Thursday, November 13, 2008
Oklahoma Ambulance Drivers Demand to be Heard
In a brazen attempt to "raise awareness" of their presence, ambulances in Oklahoma are now being equipped with some pretty serious sonic firepower to make sure they're heard over the music played in nearby cars. Using low frequency Howler™ sirens from Whelen Engineering, out of Chester, Connecticut, ambulance drivers can now literally fire sound waves powerful enough for drivers to feel an extrinsic vibration. Of course, our next thought was whether these are available to the general public, as we seem to find ourselves daily in situations that require a Howler.
Here's a video report from Tulsa's Fox 23:
Listen to example siren tones using the system. Just make sure the subwoofer is working properly.
More from Tulsa World...
Product page: Howler™ Low Frequency Tone Siren ...
(hat tip: Firegeezer)
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Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Google Joins Nanny State to Monitor Flu?
Drudge is reporting that Google plans on releasing a tool to the federal government that uses data gathered from web searches for flu related keywords to notify health agencies where an outbreak might be happening. Lets for a minute ignore the privacy implications of this project and think of the potential benefits of an early warning system that notices patterns as soon as people start getting the sniffles.
Google explains its methodology:
We have found a close relationship between how many people search for flu-related topics and how many people actually have flu symptoms. Of course, not every person who searches for "flu" is actually sick, but a pattern emerges when all the flu-related search queries from each state and region are added together. We compared our query counts with data from a surveillance system managed by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and discovered that some search queries tend to be popular exactly when flu season is happening. By counting how often we see these search queries, we can estimate how much flu is circulating in various regions of the United States.During the 2007-2008 flu season, an early version of Google Flu Trends was used to share results each week with the Epidemiology and Prevention Branch of the Influenza Division at CDC. Across each of the nine surveillance regions of the United States, we were able to accurately estimate current flu levels one to two weeks faster than published CDC reports.
CDC uses a variety of methods to track influenza across the United States each year. One method relies on a network of more than 1500 doctors who see 16 million patients each year. The doctors keep track of the percentage of their patients who have an influenza-like illness, also known as an "ILI percentage". CDC and state health departments collect and aggregate this data each week, providing a good indicator of overall flu activity across the United States.
So why bother with estimates from aggregated search queries? It turns out that traditional flu surveillance systems take 1-2 weeks to collect and release surveillance data, but Google search queries can be automatically counted very quickly. By making our flu estimates available each day, Google Flu Trends may provide an early-warning system for outbreaks of influenza.
Developing at Drudge...
Project page: Google Flu Trends...
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Clean Shopping Carts Prevent Infections, Welcome Germaphobes
Today's Wall Street Journal is profiling a shopping cart sanitizing system, dubbed PureCart™, the makers of which claim an over 99% kill rate of common pathogens that could be present on the carts. Germaphobic parents can now forget about bringing wet wipes to the store in a futile attempt to clean every object and crevice their kids can get their hands on.
Here's some info about the system from the manufacturer:
The Solution Control System is user-friendly, simple to operate and reliable. It consists of a pump, tanks and control components that are housed in a separate enclosure. The system requires only a connection to a 110 VAC, 20 Amp power source, a fresh water supply and a drain.The simple-to-use master control panel operates the start/stop of the unit, as well as provides indications of critical components and function. A key switch allows the system to run, or use the remote start/stop control to initiate unit operation.
The enclosure is a compact fiberglass unit featuring door protectors at the entrance and exit. The unit features a fixed guide system to insure the carts track through the unit at the proper distance from the spray nozzles. The enclosure is sturdy, yet portable, with retractable casters. It can also be secured for semi-permanent installation. The purifying mist is substantially contained in the enclosure through the use of flexible unit dividers. A sloped floor directs any overspray and excess solution to a drain connection.
Wall Street Journal video from a supermarket that installed the PureCart:
More from WSJ...
Product page: PureCart Systems...
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Monday, November 3, 2008
Copper Shown to Be Effective Germicide in Hospital Setting
A study at the Selly Oak Hospital at the University of Birmingham, England has shown that copper surfaces effectively reduce the presence of contagious pathogens that land on them during normal hospital operations.
From the statement issued by University Hospitals Birmingham:
The study found that, when tested, items made from copper had up to 95 per cent fewer micro-organisms on them, compared with the same items made out of standard materials such as stainless steel.The study, begun in March last year, was led by Professor Tom Elliott, a Consultant Microbiologist and Deputy Medical Director at University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, which runs Selly Oak Hospital.
