MyMedR

Fulltext Informed consent: a socio-legal study

Rathor MY, Rani MF, Shah AM, Akter SF

Med J Malaysia, 2011 Dec;66(5):423-8.

Informed consent [IC] is a recognized socio-legal obligation for the medical profession. The doctrine of IC involves the law, which aims to ensure the lawfulness of health assistance and tends to reflect the concept of autonomy of the person requiring and requesting medical and/or surgical treatment. Recent changes in the health care delivery system and the complex sociological settings, in which it is practiced, have resulted in an increase in judicial activity and medical negligence lawsuits for physicians. While IC is a well-established practice, it often fails to meet its stated purpose. In the common law, the standard of medical care to disclose risks has been laid down by the Bolam test- a familiar concept to most physicians, but it has been challenged recently in many jurisdictions. This paper aims to discuss some important judgments in cases of alleged medical negligence so as to familiarize doctors regarding their socio-legal obligations. We also propose to discuss some factors that influence the quality of IC in clinical practice.

Impact of a training intervention on use of antimicrobials in teaching hospitals

Akter SF, Heller RD, Smith AJ, Milly AF

J Infect Dev Ctries, 2009 Jul 01;3(6):447-51.

PMID: 19762958

BACKGROUND: Antimicrobials are often used inappropriately in paediatric wards of medical college hospitals in Bangladesh. Most of the antimicrobials are prescribed based on clinical grounds-signs and symptoms. This intervention study assessed the effectiveness of a training intervention on antimicrobials prescribing by physicians in paediatric wards of tertiary care level hospitals.

METHODOLOGY: This study was conducted at medical college hospitals in Bangladesh during the period from 1998 through 2000. The pre-intervention survey of antimicrobial use was conducted during 1998 in five hospitals. The post-intervention survey was conducted after the interactive training during the succeeding year in three of the original five hospitals, of which one was the intervention hospital and two control hospitals. A total of 3,466 admitted paediatric patients' treatment charts (2,171 in the pre-intervention and 1,295 in the post-intervention surveys) were reviewed.

RESULTS: The most commonly used antimicrobials were ampicillin, gentamicin, amoxicillin, cloxacillin and ceftriaxone. Appropriate antimicrobial therapy for the most common infectious diseases, pneumonia and diarrhoea, increased by 16.4% and 56.8% respectively in the intervention hospital compared with the two control hospitals and these improvements were significant (p = < 0.001 and p = 0.002, for pneumonia and diarrhoea respectively).

CONCLUSIONS: An interactive, focussed educational intervention, targeted at physicians, appears to have been effective in improving appropriate antimicrobial prescribing for the most common paediatric infectious diseases in a medical college hospital in Bangladesh.

Fulltext Hospitalised patients' awareness of their rights: a cross-sectional survey from a tertiary care hospital on the east coast of Peninsular Malaysia

Yousuf RM, Fauzi AR, How SH, Akter SF, Shah A

Singapore Med J, 2009 May;50(5):494-9.

PMID: 19495519

Optimal patient care varies considerably from place to place and is influenced by scientific as well as social developments. The purpose of this study was to investigate awareness and pertinent issues regarding informed consent among hospitalised patients and to determine lapses, in order to improve the standard of care.

Beneficial effect of the leaves of Murraya koenigii (Linn.) Spreng (Rutaceae) on diabetes-induced renal damage in vivo

Yankuzo H, Ahmed QU, Santosa RI, Akter SF, Talib NA

J Ethnopharmacol, 2011 Apr 26;135(1):88-94.

PMID: 21354289 DOI: 10.1016/j.jep.2011.02.020

Murraya koenigii (Linn.) Spreng (curry leaf) is widely used as a nephroprotective agent in kidney's infirmities among diabetics by the traditional practitioners in Malaysia. However, the latter role of curry leaf has been grossly under reported and is yet to receive proper scientific evaluation.

Fulltext Factors associated with the outcome of open tibial fractures

Yusof NM, Khalid KA, Zulkifly AH, Zakaria Z, Amin MA, Awang MS, et al.

Malays J Med Sci, 2013 Oct;20(5):47-53.

PMID: 24643115 MyJurnal

Although open tibial fractures are common in Malaysia, the outcomes for these patients have not been evaluated in the literature. This retrospective study was conducted to examine the factors associated with infection and non-union in open tibial fractures managed at Hospital Tengku Ampuan Afzan (HTAA), Kuantan, in 2009.

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