The Lancet Digest, July 5-11 2008
In The Lancet this week:
The Editorial is on WHO’s patient-safety checklist for surgery and its possible role in bringing ’a culture of safety to the very centre of patients’ care’
A research Article showing female recipients of male donor kidneys have a higher rate of graft failure than other donors and recipients. Also on the theme of organ transplantation, there is a comment on organ trafficking and transplant tourism by the steering committe of the Istanbul summit, who met at the end of April.
On the theme of global health:
A Viewpoint discusses the ethical considerations of conducting smaller trials as part of international research and offer a definition of ‘responsiveness that is useful for study design and ethical review’.
A Comment looks at the relationship between security and improved health in the context of Japan’s commitment to the human security approach to supporting global health.
‘One of the real heroes of the African AIDS response’ is the subject of this week’s profile, Nelson Sewankambo, who has been involved in HIV/AIDS research both internationally and in Uganda for over 20 years, focusing on effective prevention measures.
World Reports on:
The victory of TAC and SAMA in the protracted legal battle to overturn the influence of Matthias Rath’s ‘trials’ for vitamins and micronutrients as a cure for HIV/AIDS.
The control of Chagas’ disease in urban Peru, describing recent work of epidemiologists which combines diagnostic information, patient history and spatial data to model the spread of the disease.
A shocking report from Australia highlighting the disparity between the health of the indigenous population and the wider community, which is increasing even as the rest of the community becomes healthier.
Finally, linking to last week’s editorial on water and sanitation and Steve Cockburn’s blog which we published earlier this week, there is a profile of the physician, John Snow, regarded by many public health scientists as the father of the discipline. As well as his work on anaesthetics which contributed to the widespread use of chloroform, by observing the 1848 outbreak of cholera in London, he came to the conclusion that water was the main vehicle of dissemination. In 1854, another outbreak gave him further opportunity to investigate its spread and in 1855 he published: ‘On the Mode of Communication of Cholera’. The article quotes a response from the Lancet to his provocative views:
‘The fact is that the well whence Dr Snow draws all sanitary truth is the main sewer’.
Finally, this is to alert you that from today until November 4th there will be a weekly blog on the US election on the Lancet Global Health Network.
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