He said: “What this must mean is that the risk of picking up an infection is reduced, because we know that one of the vehicles where organisms can spread from one surface to another is by touching them. So the results are very exciting.
“The findings of a 90 to 95 per cent killing of those organisms, even after a busy day on a medical ward with items being touched by numerous people, is remarkable. So it may well offer us another mechanism for trying to defeat the spread of infection.”
Laboratory testing conducted at Aston University previously had demonstrated that the number of common hospital pathogens were significantly reduced when in contact with a copper-containing surface as compared to stainless steel. For example, MRSA was killed within one hour of contact with the surfaces.
To follow up these findings, in the first clinical study of its kind, items that contained copper, including taps, door push-plates, grab-handles, a toilet seat and a bedside trolley were specially made by local manufacturers and placed in a ward at Selly Oak Hospital.
In the main element of the study, the items were swabbed twice a day, along with similar items made with conventional materials. The samples were taken to Aston University where they were examined to see how many micro-organisms were present.
After the five weeks, the items were swapped over and tested for another five weeks. This unique ‘crossover’ technique was designed to eliminate potential bias caused by the items being used in different locations and so in different ways.
Prof Elliott said: “I have been a consultant microbiologist for several decades and have got some experience in terms of fighting infections. This is the first time I have seen anything like copper in terms of the effect it will have on the environment. We have talked about different agents in the past, cleaning agents like chlorine and hydrogen peroxide, which have an immediate effect but not a long lasting effect like copper.
“It is what I would call an intelligent metal. The copper is quietly working away in the background, killing organisms all the time. It needs to be part of what we call a bundle of care in terms of an approach to preventing infection. This gives us another arm, another weapon to fight infection which is around us and challenging us all the time. So I would see this in addition to the measures we are taking at the moment.”
Prof Lambert said: “While no MRSA was found either on the copper-containing surfaces or the standard items, because the findings strongly mirror the results of the laboratory trials, it is safe to assume that copper in a clinical environment would be just as effective against MRSA.”
Press release: Hospital trial shows copper reduces contamination ...
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Wednesday, October 29, 2008
New Approaches To Combat Flu...Coming Soon?
The Pennsylvania Department of Health announced the first laboratory confirmed case of influenza on October 24th, so it's time to line up for your shot. This year's vaccine will be delivered the same way as usual, but new research may change future practices.
First, we want to talk about the study, released October 26th by Sanofi-Aventis, that looked at high-dose influenza vaccine response among adults over 65 years of age, when compared with the standard influenza vaccine.
Study authors explain, however, that as people age, the immune system tends to weaken. Older adults become not only more susceptible to infections, but also less responsive to vaccination. When infected with the influenza virus, they are less able to mount an immune response to neutralize the attack. "Development of an influenza vaccine that will provide an improved immune response in older adults is important because this population has the highest rates of complications from influenza including hospitalization and death," said Ann R. Falsey, MD Associate Professor of Medicine, University of Rochester School of Medicine, Rochester, NY; Infectious Diseases Unit, Rochester General Hospital. Approximately 90 percent of the 36,000 average annual influenza-associated respiratory and circulatory related deaths occur among adults 65 years of age and older.The standard influenza vaccine contained 15 micrograms of hemagglutinin (HA) of each of three influenza strains, and the high-dose vaccine contained four times as much, 60 micrograms HA per strain. Both vaccines contained two influenza type A strains (H1N1 and H3N2) and one influenza type B strain.
Twenty-eight days after vaccination, a higher percentage of the subgroup given the high-dose vaccine developed seroprotective HAI titers of 1:40 or greater to each of the three vaccine strains compared with those given the standard vaccine. In addition, mean HAI titers for all strains were higher in the seronegative individuals who received the high-dose vaccine compared with those who received the standard vaccine.
