With the rapid advances in medical science and increasing complexities of patient care, the need for continuing medical education (CME) is widely accepted by the profession. CME follows general and higher professional training, and should be a life long process. Teaching hospitals and postgraduate professional institutions play vital roles in organising, promoting, and monitoring this activity. CME directorates should be established. University authorities must recognise the important role of medical teachers in postgraduate and continuing medical education, and the staff establishment and terms of service should be held regularly. Medical libraries should have easy borrowing facilities. Self-assessment and audio-visual material are particularly helpful to the busy practitioner and inexpensive local or regional journals of quality can provide pertinent and up-to-date information. All charges for attending scientific meetings and educational material should be tax deductible or subsidized. The effectiveness of CME is difficult to assess and participation is almost impossible to enforce. Much depends on the standard of medical practice wanted by society. Recertification of general practitioners or specialists poses many problems. On the other hand, completion of self-assessment programmes, active participation at medical meetings, contributions to scientific literature, and membership of medical societies with built-in peer review could be monitored and regularly used to evaluate professional status.
Over a 12 months period, out of 25,411 livebirths, 155 neonates (6.1 per 1000 livebirths) had proven septicemia by blood culture. The mortality rate was 26.5%. Septicemia was more common among the very low birthweight and preterm neonates of gestation of 30 weeks or less. 45.8% of the septicemia occurred during the first 48 hours of life. Staphylococcus epidermidis was the most common causative organism. However, mortality was highest among neonates who acquired multiresistant nosocomial infection during the later part of neonatal life.
This study has analyzed 260 patients with multiple injuries sustained in road accidents admitted to the University Hospital during the period July 1967 to July 1976, in relation to age, sex, and ethnic distribution. The types of injuries sustained have been discussed to highlight their effects on the community in a developing country. The extremities have been most frequently involved, while head injuries followed closely. The causative factors of multiple injury-producing accidents have been evaluated. The categories of victims most liable to multiple injuries have been discussed. The significance of understanding the mechanism of these accidents and the effect of such knowledge in minimizing diagnostic errors, thus enabling management and the urgent need for regional accident services in developing countries, have been stressed.
The objective of this study is to explore physician’s perception toward clinical pharmacy services and role of clinical pharmacists in governmental hospitals at Al-Qassim region. An observational cross-sectional survey was conducted. Results: 150 males and 39 females participated giving 75.5% (189 of 250) response rate. Physicians perceptions were found to be high (equal or more than 90% of frequency) in some clinical pharmacy services such as patients’ education and counselling, monitoring of patients’ responses to drug therapy including toxicity/side effects and provision of drug information to healthcare professionals. The physicians showed low perception (less than 76%) in the taking of patients’ medication history on admission, by clinical pharmacists. Conclusion: Physicians’ perception toward clinical pharmacy services and the role of clinical pharmacists was not found to be completely favourable. The reason of this mixed responses and to the accommodating feelings of clinical pharmacy services in clinical setting appear to relate to the state of infrastructure and environments of hospitals. The infrastructure and environments of hospitals need to be updated for an improved accommodation clinical pharmacy services.
A study was done in 1987 to find out the attitudes and perceptions of patients toward treatment in the Hospital Universiti Sains Malaysia (HUSM). A similar study was repeated five years later covering both patients and relatives of patients. In 1987, 17% of patients were not satisfied with the treatment mainly because of poor patient-staff relationship. In 1991, 5% of the patients were dissatisfied. The reasons attributed for their dissatisfaction were rudeness of staff, the presence of medical students and attitude of the patients and public of the nurses. There was a positive change of attitude of the aptients and public towards the hospital services after five years. Factors that lead to this improvement like education and better public relations is discussed.
To describe a prospective laboratory-based surveillance of Candida species that were collected from different anatomical sites of patients admitted to the University of Malaya Medical Centre, Malaysia, from the year 2000 to 2013.
