New South Wales police asked to investigate fake doctor

NSW police have been asked to investigate a man who allegedly stole a doctor’s identity and managed to remain employed for more than a decade at four of the state’s hospitals.

Shyam Acharya has already been charged by the Australia Health Practitioners Regulatory Authority but NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard says the maximum $ 30,000 penalty is woefully inadequate.

He has asked police commissioner Andrew Scipione to pursue the case after previously leaving it to federal authorities.

Hazzard said a police investigation could help NSW Health’s efforts to seize Acharya’s North Ryde house, estimated to be worth at least $ 1.25 million, in order to recoup his wages.

“There is a possibility that if this person were convicted of fraud, we may be able to get some of the money back under the proceeds of crime legislation,” Hazzard told reporters on Saturday afternoon. However, he said seizing the home could be complicated because another person, possibly Acharya’s wife, was on the title.

Hazzard also confirmed plans for an independent inquiry into how Acharya was allegedly able to “con the entire health system”. Acharya is said to have posed as Dr Sarang Chitale by entering Australia on a fake passport and gaining registration with the Medical Board of NSW.

He worked in hospitals at Manly, Hornsby, Gosford and Wyong while the real doctor practised as a specialist in the UK. Acharya is now on the run and believed to have fled overseas.

Labor’s health spokesman Walt Secord is backing efforts to seize the Acharya’s house and has given in-principle support to an independent investigation. “The community has a right to know if his activity led to clinical errors,” he said in a statement. “Thousands of patients and their families have question marks over their treatment.”

Since allegations about Acharya became public less than a week ago, Hazzard said about 30 people had called NSW Health believing they had been treated by him.

Twenty-six were either mistaken or had been treated by Acharya but had suffered no adverse affects as a result. The remaining four cases are still being investigated.

“The health department has indicated to me at this point that there doesn’t appear to be any serious concerns, but certainly we’ve got to look at everyone,” Hazzard said.

New South Wales police asked to investigate fake doctor

Police investigate reports of saline bag tampering at hospital

Police are investigating reports that saline bags were tampered with at a hospital in Cumbria.

Security has been increased at Cumberland infirmary, in Carlisle, after a member of staff discovered last week that a small number of the bags had apparently been tampered with.

A spokesman for the North Cumbria university hospitals NHS trust said there was “no indication that any patients have been adversely affected” by the apparent breach.

Dr Rod Harpin, the medical director of the trust, said: “I can confirm that the trust contacted the police on Wednesday 4 January regarding a small number of saline bags at the Cumberland infirmary in Carlisle which appear to have been tampered with.

“We immediately implemented our serious incident procedures and there is no indication that any patients have been adversely affected but we continue to monitor this closely. Patient safety is our absolute priority and we will continue to work closely with the police.”

The trust said considerable work had been done since the incident to review medicines across the hospital and increase security.

Cumbria police said: “We can confirm that we have been notified by the Cumberland infirmary in Carlisle of a number of bags of saline solution which have been tampered with.

“The investigation is at an early stage and enquiries are ongoing to establish the circumstances and the constabulary is working closely with the hospital.”

In May 2015, Filipino nurse Victorino Chua was jailed for life for murdering vulnerable patients by tampering with their saline bags at Stepping Hill hospital in Stockport.

Chua was ordered to serve a minimum of 35 years for murdering two patients and poisoning 20 others by injecting insulin into saline bags and ampoules.
These were unwittingly used by other nurses, causing a series of insulin overdoses to mainly elderly victims.

Police investigate reports of saline bag tampering at hospital

Hospitals fail too often to investigate deaths, NHS watchdog finds

Hospitals are failing to investigate far too many deaths and frequently ignore and exclude relatives of patients who have died, a major NHS inquiry has found.

The health service’s failure to properly look into deaths is “a system-wide problem” that means hospitals are not learning from their mistakes and thus stopping other tragedies from occurring, its report says.

The Care Quality Commission report, ordered by health secretary Jeremy Hunt, is scathing about hospitals’ shoddy and insensitive treatment of bereaved relatives’ requests for information and to be involved in an inquiry. One relative told the CQC that they encountered “more courtesy at the supermarket checkout” after their loved one’s death.

Prof Sir Mike Richards, the CQC’s chief inspector of hospitals, said: “Families and carers are not always properly involved in the investigations process or treated with the respect they deserve. We found this was particularly the case for families and carers of people with a mental health problem or learning disability which meant that these deaths were not always identified, well investigated or learnt from.”

Prof Sir Mike Richards: ‘Families and carers are not always … treated with the respect they deserve.’ Photograph: John Stillwell/PA

Deborah Coles, director of the charity Inquest, which investigates deaths in custody, said the review of how hospitals respond to deaths had exposed “a defensive wall surrounding NHS investigations, an unwillingness to allow meaningful family involvement in the process and a refusal to accept accountability for NHS failings in the care of its most vulnerable patients”.