On another front, NanoBio Corporation, a University of Michigan spinoff whose nanotechnology to deliver vaccines and pharmaceuticals transmucosally was profiled by us back in February, has just announced positive results from influenza vaccination trial:
"Our nanoemulsion-based intranasal vaccine adjuvant system represents a paradigm shift in vaccinology. It can be used to safely deliver multiple antigen types directly into the lining of the nasal mucosa, which is rich in dendritic cells that present the antigen(s) to the immune system," said James R. Baker, Jr., M.D., founder and chairman of NanoBio Corp. "The nanoemulsion adjuvant uniquely interacts with these cells to trigger unparalleled mucosal and systemic immunity.""A large, unmet medical need still exists for protecting people from influenza infection," Baker said. "The robust immunity and antigen-sparing capability demonstrated in this study are especially important for addressing this unmet need, as are the demands for a vaccine that would protect people in the face of a flu pandemic."
NanoBio plans to begin a phase 1 clinical study for seasonal influenza in the first half of 2009 and is currently initiating preclinical studies in pandemic flu.
Sanofi-Aventis press release: High-Dose Influenza Vaccine Shows Increased Immune... (.pdf)
NanoBio press release: Nanoemulsion-based Intranasal Influenza...
Technology page: NanoStat™ Platform...
NanoBio Influenza Mucosal Vaccine Program...
Image credit: Wikipedia: Influenza...
UPDATE: NanoBio has more good news about its technology. Nanostat drug delivery emulsions also appear to be effective against other scourges that have infected mankind...yes, toenail fungus and cold sores! If interested, check these: Topical Treatment for Cold Sores Achieves Efficacy of Oral Drugs; Represents Paradigm Shift in the Treatment of Skin Infections ...; NanoBio Demonstrates New Topical Approach to Treating Nail Fungus that Circumvents Problems of Current Therapy ...
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Thursday, October 23, 2008
DARPA Nose Competition
DARPA (Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency) is sponsoring a new competition to develop "... a highly versatile and sensitive broad-spectrum device capable of detecting odorants under the challenge of real-world conditions". Obviously the military and security implications are immense, but so is the potential to develop further knowledge about the inner workings of one of the most primitive CNS pathways.
Like the X-Prize devoted to Healthcare we reported on earlier, DARPA's projects attract some of the top scientists from around the world and leverages their knowledge and inspiration to produce exponential gains in the field.
Evolved Machines, Inc. (Palo Alto, CA) has been selected as a prime contractor to engineer an artificial olfaction system incorporating "brain-like" neural pattern recognition. In their press release, DARPA labeled the project "RealNose", and the agency emphasizes that it will be "the first program to tackle the separation of multiple odorants in the presence of unknown backgrounds that characterize the detection problems presented in real-world settings."
As with so many advances in medicine which evolved from military initiatives, the potential for medical gain goes beyond just the increased knowledge of neural networks, it could provide "simplified" detectors for cancers, infectious diseases, diabetes, and many other illnesses shown to be detectable by canines (among other animals).
Darpa Press Release at SAIC...
MIT News Release: Sniffing Out Success...
Flashbacks: No, Not Another Electronic Nose! ; Nanowire-based Electronic Nose; E-nose to Detect Lung CA; SPOT-NOSED: A Hi-Tech Nose For Disease Detection; "Electronic Nose" to Aid Asthma Diagnosis; Detecting Infection With E-nose
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Friday, October 10, 2008
CDC to Get Population Movement Tracker for Disaster Response
Engineers at Georgia Tech Research Institute are working on an aerial observation system, to be deployed on helicopters and small unmanned airplanes, that can monitor and relay to health officials the latest information about the population in an area after a natural disaster.
The imaging system – designed by Price and senior research engineer Gary Gray – is called the “Mini ModPOD,” which stands for “Miniature Modular Photographic Observation Device.” It consists of an off-the-shelf Canon Digital Rebel XTi digital camera, a global positioning system receiver, a small circuit board that uploads mission parameters, and an inertial measurement unit that measures the aircraft’s rate of acceleration and changes in rotational attributes, including pitch, roll and yaw. The images collected from the system can be stitched together to create a complete picture of the affected area.The research team has tested the device on several flights, selecting areas with large populations of people likely to be outdoors.
“During the first test flight, we wanted to test the clarity and resolution of the images collected during the run, and we were very pleased,” said Price. “We could see tennis balls on the ground and people reading books at outdoor tables. This was sufficient detail to allow accurate counting the number of people in an area.”
After the first flight, the researchers reduced the weight of the device and developed a more accurate geo-referencing capability, which allowed the physical location of the scenes shown in each photograph to be determined with precision.
Press release: Portable Imaging System Will Help Maximize Natural Disaster Response...