Kajian ini bertujuan untuk mengkaji hubung kait antara diameter kornea dan diameter kanta di kalangan kanak-kanak. Kajian ini melibatkan sejumlah empat puluh kanak-kanak (40 mata) yang kurang daripada 4 tahun yang menjalani pemeriksaan, prosedur atau pembedahan di Hospital Kuala Lumpur dari Januari 2010 sehingga September 2011. Pemeriksaan dijalankan dengan menggunakan bius am di dewan bedah. Diameter kornea diukur dengan ‘Holladay-Godwin cornea gauge’ sementara diameter kanta diukur dengan menggunakan mesin ultrasound yang mempunyai resolusi tinggi ‘ultrasound biomicroscope (UBM)’. Purata umur populasi kajian adalah 24.7 + 12.1 bulan. Purata diameter kornea melintang adalah 11.62 + 0.50 mm, lebih besar berbanding dengan purata diameter kornea menegak yang berukuran 11.20 + 0.58 mm. Purata diameter kanta adalah 7.94 + 0.47 mm. Diameter kornea didapati mempunyai korelasi positif yang sederhana dengan diameter kanta (r=0.479, p=0.002). Terdapat hubung kait yang kukuh di antara diameter kanta dengan umur pesakit (r=0.718, p
Insiden penyakit paru-paru obstruktif kronik (COPD) di Malaysia semakin meningkat. Tiada kajian yang dilaporkan tentang obstruksi aliran udara spirometrik, termasuk corak restriktif dan obstruksif pada populasi di Malaysia. Kajian ini dilakukan untuk mengira prevalens dan meramal obstruksi aliran udara dan menjalankan pemeriksaan gejala COPD menggunakan peralatan baru AirSmart® Spirometry dan COPD Population Screener (COPD-PS). Kajian keratan rentas dilakukan di dua hospital tertiari menggunakan COPD-PS dan AirSmart® Spirometry. Terdapat 265 subjek yang direkrut dengan 11% dan 16% populasi yang masing-masing disaring mempunyai corak yang restriktif dan obstruksif. Dua puluh peratus subjek mempunyai skor COPD-PS lebih daripada lima. Tujuh puluh empat peratus subjek dengan corak obstruktif aktif atau bekas perokok (p=0,03, p
Pengetahuan yang baik tentang teknik perahan, penyimpanan dan penggunaan susu perahan ibu adalah sangat penting kepada ibu-ibu yang ingin meneruskan penyusuan ibu selepas kembali bekerja. Objektif kajian ini adalah untuk menilai pengetahuan dan sikap ibu bekerja terhadap perahan, penyimpanan dan penggunaan susu ibu. Kajian hirisan lintang ini disertai oleh 300 ibu bekerja sepenuh masa yang melahirkan bayi di sebuah hospital tertiari di Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Kajian ini menggunakan soal selidik yang mengandungi 28 soalan menguji pengetahuan dan 9 soalan menilai sikap yang telah disahkan kandungannya. Skor tertinggi adalah 28 untuk pengetahuan dan 45 untuk sikap. Skor purata untuk pengetahuan adalah 20.47 (SD 4.06). Ibu yang mendapat skor ≥21 (≥75% skor maksimum) dikategorikan sebagai mempunyai “pengetahuan yang baik” manakala mereka yang mendapat skor
Penilaian status kesihatan mental dalam kalangan pesakit penglihatan terhad (LV) bukan merupakan rutin pemeriksaan. Kajian ini dijalankan untuk mengenal pasti status kesihatan mental dalam kalangan pesakit LV menggunakan soal selidik "Depression Anxiety Stress Scale (DASS-21) and Hospital Anxiety and Depression (HAD) Scale". Seramai 100 pesakit LV telah dipilih secara rawak. Pemeriksaan piawai LV dan penilaian kesihatan mental menggunakan soal selidik DASS-21 dan HAD scale telah dijalankan. Purata umur subjek adalah 62.77+9.15 tahun. Subjek terdiri daripada 63% Melayu, diikuti 26% Cina dan 11% India. Purata tahap penglihatan subjek adalah 0.45+0.24 LogMAR. Keputusan kajian menunjukkan min skor kemurungan dan kerisauan bagi soal selidik HAD Scale adalah 3.11+3.35 dan 2.85+3.21. Min skor kemurungan, kegelisahan dan tekanan bagi soal selidik DASS adalah 4.83+6.90, 3.58+3.79 dan 6.18+6.92. Ini menunjukkan min skor bagi kedua-dua soal selidik adalah dalam julat normal mengikut klasikasi tahap keterukan HAD dan DASS. Soal selidik HAD Scale menunjukkan 12% daripada subjek mengalami kemurungan dan 8% mengalami kegelisahan, manakala soal selidik DASS menunjukkan 7% mengalami kemurungan, 17% mengalami kegelisahan dan 24% mengalami tekanan. Ini menggambarkan bahawa kesihatan mental pesakit LV boleh terjejas disebabkan oleh gangguan penglihatan. Kesimpulannya, status kesihatan mental pesakit LV boleh ditentukan secara objektif menggunakan soal selidik DASS-21 dan HAD Scale. Penentuan status ini juga memastikan rawatan dan rehabilitasi yang lebih optimum dapat diberikan kepada pesakit LV.