The CQC, the care watchdog for England, intends to overhaul how hospitals look into unexpected patient deaths or deaths owing to mistakes by staff. Investigations in future should be more thorough, more open and involve families much better, it promised.

Hunt told the CQC to undertake the inquiry after it emerged that Southern healthcare NHS foundation trust only investigated 1% of all deaths among patients with learning disabilities over a four-year period and even fewer – 0.3% – of those with mental health problems.

A review group the CQC set up to assess hospitals’ procedures said any relative should be told how and why their loved one had died.

“Yet throughout the review process we have heard from families who had to go to great lengths themselves to get answers to these questions, who were subjected to poor treatment from across the healthcare system and who had their experiences denied and their motives questioned,” said Dr George Julian, the regulator’s special adviser on family and carer experience. This was particularly the case for relatives of patients who had had either a mental health problem or learning disabilities.

One parent told the CQC: “I was put in a room. I shall never forget what the nurse in the room told me. She said, ‘You have got to accept that his time has come.’ Bearing in mind my son was just 34 years old.”

Katherine Murphy, the chief executive of the Patients Association, said the report confirmed that too many hospitals did not honestly and openly investigate complaints from relatives. “These families have already lived through heartbreaking times – watching their loved one pass away – and they simply should not then be treated with so little respect and consideration,” she said.

The review team based their findings on assessing how 12 NHS trusts responded to unexpected or unusual patient deaths or deaths where errors had occured, discussion with more than 100 families and a survey of all NHS trusts in England.

When the team reviewed 27 investigations hospitals had undertaken they found that the families’ views had been taken onboard in just three cases. Many relatives were not kept informed about how investigations were progressing, often causing further distress.

The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, which represents doctors, will help the CQC draw up an agreed system for investigating unusual deaths. Coles said a truly independent investigation framework was needed to tackle head-on the dangerous systems and practices which were “costing people’s lives”.

Problems the CQC found included families’ involvement in investigations being merely “tokenistic”, the views of NHS staff being given greater weight than that of relatives and hospitals seeing family members as “antagonistic” if they sought too much information or involvement.

Hospitals fail too often to investigate deaths, NHS watchdog finds

CQC to investigate as mental health detentions hit 10-year high

The health and social care watchdog is to launch an investigation after government figures revealed the number of detentions for mental health treatment had risen to its highest level in at least a decade.

Patients were detained in England for treatment under the provisions of the Mental Health Act 63,622 times in the year to April 2016, the statistics from NHS Digital showed, a rise of 47% since 2006, the year comparable records began, when there were 43,361 detentions.

Dr Paul Lelliott, the deputy chief inspector of hospitals and lead for mental health at the Care Quality Commission, said the figures were concerning, particularly given a national commitment to reduce the number of mental health detentions.

“The causes of the rise in the use of the act are likely to be complex, but the increase in detentions needs to be examined carefully,” he said. “We do not know, for example, the extent to which the rise is due to repeated detentions, it could signal a lack of support in the community for people with serious mental health problems or if people are being detained repeatedly, it could be a sign that some services are operating ‘revolving door’ admissions.

“To get to the bottom of this, we are launching an investigation into the reasons why detentions under the Mental Health Act in England continue to rise. We expect to publish our findings from this next year.”

Much of the rise in detentions came recently, with a 31% increase in the past five years, the statistics showed. Detentions under section two of the Mental Health Act, which allows for people to be held against their will for up to 28 days for diagnosis and treatment, were up 36% over that period. Detentions under section three, which allows for patients to be held for up to six months of compulsory treatment, were up 7%.

Marjorie Wallace of Sane says doctors are being forced to use the act to obtain an inpatient bed for treatment. Photograph: Richard Saker for the Observer

A snapshot figure, taken on 31 March, found 20,151 people were being detained under the act, 30% of whom were being held in private hospitals.

Peter Kinderman, the president of the British Psychology Society, said the figures were “tragic and shocking, but not terribly surprising”. Cuts to health budgets, combined with widening inequality, social turmoil and economic austerity were leading to an ever tighter squeeze on the poor, he said.

“If there are pressures on the service from cutting community support, various forms of psychotherapeutic support or social support for people, you could see how the pressures would build up and the people who are on the edge of coping might be pushed into feeling as if there was no support for them and feeling as if they might want to take their own lives,” said Kinderman.

“It doesn’t take much of a threat to social support for people in crisis for them to feel like there’s no point in carrying on living, and at that point you need to step in and take quite drastic action to help them.”

Marjorie Wallace, the chief executive of the mental health charity Sane, speculated that the rise could be the result of situations where patients or their doctors felt detention was the only way to get proper mental health treatment. “We know that community mental health services are overstretched and in many cases unable to provide the early treatment that could prevent people becoming so desperately ill,” she said.

