A study to be published this month in the Journal of the American Medical Association indicates that babies who are delivered late or delivered early may be at a higher risk of cerebral palsy.  According to the study, babies delivered as early as 37 to 38 weeks, or as late as 42 weeks, may be at a higher risk compared to babies delivered at 40 weeks.

Researchers looked at how timing of delivery affected the risk of cerebral palsy.  They considered more than 1.68 million babies delivered between gestational ages of 37 and 44 weeks, and suffering no birth defects.  Researchers found that the risk of developing cerebral palsy was higher in babies born between 37 and 38 weeks, and at 42 weeks or later, compared to babies delivered at 40 weeks.  Since cerebral palsy can’t be diagnosed at birth, the doctors followed the babies through the next few years to monitor them.  According to the researchers, the risks seem to increase by about 44% for babies born after 40 weeks.

The margin of risk is low, and the vast majority of babies who were born a few weeks before or after 40 weeks will not develop cerebral palsy.  Researchers are now recommending that these study findings not be used as a factor when determining intervention time for delivery. 

Doctors unrelated to the study confirm that there is always a higher risk of not just cerebral palsy, but other complications too, when babies are delivered at 37 or 38 weeks, or after 42 weeks.  The risks of these complications are the reason why pre-term deliveries are not encouraged.  But if there is a medical necessity for a preterm delivery, then Arizona medical malpractice lawyers don’t believe this study's findings should be the reason why doctors postpone the delivery.

A study being conducted at the University of Nebraska Medical Center Munro-Meyer Institute is helping children with cerebral palsy improve their sitting skills.  The study is being funded by a $600,000 grant from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research. It is focused on comparing two treatments, and their effect on improving sitting abilities in children with moderate to severe cerebral palsy.

The study includes a control group that receives physical therapy twice a week.  These children are compared to an experimental group which also receives the same therapy.  However, the children in the experimental group children are made to sit on mats that vibrate randomly at varying frequencies.  According to the researchers, the theory is that when the body vibrates, it increases the child's ability to sense where the body is in space.  This promotes sitting abilities. 

Early results from the study indicate a slight difference between the two groups.  Children in the experimental group with the vibrating mats seem to have improved sitting abilities compared to the other group.  Over the next couple of years, the study will determine whether there is a meaningful and strong difference between both groups.  If there is a definite improvement in the ability of children with cerebral palsy to learn how to sit with the help of these mats, doctors and therapists could recommend that children use these mats.

Arizona cerebral palsy lawyers with a strong interest in cerebral palsy know that for these children, even the most basic sitting activities can mean a lifetime of challenge.  Children with cerebral palsy have minimal posture control and spastic limbs which makes even the simple activity of sitting a significant challenge.  Hopefully, the study will show some improvements as a result of using the mats, so parents can have a device that helps them with their kids.

In 2006, a survey of hospitals found that 16% had suffered some kind of tube mix-ups at their facility.  For years now, patient safety groups have called for simple requirements that would prevent tubes for one specific purpose from being used for another purpose, just like nozzles at the gas station prevent drivers from using the wrong fuel.  However, strong opposition by the medical device industry and inaction by the Food And Drug Administration have prevented these basic safeguards from being put in place.

As a result, there are hundreds of patient deaths and injuries every year traced to tube mixups.  What's worse, no Arizona medical malpractice lawyer would be able to tell you exactly how many people are being injured or killed every from the wrong tube inserted into their bodies.  These mistakes are rarely reported, and the medical device industry has been hugely successful in shielding the often devastating impact of these errors.

A patient in critical care in a hospital may have more than one tube inserted into his body.  These tubes aid in the delivery of medications and nutrients to the patient, as well as in the extraction of fluids, gases or blood.  With so many tubes being used for a variety of different purposes, errors are far too common.  Overstressed nurses are responsible for connecting and disconnecting a number of tubes every day, and tube mix-ups and errors do occur.

