Australian hospitals

Stanton LA, Peterson GM, Rumble RH, Cooper GM, Polack AE. Drug related admissions to an Australian hospital. J Chn Pharm Ther 1994 19 341-7. 

The Executive Secretary of ADRAC is Dr. Ian Boyd (Ian.Boyd health.gov.au), who administers the affairs of the committee. The Chair of the ADRAC committee is Dr. Timothy Mathew, a nephrologist based in Adelaide, South Australia. The current membership of the committee is constituted entirely of senior medical practitioners from locations around Australia. Each member has an extensive background in clinical and academic medicine, and all are highly respected by their peers. The Society of Hospital Pharmacists has recently lobbied without success for the addition of one or more senior clinical pharmacists to the committee. This request has been based on the sizable proportion of reports from the Australian hospital pharmacy sector and the unique skills and training that an appropriate pharmacist could bring to the committee. 

SHPA is the primary professional body that represents pharmacists practicing in Australian hospitals and similar institutions. Founded in 1941, the Society today has a membership of more than 1700 pharmacists practicing in all states and territories of Australia. 

The Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia Committee of Specialty Practice in Drug Usage Evaluation. SHPA Standards of Practice for Drug Usage Evaluation in Australian Hospitals. In Practice Standards and Definitions Johnstone, J.M., Vienet, M.D., Eds. The Society of Hospital Pharmacists of Australia Melbourne, 1996. 

SHPA currently represents over 1,500 pharmacists and pharmacy technicians working in hospitals and related institutions. This represents over 80% of Australian hospital pharmacists. 

When healthcare workers safely behaviours were assessed through observational techniques, Zohar et al. (2007) showed both group and hospital level culture as predictors of the future safety behaviours (e.g. medication and emergency safety), observed in a sample of 955 nurses in Israel. Since observations can be difficult to gather in hospitals, self-report measures are also used to assess safety behaviours such as workers safety compliance and safety participation behaviours). Positive associations between safely culture and their self-reported measure of safety behaviours were shown in a sample of 525 employees in an Australian hospital (Neal et al. 2000). Later, improvements in these behaviours at the group level were linked to a reduction in future aceident rates (Neal and Griffin 2006). A similar measure was included as a measure of workers safety behaviour in this Scottish study. 

Reid AB, Daffy JR, Stanley P, Buising KL. Use of pristinamycin for infections by gram-positive bacteria clinical experience at an Australian hospital. Antimicrob Agents Chemother 2010 54(9) 3949-52. 

In the recent case, a forty-seven-year-old woman was admitted to an Australian hospital in 1995 or early 1996. Much like Porritt, the patient suffered from general debility, headaches, confusion, weight loss, constipation, and had difficulty with abstract reasoning. Tests revealed a blood-lead level 9.75 times the level considered safe by Australian officials at the time. Further study revealed that the sole source of lead exposure in this case was lead-contaminated water. In particular, lead-based solder was used in the patient s hot water heater, and she was a heavy coffee drinker. Ten years prior to her admission to the hospital, the patient s symptoms had been attributed to chronic fatigue syndrome, and for ten years, that is what the patient and her physicians believed. In fact her symptoms had been caused by drinking lead-contaminated water. ... 

The cross-national prescribing database using the same methodology provided a useful and valid comparison of patterns of prescribing psychotropic medications in mental health services in Australia, Thailand, and Malaysia (Ng et al, submitted). The study was carried out in three outpatient mental health centres in North Western Mental Health (NWMH) in Melbourne (September to November 2002), Prince of Songkla University Hospital in Hat Yai (January to March 2003), and Hospital Kuala Lumpur (January to March 2003). The proportions of outpatients treated with a primary diagnosis of a psychotic illness were 91%, 41%, and 75% in the Australian, Thai, and Malaysian samples respectively. Considering psychotropic prescriptions in schizophrenia alone, the majority of patients were prescribed antipsychotics Australia (93.7%), Thailand (92.9%), and Malaysia (97.7%). 

A randomised, controlled trial. Drugs Aging 18(2) 143-149 Roughead EE, Gilbert AL, Primrose JG et al. (1998) Drug-related hospital admissions a review of Australian studies published 1988-1996. Med J Aust 168(8) 405-408 Tinetti ME (2003) Clinical practice. Preventing falls in elderly persons. N Engl J Med 348(1) 42-49... 

This article is based on a lecture delivered to the Polymer Division of the Royal Australian Chemical Institute, whose generous hospitality is gratefully acknowledged. 

A 7-year retrospective Australian study of 182 industrial bums found that 5.5% were ocular bums due to chemicals, gas explosions, and electric flashes (percentages not specified) [13]. In another Australian study of 159 cases of hospital-admitted alkali ocular bum patients from 1972-1981, the majority of bums were Grade 1 or 2 and none of these resulted in vision loss [14]. 