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Thursday, October 2, 2008
Passive Radiation Monitors Detect Gamma Rays on State Highways
Radiation detection technology developed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is now being used to remotely detect the presence of radioactive materials in vehicles driving on highways.
So far, one state in the Western United States has deployed more than a score of the radiation detectors, called the adaptable radiation area monitor (ARAM), and placed them at vehicular entrances to that state to monitor for nuclear materials. The ARAM systems can detect concealed radioactive material about the size of a grain of sand moving at 45 miles per hour, nearly freeway speed.A second state, New Jersey, has acquired from Textron Defense Systems a fleet of SUV's outfitted with the ARAM detection technology to patrol its highways and streets for nuclear materials.
New Jersey's RadTrucks are remarkably simple to use, said state Trooper Dave Gatto, who was quoted in a Philadelphia Inquirer article. Gatto said that after 10 hours of training he could tell the difference between the radioactive signatures emitted by uranium, cesium, and plutonium and even mundane sources such as kitty litter.
ARAM can be deployed in a host of ways -- as a portable detector in an SUV, as a vehicle monitor alongside freeways, as a pedestrian portal monitor, as a package or luggage detector, as a fixed maritime detector and as a portable maritime detector.
Operating at room temperatures, ARAM can detect gamma rays and, with the assistance of a helium-3 neutron detector, also can monitor for neutrons.
The system relies on a minimum number of components, including a sodium iodide detector, multi-channel analyzer, computer and sophisticated LLNL control and commercial analysis software. It acquires 1,024 channels of data 10 times per second, which allows the control software a higher probability of detection and provides the commercial analysis software with highest quality data for identification.
"This type of system gives us a better chance of not only picking up that there's radiation, but the type of radiation, whether it's a medical isotope or a terrorist device," said Dave Trombino, a nuclear engineer at LLNL and one of the ARAM developers.
Press release: States use LLNL-developed radiation detection advance for highway monitors, patrolling roads
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Monday, September 22, 2008
WHO Warns...Just Say No to E-cigarettes!
Mark Twain said: "To cease smoking is the easiest thing I ever did. I ought to know because I've done it a thousand times." Breaking nicotine addiction remains difficult despite the many aids available. Too often, as in Twain's case, success is short lived. Smoking cessation is a huge business and the "e-cigarette" is one of the more recent products attempting to break in to this lucrative market. Complete with wisps of smoke, a glowing LED end and a piezoelectric nebulizer that vaporizes nicotine contained in the replaceable cartridges, it sounds like the ideal solution to quell the physical, social and chemical triggers that lead to relapse.
Sound too good to be true? Well, on September 19th, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned against using electronic cigarettes, saying "there is no evidence to prove they are safe or helped smokers break the habit... Toxicological tests and clinical trials have not been performed on this product."
These devices are mostly sold on the internet and produced by unregulated companies (often in China). The World Health Organization became very concerned when they saw that some manufacturers were using the WHO name/logo on their packages/website and feared this could be construed as an endorsement by the organization.
Douglas Bettcher, acting director of the WHO's Tobacco Free Initiative, said "It has really taken countries and the WHO by surprise. It has been a product that appeared very suddenly on the market in a short period of time."
WHO press release: Marketers of electronic cigarettes should halt unproved therapy claims...
More from Reuters Health News...
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Steven Levitt vs Children's Carseats
In this TED talk, the freakonomist-in-chief Steven Levitt does what he does best: explore the hidden side to conventional thinking. In this particular lecture, Dr. Levitt reveals the secret truth of children's car seats, and even some mysteries of the placebo effect.
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Wednesday, September 17, 2008
TriSano, an Open Source Infectious Disease Reporting System, Going Live in Utah
Utah will soon be rolling out a statewide system for disease reporting that promises to automate and make the process more transparent. The system, called TriSano™, is an open source project licensed under the Affero GPL. According to TriSano, its name is a composite of two ideas:
Tri is a prefix meaning three. Tri represents the collaboration between local, state and federal entities. It depicts the primary disciplines of public health: epidemiology, biostatistics and health services. Tri also refers to the epidemiological triad of people, place, and time.Sano is an adjective meaning promoting good health.
Dana Blankenhorn at ZDNet has more about the project:
CSI corporate development officer Laurie Williams said that TriSano replaces a system of faxes which now must be sent when doctors diagnose specific conditions.“Reporting now will be a byproduct” of data entry, she said, meaning officials will be able to detect patterns in real time, and respond much more quickly to outbreaks than before.
