Standardization of Antibiotic Management and Reduction of Opioid Prescribing in Pediatric Complicated Appendicitis: A Quality Improvement Initiative.

Background: Appendicitis is one of the most common pediatric surgical procedures in the United States. However, wide variation remains in antibiotic prescribing and pain management across and within institutions. We aimed to minimize variation in antibiotic usage and decrease opioid prescribing at discharge for children with complicated appendicitis by implementation of a quality improvement (QI) initiative.

Case Study: Using Electronic Medication Administration Record to Enhance Medication Safety and Improve Efficiency in Long-Term Care Facilities.

The electronic medication administration record (eMAR) has been used in hospitals and acute care facilities in Canada for over a decade. Unfortunately, the Canadian continuing care sector has been slow to adopt eMAR usage. Medication delivery in long-term care has traditionally been through paper-based orders and manual documentation in the paper medication administration record.

Raising the visibility of school nursing services.

In an attempt to raise the visibility and profile of the school nursing service in the London boroughs of Hounslow and Richmond, school nurses sought to hear from the voices of the young people with whom they work. Ten focus groups in secondary educational provisions were held in a bid to look at young people's accessibility to technological devices, where they would go if they had a health problem and which health topics they would like more information on. This paper examines both national and local data and demographics, and discusses findings from the focus groups run with local young people.

Factors influencing European consumer uptake of personalised nutrition. Results of a qualitative analysis.

The aim of this research was to explore consumer perceptions of personalised nutrition and to compare these across three different levels of "medicalization": lifestyle assessment (no blood sampling); phenotypic assessment (blood sampling); genomic assessment (blood and buccal sampling). The protocol was developed from two pilot focus groups conducted in the UK. Two focus groups (one comprising only "older" individuals between 30 and 60 years old, the other of adults 18-65 yrs of age) were run in the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Germany (N=16).