“Moreover, without available local psychiatric beds, doctors are being forced to use the act in order to obtain an inpatient bed for treatment, which may involve sending patients to unfamiliar hospitals where they cannot be easily visited by professionals they know, let alone their friends and family. It is a scandal that you have to be sectioned in order to get treatment. What we need is more rather than fewer beds, so that those who need sanctuary and healing can receive help without having to be deprived of their liberty.”

A Department of Health spokesperson said: “People with mental illness need the best possible care and local areas are investing £693m more to make sure the right services are in place. Decisions about detention under the Mental Health Act are clinically led but the Care Quality Commission will be looking into the rise in cases.”

CQC to investigate as mental health detentions hit 10-year high

UK to investigate human health impact of microplastics

The government is to conduct an investigation into the impact on human health of microplastic particles found in shellfish and other marine animals.

The study by the chief medical officer for England, Prof Dame Sally Davies, is to be carried out as part of a wider, year-long review of the health effects of pollution.

The move follows the announcement in September that the government is to ban the use of plastic microbeads in cosmetics and toiletries after the Commons environmental audit committee raised concerns about their effect on the marine environment.

In its official response to the committee’s findings, the government acknowledged there was “little evidence” available on the impact to human health of microplastics – defined as particles smaller than five millimetres.

It said that research had however shown high concentrations could cause physical harm to marine worms and microplastics could transfer along a “simple” food chain – such as from a mussel to a crab.

In its report, the committee said someone eating six oysters was likely to have consumed 50 particles of microplastics and that the human health impacts should be a “priority subject for research”.

Committee chairwoman, Mary Creagh, said: “It’s welcome news that the chief medical officer will investigate the impact of microplastics on human health.

“Our inquiry recommended more research in this area – as microplastics are found frequently in sea food like shellfish and oysters.”

UK to investigate human health impact of microplastics

European Regulators Investigate Cardiovascular Safety Of Ibuprofen

The European Medicines Agency announced on Friday that it had initiated a overview of the cardiovascular safety of ibuprofen when taken in high doses over  an extended period of time. The review will be carried out by the Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee (PRAC).

The EMA explained that people taking ibuprofen ought to proceed to take it as extended as they follow the package deal label or the guidelines of their doctor or pharmacist.

The cardiovascular threat of all non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medicines (NSAIDs) have been below near scrutiny for a amount of years. The enhanced danger connected with a single group of NSAIDs, the COX-two inhibitors, has been acknowledged for much more than a decade. Researchers have also located evidence for cardiovascular difficulties with the NSAID diclofenac.

The agency mentioned it had located no proof for a problem in men and women taking doses significantly less than two,400 mg/day or for quick periods of time. ”Ibuprofen is one of the most broadly employed medicines for soreness and inflammation and has a properly-known safety profile, specifically at normal doses,” the EMA explained.

European Regulators Investigate Cardiovascular Safety Of Ibuprofen

Jeremy Hunt need to investigate statins tips panel, says Labour

On Wednesday Prof Mark Baker, a senior Nice official, described the considerations as “completely unjustified” . None of the panel members stood to acquire financially from the guidance, he additional.

All of the back links, such as payments for sitting on advisory boards for drug companies and acquiring funding for investigation, have been formally declared to Nice and published on-line.

Nonetheless, Sarah Wollaston, a Conservative member of the Commons wellness decide on committee and a former GP, said: “This ought to lead to an examination by Good. It is a concern as this panel’s choice has this kind of widespread implications for prescribing and expense to the NHS.”

“I feel there are various levels. Sometimes the conflict of interests can be extremely small. It is about the degree of the conflict.

“I feel it is very critical that the public can clearly see what degree of conflict they have and can be confident they have the proper stability of Good specialists.

“Doctors require to have a register much like MPs do, of outdoors interests, so men and women can swiftly and simply see what their interests are. ”

She continued: “A broadly trusted independent physique demands to be in a position to examine the information as well.

“The concern is that we will end up medicating healthier people.”

Andrew Gwynne, the shadow wellness minister, extra: “Patients want to come to feel the suggestions they get can be trusted – but the lack of transparency in this method will be concerned them additional.

“Neither large firms nor individuals should stand to personally profit from choices about our care. Jeremy Hunt must launch an investigation without delay.”

Great will publish its last recommendations subsequent month, following a public consultation.

In February it announced its ideas to reduce the “risk threshold” for statins in half — meaning that the huge vast majority of guys aged over 50 and most females in excess of the age of 60 are likely to be advised to consider the medication to guard against strokes and heart disease.

Nice says the advice will prevent a lot of men and women from turning into unwell and dying prematurely.

Even so, in a letter to Mr Hunt and Great, the group of 9 doctors, which includes Sir Richard Thompson, the president of the Royal College of Doctors, cited analysis, independent of the drug industry, showing that statins have been connected with a 48 per cent boost in the chance of diabetes in middle-aged girls.

Other likely side results could contain depression, fatigue and erectile dysfunction, they warned.

Jeremy Hunt need to investigate statins tips panel, says Labour