But this was no easy hack, she noted.
“There are about 75 reportable diseases in the state of Utah,” Williams said. ”Each form is different. Each disease is different. In some cases it’s reported just in the state, in others it might be reported to the CDC.
“The long answer is each report must feel a little different. And whether or not the patient is known differs. So the information that is put in changes, and what’s reported on changes.”
More from the ZDNet Healthcare Blog...
White paper: Collaborative Software Initiative: A New Model for Open Source Software in Public Health (.pdf)...
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Monday, September 15, 2008
Medical Sample Courier Pigeons Use GPS Sense to Get Around
In South Africa a project is testing, so far with good results, the viability of using GPS-guided model airplanes to transport blood and saliva samples from remote areas to a central laboratory. Here's video of the project from the New Scientist:
More at the New Scientist...
(hat tip: Gizmodo)
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Using Satellites to Predict Infectious Disease Outbreaks
If it were possible to predict outbreaks of infectious diseases, public health organizations would be able to act quickly and preemptively to help control and limit the spread. Dr. Rita R. Colwell of the University of Maryland, College Park, has been able to do just that by using satellite imaging to track climate information that supposedly can predict outbreaks of Cholera before they occur. Cholera is a water-borne disease caused by the bacterium Vibrio cholerae and is a significant problem in the developing countries of the world. The gram-negative bacteria produces a cholera toxin which acts at the small intestine causing severe diarrhea leading to dehydration and sometimes death.
[The bacterium] has a known association with a crustacean (called a copepod) which lives on zooplankton, a type of plankton. Cholera outbreaks have been linked with environmental factors, including sea surface temperature, ocean height, and biomass (this is estimated by measuring chlorophyll produced by plankton).Professor Rita R. Colwell and her team at the University of Maryland, College Park, have used remote satellite imaging to track this climatologically important information and the data collected now can be used to predict outbreaks of cholera before they occur.
Cholera epidemics have been episodic, so the ability to predict them could be one further step towards controlling this serious, water-borne disease by providing rapid response public health measures. The climate factors shown to be associated with cholera also play a role in many other infectious diseases. So this development offers a useful model for understanding human health effects related to climate change.
"We are now beginning to understand infectious disease is a moving target," said Colwell. "As the climate shifts, any disease with an environmental stage or vector is going to be affected." Colwell will call for an integrated approach of global scientific paradigms to track and tackle infectious disease: "We must protect this blue planet" she said "it's the only one we've got".
Original story: Scientists use remote satellite imaging to predict outbreaks of infectious disease...
Image: Landsat 7 Satellite. (NASA)
(hat tip: POPSCI.COM)
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Thursday, September 11, 2008
NIH Issues Report on Bisphenol A
The National Toxicology Program, a federal research program at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), part of the National Institutes of Health, has just released a report about possible risks to human reproduction or development as a result of chronic exposure to bisphenol A (BPA), a commonly used chemical in household plastics.
The report is full of ambiguities. Here's what the Director of NTP Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction (CERHR), Dr. Michael Shelby issued to the press:
"Unfortunately, it is very difficult to offer advice on how the public should respond to this information. More research is clearly needed to understand exactly how these findings relate to human health and development, but at this point we can't dismiss the possibility that the effects we're seeing in animals may occur in humans. If parents are concerned, they can make the personal choice to reduce exposures of their infants and children to BPA."
Full report: NTP-CERHR Monograph on the Potential Human Reproductive and Developmental Effects of Bisphenol A (.pdf)
NTP Finalizes Report on Bisphenol A...
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Friday, August 15, 2008
Algorithms Predict Epidemic Outbreaks
At Sandia Lab research is being conducted on predicting the effects of an epidemic on a given population, using algorithms and computers that seem to correlate well with past outbreaks.
