Oliver McGowan death prompts mandatory autism training

Oliver McGowan, 18, died at Southmead hospital in Bristol in 2016 after being given a drug he was allergic to despite repeat warning from his parents.

The government has announced funding of £1.4m to develop and test the new training package.

Training is not currently mandatory and varies, a government spokesperson said.

The targeted programme will be "named in memory of Oliver McGowan and in recognition of his family's tireless campaigning for better training for staff" a government spokesperson said.

It will draw on case studies which "capture exactly why NHS and social care staff need learning disability and autism training" the spokesperson said.

An independent review is to be carried out into Oliver McGowan's death.

Read more at BBC News

A Basic Meditation to Tame Your Inner Critic

Nearly everyone recognizes the inner critic, that judgemental voice inside us that heckles and cuts us down. Whatever we do isn’t enough.
This push for perfection is exhausting, but often avoidable with practice. Rationalizing with what is basically an irrational habit doesn’t help much. The inner critic is like the old two guys on the Muppet Show endlessly deriding whatever happens without reason at all. Reasoning with our inner tyrant validates it as if it deserves our attention when mostly it's just an unhelpful pattern of thinking we’ve picked up along the way.
Read more at mindful.org

Third-level students are suffering from extreme anxiety and depression, study shows

IRELAND’S FIRST STUDY into third-level students’ mental health has indicated that a significant number are suffering from anxiety (38.4%), depression (29.9%) and stress (17.3%).

The Union of Students in Ireland will later today publish the first National Report on Student Mental Health in Third Level, which shows that many students suffer from extreme stress or anxiety. In some cases this appeared to be linked with the subject they were studying. 

Those studying in the areas of health science and hospitality appear to be more likely to be within normal ranges and less likely to be extremely severely anxious, according to the survey.

Those studying engineering were least likely to be extremely severely anxious (32.9%).

Read more at The Journal.ie 

What Meditation Looks Like In Your Brain, According To Experts

You sit down, focus on your breathing, and attempt to get rid of all the stress of the day through a few minutes of meditation — but what really happens in your brain when you're meditating? The answer, experts tell Bustle, is more complex than it might seem. The neuroscience of meditation is a broad and complicated area of research, and scientists are often more interested in the impact of your meditation practice on your brain over the long term.
"If meditation just produces changes when you're meditating, it's like a drug, and it would wear off — and what would be the point of that?" Dr. Richard Davidson, PhD, the William James and Vilas Professor of Psychology and Psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin–Madison and founder of the Center for Healthy Minds, tells Bustle. However, the changes that occur in your brain while you're meditating build up over time to produce remarkable shifts in cognition and brain structure. The meditating brain is a very cool thing.

Read More at Bustle.com

The placebo experiment can my brain cure my body? Dr Michael Mosely

Could taking a placebo, a pill which contains nothing but ground rice, really help cure back pain?

Jim Pearce is certainly convinced.

When we first met, the 71-year-old was confined to a wheelchair and using morphine because of his back pain.

But after he took part in our study, taking our convincingly-labeled blue-and-white-striped "new" painkillers, he seemed like a different person.

The only thing was that he'd been taking placebos; dummy pills - they contained nothing but ground rice. But they worked.

"I just woke up one morning and I thought, hang about, I haven't got a twinge in my back. And it's been going from strength to strength."

I asked him which he preferred, my pills or the morphine?

"I got rid of the morphine and kept taking your blue pills."

Jim was one of 100 people who took part in a trial for our BBC2 Horizon programme: Can my brain cure my body?

It was a back pain study - with a twist. The twist being that everyone, unknowingly, was getting placebo? We wanted to see if people taking the pills would get better anyway?