In a retrospective study of 148 cases of occupational eye injuries in Germany, ocular bums (not specified as chemical or other etiology) comprised 15.5% of the total [10]. In another German study of 101 patients with 131 severely burned eyes, 72.3% of the injuries were work-related, 84.2% were chemical injuries, and 79.8% of these were due to alkalis [11], Of 42 cases of alkali ocular bums admitted to a German eye clinic between 1985 and 1992, 73.8% involved industrial accidents [19]. In Finland in 1973,11.9% of all industrial accidents were ocular injuries and bums comprised 3.6% of these (chemical or other injury mechanism not specified) [12]. A 7-year retrospective Australian study of 182 industrial bums found that 5.5% were ocular bums due to chemicals, gas explosions, and electric flashes (percentages not specified) [30]. In a 4-year hospital-based study in Taiwan, of 486 patients with eye injuries, 39.9% were work-related [20]. Chemical ocular bums accounted for 19.6% of these injuries [20],... 

J. A. Zoltewicz wishes to thank the Australian-American Educational Foundation (Fulbright-Hays Program) for financial support and the University of Florida for a leave of absence that made possible the writing of this article. The members of the Organic Chemistry Department of LaTrobe University are thanked for their hospitality. Dr. R. T. C. Brownlee kindly provided the computer program that led to the results reported in Table I. 

Molecular Parasitology Laboratory, Division of Infectious Diseases and Immunology, Australian Centre for International and Tropical Health and Nutrition, The Queensland Institute of Medical Research and The University of Queensland, Post Office Royal Brisbane Hospital, Queensland 4029, Australia... 

This abuse is not unique to the United States, either. In late 2001, an investigation was launched into the birthing unit staff at Australia s Wollongong Hospital. Ten Australian midwives and a physician allegedly took part in a series of laughing gas parties, illicitly indulging in the hospital s supply of nitrous oxide and the sedative temazipan. 

Significantly higher levels of DDT and dieldrin were reported by Brady and Siyali (1972) in a survey of 75 human fat specimens. All the samples contained DDT and also HCB, which had not been previously reported in other surveys. An extensive NSW survey in 1988 was conducted by Ahmad et al. (1988) on 290 samples of human body fat obtained from the Westmead Hospital, Sydney. Western Australian levels of total DDT and dieldrin in body fats were shown to be elevated in the late 1960s. However by 1991 total DDT and dieldrin levels had decreased substantially (Stevens et al., 1993). 

Galloway, G. (1998) Motivations for leisure. In W. Faulkner, C. Tidswell and D. Weaver (eds) Progress in Tourism and Hospitality Research 1998 Part 1 (pp. 99-108). Proceedings of the Eighth Australian Tourism and Hospitality Research Conference, Gold Coast. Canberra Bureau of Tourism Research. 

Pearce, P. and Greenwood, T. (1999) And then her snorkel filled with water Analysing critical Reef tourism situations. In J. Molloy and J. Davies (eds) Tourism and Hospitality Delighting the Senses, 1999, Part 1 (pp. 222-234). Proceedings of 9th Australian Tourism and Hospitality Research Conference (CAUTHE), 10-13 February, Adelaide. Canberra Bureau of Tourism Research. 

Woods, B. (2001) Wildlife tourism and the visitor experience Flinders Chase National Park Kangaroo Island. In C. Pforr and B. Janeczko (eds) Cauthe 2001 Capitalising on Research (pp. 377-394). Proceedings of the Eleventh Australian Tourism and Hospitality Research Conference, 7-10 February. Canberra University of Canberra. 

The importance of this history is that it meant there was a precedent for the use of lithium as a medicine. It also meant that lithium was readily available for experimentation in the pharmacies of psychiatric hospitals. Therefore when John Cade, an Australian psychiatrist, suggested that lithium might be a useful treatment in people with mania in the 1940s, it did not seem curious. Cade also experimented with use of the elements strontium and cerium in the treatment of psychiatric disorders, but they never caught on in the same way because there was no prior history of medicinal use. 

Van Den Bos H, Rosenbauer C, Goldney RD. The assessment of involuntary movement disturbances in a psychiatric hospital population an Australian experience. Aust J Psychopharmacol 1999 9 42-3. 

Margalit, G., Goldberg, A., Rosen, Y., Tekes-Manova, D., Golan, M., Benedek, P., et al. (2003). Recommendations for pediatric nursing requirements at a field hospital based on the Israel Defense Forces experiences following the 1999 Turkish earthquake disaster. Australian Emergency Nursing Journal, 6(1), 15-18. 

Freitag D, Bebee R, Sunderland B. Digoxin-quinidine and digoxin-amiodarone interactions Frequency of occurrence and monitoring in Australian repatriation hospitals. J Clin Pharm Ther 1995 20 179-83. 

The SHPA Standards of Practice for Clinical Pharmacy are used as a reference point for benchmarking the provision of clinical pharmacy services in hospitals in Australia. An independent not-for-profit organization, the Australian Council of Healthcare Standards (ACHS), accredits healthcare organizations... 

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