[Jaideep] Ray says that characterizing diseases requires observations of real outbreaks and then building computer models around them. He did this for a 1979 anthrax outbreak in Sverdlovsk (called Yekaterinburg, after the fall of the Soviet Union), a city of about 1.2 million people in central Russia. Initially the Soviets said the victims contracted the disease by eating anthrax-contaminated meat or having contact with dead animals. At the end of the Cold War American physicians reviewed documents published by pathologists who performed autopsies during the epidemic, confirming the pathogen was airborne. Records showed that 80 humans were infected, most of them by inhaling the pathogen. A total of 68 died of the disease.Using the computer program, Ray ran the data obtained from hospital records of people who became sick in the early days of the epidemic. The program automatically tried many combinations of the unknown number of infected people, time and dose of anthrax exposure until it got as close to the real observation as possible. In the final runs, using data from the first nine days of the 42-day outbreak, the model inferred that almost certainly less than 100 people had been infected, with the most probable number around 55.
That was “pretty close,” to the real event, he says. The program, which also estimated the time of the release and the dose of anthrax inhaled, took 10 minutes to run.
“If they had had this program in 1979 the Soviet officials would have known that this was going to be a small outbreak,” Ray says. “Instead they got into a panic and vaccinated 50,000 to 60,000 people — the whole southern end of the city.”
Nigerian smallpox epidemic
After proving the software actually works, he turned his attention to communicable diseases, specifically smallpox. He modeled a documented smallpox outbreak in Nigeria in 1967, which broke out in a fundamentalist sect (Faith Tabernacle Church, FTC) in the town of Abakaliki. The sect consisted of 120 people who lived in nine different compounds, along with 177 of their nonsectarian brethren. The FTC members mixed strongly in their compounds and across compounds at church four times a week and social visits.
A small girl first introduced the disease into the population. It spread rapidly in her compound and jumped to other compounds via the church and social visits. The sect members refused medical treatment and did not quarantine the sick and contagious members. While the World Health Organization (WHO) monitored the outbreak and kept records of who got sick and when, it did not record the dates of recovery or deaths of the infected people.
Of the 32 people who became infected during the epidemic, 30 were FTC members.
Full story: Sandia researcher develops inference technique that estimates how many people will fall sick in an epidemic
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Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Meth Cooks Getting Big Brother Treatment
Today pharmacists in the state of Kansas will get access to a new pseudoephedrine tracking system that first saw its use in Australia. Seeing how methamphetamine is "cooked" from OTC pharmaceuticals, law enforcement agencies are trying their best to limit traffic in the substance by having pharmacies link together purchases and being on alert when one individual tries to hoard the stuff.
More about the system:
MethShield™ can work on two different levels. First, it works as a simple electronic logbook allowing you to effortlessly comply with requirements of State and Federal laws. Photo ID information is simply typed or scanned into the system. The product requested is then selected from a live database of pseudoephedrine based products. The database tracks the amount of pseudoephedrine in each product sold to an individual and ensures compliance with daily and monthly limits.The second and optional feature of MethShield™ is that it can alert you to suspicious purchase behavior. MethShield™ can tell you if the person at your counter is making their first visit to the pharmacy today or their fifteenth. The real power of MethShield™ comes with aggregation of the data. By taking the information you have entered and combining that with data from pharmacies across a state or nation, law enforcement can be provided with a real-time snapshot of any suspicious behavior. MethShield™ then provides law enforcement with a sophisticated set of intelligence tools to assist in the tracking and apprehension of potential pseudoephedrine runners.
KWCH TV: MethShield Kicks off in Kansas...
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Thursday, July 17, 2008
Rapid TB Detection Using Single-Particle Aerosol Mass Spectrometry
At Lawrence Livermore National Lab researchers may have found a new way to detect tuberculosis.
In experiments over the past year, a research team at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has used their system to detect a tuberculosis surrogate, even when it is surrounded by sputum and mucus-like substances.They also were able to differentiate between two similar bacteria, distinguishing between an avirulent strain of tuberculosis and a similar bacterium, Mycobacterium smegmatis.
Their research, using a system called Single-Particle Aerosol Mass Spectrometry, or SPAMS, is described in today's edition of Analytical Chemistry, a semi-monthly journal published by the American Chemical Society.
"Without reagents, we can rapidly detect avirulent tuberculosis that is coated in sputum-like materials and we can distinguish between two similar mycobacteria," said Kristl Adams, a LLNL postdoctoral biological physicist and the paper's lead author.
"The reason we used two similar mycobacteria in our research is that tuberculosis-like symptoms in a patient could be caused by many bacterial infections, not just tuberculosis. So we would like to differentiate between non-tuberculosis and tuberculosis infections," Adams explained.
While emphasizing that their work is only a first step toward using SPAMS for tuberculosis diagnostics, Frank and Adams said they believe SPAMS could potentially detect the disease within five minutes with concentrated samples.
