Sleep Category Archives — Page 2 of 3 — DC Medical Malpractice & Patient Safety Blog Published by Washington, D.C. Personal Injury Lawyers

May 8, 2019

Big Pharma executives convicted of criminal racketeering with opioid sales

Even as more felony charges may follow in drug epidemic, sleep med warning suggests pill popping stays too popular

Five top executives at a major drug maker have been convicted of criminal racketeering for their aggressive and deceptive marketing of a fentanyl spray in a case that prosecutors long have said may warn corporate leaders about their culpability in the nation’s opioid painkiller crisis.

Federal jurors deliberated for 15 days before finding guilty John Kapoor, founder and CEO of drug maker Insys (shown at right). Jurors also convicted Richard M. Simon, former Insys national director of sales; Sunrise Lee and Joseph A. Rowan, both former regional sales directors; and Michael J. Gurry, former vice president of managed markets. As the New York Times described the case against them:

March 8, 2019

Catching up on your sleep this weekend? It doesn’t work, researchers find

by Patrick A. Malone

Americans may put off to the weekend catching up on sports scores, store sales, the latest news and more. But there’s a health essential that new research suggests cannot be put off for the weekend: a good night’s sleep.

The study, conducted at the University of Colorado and published in the science journal “Current Biology,” focused on a small group: three dozen healthy adults, split into three groups, with one allowed to sleep nine hours nightly, another getting just five hours of slumber, and a third with a staggered schedule. The last group, for five days, got five hours of sleep, followed by two days in which they could snooze for as long as they wished. They had to return, though, to the five-day cycle of five-hour slumbers.

Researchers followed their subjects for nine-day spans. The results will be un-welcome for proponents of weekend catch-up sleep, because it didn’t help in the ways that many of us would wish. As the Washington Post reported, those “who were limited to five hours of sleep on weekdays gained nearly three pounds over two weeks and experienced metabolic disruption that would increase their risk for diabetes over the long term. While weekend recovery sleep had some benefits after a single week of insufficient sleep, those gains were wiped out when people plunged right back into their same sleep-deprived schedule the next Monday.”

January 24, 2019

Savvy Rx from a resident: Docs, know why and what you’re ordering, please

by Patrick A. Malone

Well, just because.

That isn’t a great answer for cranky toddlers with too many questions. It’s also an unacceptable but real reason why too many hospitalized patients get woken up in the middle of the night and subjected 24/7 to expensive, invasive, and often unnecessary tests and procedures.

Abraar Karan (right), an internal medicine resident at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital/ Harvard Medical School, has blogged with welcome candor about doctors’ casual acceptance of medical routines that not only discomfit but also can harm patients. As he wrote online for BMJ (aka the British Medical Journal): “The reality of medicine is that there are many things we as doctors do for absolutely no reason. That is to say, there is no evidence (randomized controlled trial or otherwise) for doing them, other than ‘that’s the way we’ve always done it.’”

November 26, 2018

With these holiday gifts, health-conscious may need to add dose of skepticism

by Patrick A. Malone

Holiday gift-giving can be expensive, so the health-conscious may wish to exercise skepticism about some potential purchases with dubious or unexpected consequence.

If you’re considering forking over more than a few dollars, think twice about:

So-called “tall” or “standing” desks. They were supposed to be a response to growing research about workers’ heightened health risks from sitting all day long. But studies show that standing while working with a computer isn’t as beneficial as some advocates may have claimed. That’s because it isn’t exercise or movement — which was supposed to the point of promoting healthier workplace practices, such as getting up from the desk and walking around every few minutes rather than becoming sedentary on the job. Studies, in fact, show that workers who must stand all day suffer health harms, like varicose veins and more. Some employees with posture issues may benefit some from standing and not scrunching themselves up while sitting at a desk. For most of the rest of us, it does matter to get up, exercise, and move. A fancy desk isn’t necessary for that, right?

April 10, 2018

Hospitals give patients and taxpayers too many causes for high anxiety

by Patrick A. Malone

Hospitals may be providing us all with too many causes for high anxiety, with reports on increasing findings of “nightmare” bacteria stalking more health care facilities than had been known, more disclosures about how taxpayers may foot an even bigger bill to deal with a beleaguered public hospital in Washington, D.C., and a respected reform advocate’s detailing of just how traumatizing many hospital stays may be.

Let’s start with the new research by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a study that tried to determine just how many cases there might already be of patients infected in hospitals, nursing homes, and other medical care facilities with so-called Superbugs, bacteria that resist treatment not only with most standard antibiotics but also drugs that are deemed therapies of last resort. These include three types of bacterial infections deemed especially urgent but difficult to control: Clostridium difficile (C. difficile), aka C-diff; carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae (CREs, as shown above); and Neisseria gonorrhoeae.

CDC officials weren’t sure how many of the Superbug cases — which leave doctors and hospitals little option but to provide only supportive care — they might detect by scrutinizing records from pathology labs nationwide.

