News Briefs
News Briefs
Joint Commission offers pain management seminars
Physicians, nurses, and other practitioners will have the opportunity to learn more about pain management during a series of one-day seminars sponsored by the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations.
The seminars will be held Nov. 15 in East Elmhurst, NY; Nov. 17 in Hebron, KY; and Dec. 1 in Mesa, AZ. The three seminars are part of a five-city series. Previous seminars were held in Chicago and Austin, TX, in September.
The seminar, Essential Elements of Effective Pain Management: A Standards-Based Approach, will cover the following points:
• new pain management standards and their interpretation;
• implementation strategies;
• cultural, communication, and complementary medicine aspects of pain management;
• unique aspects of pain management, through networking with faculty and participants.
Participants also will receive sample pain assessment tools and information on how to calculate the effectiveness of pain management in their own organizations through indictors and performance measures.
The cost of the program is $430 or $440, depending on the location. For more information or to register call (518) 431-7834 (New York); (513) 531-0200 (Kentucky); and (480) 968-1083 (Arizona).
OK to recommend marijuana, judge rules
Physicians in California can recommend marijuana to patients who may benefit from it without fear of federal authorities stripping them of their license to prescribe medicine or impose fines.
That’s the ruling U.S. District Judge William Alsup in San Francisco presented in mid-September. The ruling follows a temporary injunction in California that prevented the government from revoking a physician’s license to prescribe medicine and made it permanent.
Not a criminal act
California voters approved a medical marijuana law in 1996, but the Clinton administration threatened physicians by revoking their license to prescribe medicine. Physicians and patients filed a class action suit in January 1997 against the federal government. The suit alleged that the government threat violated California’s free speech rights under the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment.
Alsup wrote in his decision that, contrary to the governments argument, it is not true that a mere recommendation will necessarily lead to the commission of a federal offense. Such recommendations can lead to lawful and legitimate responses, he wrote. "In the marketplace of ideas, few questions are more deserving of free-speech protection than whether regulations affecting health and welfare are sound public policy."
Therapy recommended for identity issues
Learning that you may be the offspring of donor insemination could lead to an internal struggle for identity, according to researchers in the United Kingdom. As a result, they suggest, specialized therapy may be necessary to help those individuals.
Researchers interviewed 13 men and three women ages 26 to 55 who participated in donor offspring support networks in Australia, Canada, the UK, and the United States. Questionnaires asked about the subjects’ experiences and feelings. The results were published in the September issue of Human Reproduction.
Respondents reported the following:
• feelings of shock;
• mistrust within the family;
• frustration in searching for the biological father.
Need to know genetic origins
Additionally, respondents said that secrecy within the family had a negative effect, and they felt a need to know about their genetic origins.
As a result, the researchers write, the experiences may indicate a struggle to accommodate and evaluate information about their new identities as donor offspring. Psychotherapists, they add, should be aware of the identity issues when counseling such patients.
In a related article in the same issue, researcher Claes Gottlieb, MD, of the Sophiahemmet Hos-pital in Stockholm, Sweden, suggests that legislation alone isn’t adequate to persuade parents to tell their donor children about their conception. Sweden enacted a law in 1985 giving children born as a result of donor insemination the right to receive identifying information about the sperm donor.
Of the 148 couples interviewed, only 52% had told or intended to tell their child. While most had not informed their child, 59% had told someone else. The increased risk of children receiving the information from another source might be harmful to the child, Gottlieb suggests. "We believe that stimulating ethical discussions within the responsible professional groups is of major importance as a complementary measure," he writes.
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