As with the fight against medication errors, there's plenty of finger pointing and blame to go around when it comes to tube mix-up errors.  Since 1996, safety groups have advocated that tubes that are used for different functions be made incompatible, so that they're not used for other purposes.  It would be a simple fix to a potentially serious problem, but as you would expect, there has been plenty of procrastination and finger pointing over the issue. The hospitals blame the tube manufacturers for errors, while the manufacturers blame the regulators, hospitals and standards groups.

The New York Times illustrates with some examples of tube mix ups that have taken place around the country.  The examples are horrifying, and include spinal anesthetics and liquid food bags connected to tubes entering veins.  Many of these errors are fatal.  Some of them are mind-boggling.  In one instance, intravenous fluid was connected to a tube that was meant to deliver oxygen, resulting in death by suffocation.

In the 21st century, it's a matter of shame to Arizona medical malpractice attorneys that such errors that can be prevented with some of the most basic safeguards, continue to occur.

Months after the Food and Drug Administration began an investigation into dozens of cases of radiation overdoses that have left scores of patients injured, Arizona medical malpractice lawyers, patients and patient safety group have few clues to how these overdoses occurred. 

The New York Times first brought national attention to patient overdoses at some of the country's biggest hospitals, including Los Angeles’ Cedars-Sinai.  The overdoses were noticed last summer, and since then, the Food and Drug Administration has begun an investigation into these cases.  Ten months later, the agency still has not made clear what these investigations have yielded.  In the meantime, equipment manufacturers including GE, and the hospitals where these overdoses occurred, continue to engage in a battle of words blaming each other for the over-radiation.

GE's equipment is involved in many of the radiation cases, although some of the scanners were made by Toshiba.  GE says that the over-radiation was the result of programming errors that were made by the staff of the hospitals.  To be fair, preliminary investigations have not revealed any equipment malfunctioning problems.  However, the hospitals insist that the equipment was designed unsafely, and should have come with proper safeguards that would have automatically shut the equipment down if there was a danger of over-radiation.

Unfortunately, the equipment did not come with such safeguards or devices.  As a result, dozens of patients received massive radiation overdoses that has left them with hair loss, headaches, and confusion and fear of long-term health effects from the over-radiation.  Among the long-term health effects these patients face, is the development of cancer.

Arizona medical malpractice lawyers hope the FDA will wind up its investigation quickly, and recommend measures that can be taken by other hospitals around the country to prevent more over dosages.

Prescription drug errors injure more than 1.5 million patients in the US every year.  Most of these errors are entirely preventable, and occur mainly because two medications sound alike, or because pharmacists misread dosages.  There is much that patients can do to avoid suffering injuries caused by prescription errors.

Arizona medical malpractice lawyers believe the best thing you could do to reduce your chances of a prescription error is to make sure you know the name of the medication you’ve been prescribed, and the dosage.  If you're unable to read the doctor's prescription, it’s highly likely that a pharmacist won't be able to either.  Most errors occur because pharmacists misread a prescription.  That happens when medications have similar names.  These names look similar when they are written on a prescription, or sound similar when they are read out in the pharmacy.  In any case, a mix-up can have lethal consequences.

Before you leave the doctor’s office, make sure that you understand the dosage, side effects of medication, the mode of usage (before or after meals) and other important details that can impact the way you ingest the medication.

Follow your doctor's instructions carefully.

If you want your prescription translated into English, you can get the pharmacist to translate it for you.  Most pharmacies will have translation software, although the accuracy of these is debatable.  If you need your prescriptions, take someone who speaks English along with you.

Before you leave the pharmacy, make sure that you have the right medication.  Check the refill bottle and the label.  Do they look the same as the last time you had a refill?  If you have doubts, ask questions.

Try to use the same pharmacy as much as possible for your medication needs.  This way, you may be able to avoid errors because the pharmacy database keeps track of errors.