December 1, 2017

Are smart phones & e-devices putting teen-aged girls in harm’s way?

by Patrick A. Malone

Teen-aged girls are turning up in increased numbers for emergency treatment at hospitals because they have cut, burned, poisoned, or otherwise tried to harm themselves. This disturbing trend may be linked to the obsession by the young, especially girls ages 10 to 14, with smart phones and their aggressive online, but weak real world, social lives.

The data developed by researchers from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control also provide a serious warning about girls’ struggles to reach maturity because the rise in detected instances of self-harm also may signal increases in suicides—the No. 2 cause of death of young people ages 10 to 14.

Researchers say the negative numbers —most pronounced as an 18.8 percent increase in incidents of self-harm among girls ages 10 to 14 — affected young females most, with young males showing no major changes in comparable cases of cutting, poisoning, burning, or otherwise hurting themselves.

September 27, 2017

Sound sleep for young could be an economic boon and helpful with ADHD

by Patrick A. Malone

Improve Your Sleep Quality to Maximize Your Goals

Although grown-ups may struggle with health woes caused by a lack of a good night’s sleep, a long and sound slumber, without early rising, may be even more crucial for middle- and high-schoolers. Their restful sleep may have economic benefits for us all, as well as surprising effects on attention disorders, which are one of the rising banes for the young.

New study by the nonpartisan and nonprofit RAND Corporation not only supports the health benefits from teens getting more sleep by starting school at around 8:30 in the morning— later than many schools now—researchers say such a move could be a, “cost-effective … strategy which could have a significant impact on public health and the U.S. economy.” As they reported:

April 28, 2017

Teens need more help with school schedules, the law, pregnancy prevention

by Patrick A. Malone

There may be more science and policy impact than many parents, teachers, and coaches realize when they joke that teen-agers can be so slow to mature now they’re almost like aliens. Young people, in fact, may need distinctive school schedules, courts, and reproductive awareness programs—all based on building research about adolescent brain and body development.

School start times and growing kids’ sleep needs

Let’s start with one of the common flashpoints in many households with teens: getting up and to school on time. The American Academy of Sleep Medicine has just joined with the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in recommending that middle and high schools start the day no earlier than 8:30 a.m.

March 21, 2017

If patient safety matters, why are residents returning to long, sleepless shifts?

by Patrick A. Malone

Must doctors be absolutely impervious to common sense improvements in the way they train their own? Their bullheadedness has reemerged with the revisited decision by a major academic credentialing group to allow medical residents yet again to work 24-hour shifts.

The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education clearly was on the defensive when it issued its memo on residents’ learning and working hours, guidance that academic medical centers and hospitals nationwide will rely on in setting workplace standards for the young doctors in whose hands so many patients will put their lives. The council noted that it had established a high-level task force to reconsider criticisms of residents’ stress and overwork and how this might imperil patient care, responding to an early rollback of shift hours:

“… The Task Force has determined that the hypothesized benefits associated with the changes made to first-year resident scheduled hours in 2011 have not been realized, and the disruption of team-based care and supervisory systems has had a significant negative impact on the professional education of the first-year resident, and effectiveness of care delivery of the team as a whole. It is important to note that 24 hours is a ceiling, not a floor. Residents in many specialties may never experience a 24-hour clinical work period. Individual specialties have the flexibility to modify these requirements to make them more restrictive as appropriate, and in fact, some already do. As in the past, it is expected that emergency medicine and internal medicine will make individual requirements more restrictive.”

December 16, 2016

Merry, merry, and happy, happy? Some ideas to keep the holidays safe, healthy

by Patrick A. Malone

Because the holidays should be filled with abundant joy, here are a few ways to safeguard the health and well-being of you and yours in the days ahead:

Don’t ignore deadly fire dangers

The tragic Oakland, Calif., warehouse-concert hall blaze that claimed at least 36 lives has provided a timely reminder: Fires remain a huge concern, and, especially as cold weather sets in and families add seasonal lighting displays, caution needs to be a watchword. Yes, building codes have improved admirably over time, and fire fighters and many inspectors do a public service that deserves a salute. But affordable housing, especially in big cities like Washington, D.C., remains in crisis shortage. This has forced many, including young people, into overcrowded, substandard housing—some as little more than squatters in dangerous, vacant, or dubious buildings. Meantime, many homeowners resort to space heaters or other devices (including turning on kitchen stoves and ovens) as temperatures fall. Or they’re putting up flashy holiday light displays or even Christmas trees with risky electricals. These excesses can overwhelm safety systems, and not every property owner does due diligence to maintain now common household alarms. The National Fire Protection Association reports that firefighters across the country in 2015 responded to more than 1.3 million blazes, which killed more than 3,200 Americans and injured almost 16,000, and caused more than $14 billion in damages. U.S. fire departments, between 2010 and 2014, responded to an estimated average of 210 home fires per year that began with Christmas trees. These blazes caused an annual average of six civilian deaths, 16 civilian injuries, and $16.2 million in direct property damage. Common sense doesn’t change: Be careful while cooking holiday feasts. Think super safety when setting up holiday displays. Reconsider if portable heaters make sense in your home. Ensure your smoke and carbon monoxide alarms are working. Click here for some seasonal fire safety ideas.