The SPAMS researchers have spoken with doctors at two northern California university medical centers about the possibility of undertaking experiments in a clinical setting to detect virulent tuberculosis within sputum samples from infected people.
The biggest challenge going forward is determining if infectious tuberculosis in humans can be detected with our pattern-matching algorithm. It is undetermined if the virulent tuberculosis pattern will have enough similarity from patient-to-patient that we can train on a known TB patient and detect TB in a patient with an unknown infection," Adams said.
Press release: Instrument designed for biological pathogen monitoring can detect tuberculosis surrogate
Abstract in Analytic Chemistry: Reagentless Detection of Mycobacteria tuberculosis H37Ra in Respiratory Effluents in Minutes
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Wednesday, July 16, 2008
TakesAllTypes Blood Distribution Project
Takes All Types (TAT) is a non-profit project that utilizes various internet and wireless technologies, from email, Facebook, and mobile phones, to register and contact people willing to donate blood, depending on need, whether it be geographic or based on specific blood type.
Watch an interview by ABC News with Ben Berman, one of the co-founders of the project, where he explains the details of the project.
Project homepage: TakesAllTypes.org...
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Tuesday, July 8, 2008
The Latest on HealthMap, an Online Disease-Mining System
John Brownstein, PhD, co-founder of HealthMap, an online infectious disease monitoring and tracking website, has published an interesting article in the latest PLoS Medicine, together with Clark Freifeld, a software developer and others, that documents the latest efforts to make HealthMap technology more attune to the language and chatter of the internet. We first reported about HealthMap back October, 2006. Since then the project has received a $450,000 grant from Google. Children's Hospital Boston, where Brownstein et al. are from, is now reporting that HealthMap "has expanded its surveillance reach and now mines the Internet in English, Chinese, Spanish, Russian and French. Additional languages such as Hindi, Portuguese and Arabic are under development."
More the PLoS Medicine article:
The use of international news media for public health surveillance has a number of potential biases that merit consideration. While local news sources may report on incidents involving a few cases that would not be picked up at the national level, such sources may be less reliable, lacking resources and training, and may report stories without adequate confirmation. Furthermore, other biases may be intentionally introduced for political reasons through disinformation campaigns (false positives) or state censorship of information relating to outbreaks (false negatives). We have attempted to better understand some of these issues through ongoing analysis and evaluation research. We ran a 43-week evaluation of HealthMap data, covering the period of October 1, 2006 through July 18 2007. We found that pathogen diversity was substantial across news sources, with 141 unique infectious disease categories reported through the Google News feed alone. We found the frequency of reports about particular pathogens to be related not to their associated morbidity or mortality impact, but rather to the direct or potential economic and social disruption caused by the outbreak.
The system characterizes disease outbreak reports by means of a series of text mining algorithms. Characterization stages include: (a) identifying disease and location; (b) determining relevance—namely, whether a given report refers to any current outbreak; and (c) grouping similar reports together while removing exact duplicates. Once the reports are automatically processed, curators correct the misclassifications of the system where necessary. Currently, only one analyst reviews and corrects the posts. However, additional resources would enable more detailed multilingual curation and annotation of collected reports.Extracting location and disease names from text reports presents the most formidable challenge. HealthMap draws from a continually expanding dictionary of pathogens (human, plant, and animal diseases) and geographic names (country, province, state, and city) to classify outbreak alert information. However, disease and place names are often ambiguous, colloquial, and subject to change, and may have multiple spellings (e.g., diarrhea, common in the US, and diarrhoea, common in the UK). Thus, the expansion and editing of the database requires extensive manual data entry.
Once location and disease have been identified, articles are automatically tagged according to their relevance. Specifically, we identify whether a given report refers to a current outbreak (“breaking news”), as opposed to reporting on other infectious disease–related news, such as vaccination campaigns, scientific research, or public health policy. In this case, HealthMap makes use of a Bayesian machine learning algorithm, trained on manually characterized existing reports, to automatically tag and separate breaking news. Finally, duplicate reports are filtered, identified, and grouped based on the similarity of the article's headline, body text, and disease and location categories. Using a similarity score threshold, the system groups related articles into clusters that provide the collective information on a given outbreak.
Knowledge integration and dissemination.
HealthMap is particularly focused on providi