Read more at BBC News

A Mindfulness Practice for Stressed-Out Parents

In spite of my bookshelf from graduate school, much of what I’ve learned about parenting has come from my parents, and my own experience as a parent—as it has for us all. I’m a clinical psychologist who has spent the better part of 20 years specializing in the treatment of children, as well as in counseling parents. I’m trained, licensed, experienced, and even fairly well-read. And as a parent myself, I can honestly answer “that” question from anxious parents coming to me for help–whether my understanding of what they’ve been through extends from professional to personal. So yes, I know quite a bit professionally and personally about parenting.

Read more at Mindful

Alastair Campbell: Depression And Me

In an intensely personal and often surprising film for BBC Two, Alastair Campbell: Depression And Me, Alastair Campbell candidly talks about his experience living with depression and explores if radical new treatments can make a difference.

Alastair is best known for his role as Tony Blair’s formidable and often contentious spin doctor but, away from the public eye, he has been dogged by crippling bouts of depression for most of his life. Some days, just getting out of bed is too hard. Therapy and anti-depressant medication is helping him keep his head above water - but is that really the best he can hope for?

Encouraged by his family, Alastair sets out on a journey to explore if cutting edge science can offer him - and the millions of people like him - the hope of one-day living depression-free. As he tries to understand his depression better he also reflects back on key events in his life and asks if they could have had a negative effect on his mind.

Read more at Mental Health And Me also at Time to change

Advantages and Disadvantages of Nursing in Ireland

Nursing in Ireland provides plenty of opportunity and variety for your nursing career. Nurses are in high demand because of their ability to complete many primary care services.

While Ireland's health care system is modern and reasonably efficient, there is no doubt that change is needed to improve patient facilities, reduce waiting lists and develop better working conditions for medical staff, especially nurses. This change is happening, albeit slowly, and Irelands Health Service will continue to strive forward with its improvement plans, including building new hospitals. This investment and growth in the Irish Health Service will provide new career opportunities for nurses. Now is a great time to get in on the ground level and witness the development first hand.

While there are temporary hiring difficulties in the public sector at the moment, there are still plenty of nurse job opportunities in the private sector that are actively recruiting nurses throughout Ireland. Permanent nursing employment contracts are available with some offering 39 hour weeks.

Ireland offers nurses a competitive salary scale of (€27,483-€43,800), pension and investment in further education for each nursing career. Nursing supports offered to nurses include sponsorship of post-graduate formal academic courses that will facilitate career progression as well as a training bursary from Nurse Jobs Ireland.

A disadvantage to nursing in Ireland is the cost of living here, especially rental costs. The competitive salary offered to nurses is nationwide and the cost of living is not as expensive as Dublin. There are nurse jobs in Cork, Limerick and Clare which also offer city lifestyles. However, there is a travel card you are entitled to that is tax deductible so you can live outside Dublin city centre.

Read More at Nurse+Jobs Ireland

What Does a Cardiac Nurse Do?

The most general term for a nurse that works with patients with heart problems is a cardiovascular nurse. They are also called cardiovascular clinical nurse specialists or CNSs.Most CNS jobs will be located in hospitals. Since they are specialized to work with the heart, they will care for critically ill patients and those recovering from surgeries and procedures like bypass, angioplasty and more. But the hospital isn’t the only place they work. They could help patients recover at home. And the work with patients of all ages, since heart problems don’t only happen to a certain age group. Another term for a Cardiovascular Nurse is a Cardiology Nurse. Both jobs are essentially the same – helping patients recover and/or educating people about how to maintain heart-healthy lifestyles. Read more at the Nerdy Nurse

Great British Bake Off's Nadiya Hussain thanked by BBC viewers for soul-baring documentary about anxiety

The Great British Bake Off star Nadiya Hussain has been applauded by BBC viewers for shining a light on an issue that has many suffering in silence.

BBC One premiered Nadiya: Anxiety and Me as part of Mental Health Awareness Week on Wednesday (May 15), in hopes of reaching some of the 5 million people currently suffering from anxiety across the UK today.

Nadiya is among those who suffer from anxiety and extreme panic attacks, even though she had never been formally diagnosed until making this documentary.

