presented today"s data. "The XPECT results show that continuous monitoring by the Reveal XT device enables reliable detection of AF with high sensitivity and specificity, along with accurate recordings of AF episode duration," said Prof. Hindricks. "Additionally, this trial demonstrated that the Reveal device correctly rules out AF in patients who do not have significant AF burden. Continuous monitoring can be an essential tool for physicians to successfully manage AF or subsequently take action to prevent negative outcomes such as stroke resulting from AF. Physicians can best optimize the use of antiarrhythmic and anticoagulation medicines only if they can precisely and correctly diagnose a patient"s atrial fibrillation." About the Reveal XT Insertable Cardiac Monitor Placed just under the skin of the chest area in a short outpatient procedure, the Reveal XT device provides up to three years of continuous heart rhythm monitoring. Reveal XT captures and stores an electrocardiogram (ECG) automatically, according to physician-programmed settings. An additional option to store an ECG is having the patient place a hand-held pager-sized assistant over the device, and pressing a button. Later, a physician analyzes the stored information which can be transmitted remotely via the Medtronic CareLink® Network, or viewed during an in-office patient visit. Clinical data available to the physician includes views of individually stored ECG episodes, or longer-term trended diagnostic data via Reveal XT"s Cardiac Compass® Report, including daily AF burden, patient activity, and average day and night heart rates. Additionally, Medtronic Reveal devices are labeled for use in MRI machines, meaning patients with a device implanted may safely undergo MRI scans under certain conditions. "XPECT confirms the clinical utility of the Reveal XT device to identify the presence or absence of AF. In fact, it is the only device available today that has proven sensitivity and specificity detection, and monitoring capabilities for AF," said Elizabeth Hoff, general manager and vice president of the Subcutaneous Diagnostics & Monitoring unit of the Cardiac Rhythm Disease Management business at Medtronic. "Because AF puts patients at an elevated risk for stroke and can be intermittent and asymptomatic in nature, detection and continuous monitoring can provide important clinical information to guide treatment decisions." References 1 Fuster V, et al. ACC/AHA/ESC 2006 Guidelines for the Management of Patients with Atrial Fibrillation: a report of the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association Task Force on Practice Guidelines and the European Society of Cardiology Committee for Practice Guidelines (Writing Committee to Revise the 2001 Guidelines for the Management of Patients With Atrial Fibrillation): developed in collaboration with the European Heart Rhythm Association and the Heart Rhythm Society. Circulation. 2006;114(7):e257-354. 2 Chugh SS, Blackshear JL, Shen WK, Hammill SC, Gersh BJ. Epidemiology and natural history of atrial fibrillation: clinical implications. J Am Coll Cardiol. 2001;37(2):371-378. 3 Stroke: 1991; 22:983-988 4 M. Patten. Event-recorder monitoring in the diagnosis of atrial fibrillation in symptomatic patients: subanalysis of the SOPAT trial. JCE 2006: 17; 1216-1220 5 G. Senatore. Role of transtelephonic electrocardiographic monitoring in detecting short-term arrhythmia recurrences after radiofrequency ablation in patients with atrial fibrillation. JACC 2005; 45: 873-876 6 P. Ziegler. Comparison of continuous versus intermittent monitoring of atrial arrhythmias. Heart Rhythm 2006; 3: 1445-1452 7 H. Kottkamp. Time courses and quantitative analysis of atrial fibrillation episode number and duration after circular plus linear left atrial lesions. JACC 2004: 44; 869-877 Medtronic


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