The one-off special followed Nadiya to a Brighton school to see how educators cope with their students' anxiety, and to King's College London to learn about the ways she could avoid passing down anxiety triggers to her children.

Read More at Digital Spy

How Meditation Can Improve Mental Health

It is important to maintain and promote mental health and well-being. Mental health includes emotional, psychological, and social well-being. Poor mental health can have serious consequences on how we think, feel, and act and can even lead to harmful consequences and disorders, including depression, anxiety, and suicide if the problem is severe enough and persists.
Mental illnesses are serious, yet common, disorders that can affect mood and behavior. These issues can be occasional or long-lasting and can affect day-to-day functioning and ability to interact and relate with others.
There are a number of ways that you can improve your situation and help to increase mental well-being. One of the best ways to do this is through meditation and mindfulness practices.
Read more at Thrive Global 

Radical Parkinson's treatment tested in patients

A radical Parkinson's treatment that delivers a drug directly to the brain has been tested in people.

Patients in the trial were either given the drug, which is administered via a "port" in the side of the head, or a dummy treatment (placebo).

Both groups showed improved symptoms, meaning it was not clear if the drug was responsible for the benefits.

However, scans did find visual evidence of improvements to affected areas of the brain in those given the drug.

The study's authors say it hints at the possibility of "reawakening" brain cells damaged by the condition.

Other experts, though, say it is too early to know whether this finding might result in improvements in Parkinson's symptoms.

Read more at BBC News

Give us a reason to come home’: Irish nurses hold rally at Sydney Opera House

More than 250 Irish nurses gathered at the Sydney Opera House on Saturday to urge the Irish Government to increase pay and “give us a reason to come home.”

The group in Australia came out to show its support for nurses and midwives in Ireland who are going on strike on January 30th over pay and conditions.

Irish nurse Laura Phillips said the pay in Ireland is “not competitive” and that hundreds of Irish-trained nurses working in Australia will not come home until salaries improve.

More from the Irish Times

An investigation into compassion fatigue and self-compassion in acute medical care hospital nurses: a mixed methods study

Article highlight:

An investigation into compassion fatigue and self-compassion in acute medical care hospital nurses: a mixed methods study:

Abstract

Background

In the acute medical care hospital setting, nursing the sick and dying is both physically and emotionally demanding, making acute medical care hospital nurses more vulnerable to Compassion Fatigue (CF) or Secondary Traumatic Stress (STS). If not addressed in its earliest stages, CF can adversely change the caregiver’s ability to provide compassionate care. It has been shown that Self-Compassion (SC) can be beneficial for the caregiver, with corresponding benefits for the individual needing care. However, the relationship of this attribute to CF in the acute medical care hospital nursing setting has not been intensively studied. This study explores the environmental and psychosocial factors affecting the prevalence and levels of CF in acute medical care hospital nursing staff and whether SC can be used as a coping strategy that enables nurses to mitigate the prevalence and levels of CF.

See Full Article at: Journal of Compassionate Health Care

The 3 habits of calm: TV doctor on how to reduce stress

Dr Rangan Chatterjee has seen first-hand how stress affects his patients - and has found simple but effective methods to help them. Here he describes how small changes can help you to lead a more fulfilled and calmer life.

When we consider stress, we don't usually think of meaning and purpose. But living a life that's devoid of these qualities is inherently stressful. I'd even go as far as to say that the single best way of living a calmer, happier life is to do it with a strong sense of purpose. But what do I mean by 'purpose'? One way of thinking about it is as living your life on purpose.

People with a strong sense of purpose enjoy significantly better health compared to those who don't, including less likelihood of developing heart disease, strokes and depression. Research also shows that they sleep better and live longer.

Perhaps more crucially, though, people with a sense of purpose live happier lives.

But here's the problem. In order to find out who we are and what our purpose is, and then begin to change our lives, we need time. And time is precisely the thing that the modern world is stealing from us.

Read more at Independent: Life: Health & Wellbeing