Hospitals and clinics must maintain accurate and readily accessible medical records to ensure proper treatment of patients. Prescription and diagnosis mistakes caused by substandard record keeping are an all-too-common form of medical malpractice, and facilities that confuse patient records or make other mistakes deserve to be held accountable when those errors cause harm or lead to a wrongful death. Health care information technology systems have developed rapidly in recent decades not only to improve performance and enhance safety, but also to reduce the costs of delivering ...

According to a new Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) policy, certain commercial operators now face strict requirements when applying for or updating their operating authority registration. The FMCSA now reviews and evaluates the ability and willingness of motor carriers, brokers and freight forwarders to follow applicable laws and regulations. This policy impacts commercial trucking safety by making it difficult for operators failing to meet its new performance factors to gain or maintain their registration. Hopefully, this policy will make the roads ...

Workers' compensation rates in New York were decreased for the first time this year since 2008. In July, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced the lower workers' compensation premiums as a final measure to implement reforms from a law passed in 2007. Earlier in 2012, other changes were also implemented from the 2007 workers' compensation reforms including instituting treatment guidelines and benefit caps. The goal of these changes is to improve the New York workers' compensation system for both employers and claimants. Debate About Workers' Comp Premiums The Workers' Compensation ...

School is back in session now, and parents around the state are breathing a sigh of relief. The sigh is likely much more pronounced for parents who dealt not only with their children's at-home rambunctiousness during the summer months, but also with custody and parenting plan disputes brought about when custodial or non-custodial parents want to take a vacation with the children. Since the kids are back in school now, there is less need for parents seeking to make modifications for lengthy intrastate, interstate or international vacations, but smaller trips -- like those ...

In Illinois, as in all states, people die every year in motor vehicle, construction and workplace accidents that are caused by others. Illinois allows the families of those killed in these accidents to recover damages for the wrongful death of their loved ones. What Is Wrongful Death and Who Is Eligible to Sue for Damages? Illinois law defines wrongful death as a death caused by a wrongful act, neglect or default that would have allowed the deceased to recover damages for his or her injuries in a personal injury lawsuit had he or she survived. Wrongful death lawsuits ...

Working parents sometimes find it difficult to attend all of their children's activities such as school conferences or school plays because of career demands. The demands can be especially high when the new school year starts in September: curriculum night, parent-teacher conferences, etc. Unfortunately your job can sometimes be less than flexible. A few Michigan legislators are considering a fix: a proposed law that would allow working parents to have the option of taking time off from work to attend their children's school activities, without the fear of retaliation. ...

A landmark ruling by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) activists and equal rights advocates around the country breathing a sigh of relief. The EEOC declared in an April decision that transgender people are protected against workplace discrimination based on their sexual orientation or gender identity. Why Is This Decision Important? A series of federal court cases in the 1980s expressly disavowed gender discrimination claims of transgendered people. Since that time, advocacy groups like the Transgender ...

The Kansas legislature has given prosecutors additional ammunition to use in prosecuting people suspected of driving under the influence. Under a new law, anyone who is suspected of DUI and refuses to submit to a blood alcohol test can be prosecuted and face the same penalties as a person convicted of DUI. Across the country, only sixteen other states have a similar provision. Prosecutors claimed the law was needed because some repeat DUI offenders would refuse to take a blood alcohol test, gambling that a jury might not convict them. One prosecutor said that over a ...

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved the first phase of a clinical trial that could potentially revolutionize treatment available for people with spinal cord injuries. The Miami Project to Cure Paralysis is a joint venture created by a father and son, both of whom used to play football. The father, a former NFL linebacker, has been striving to find a cure for his son's paralysis since his son was injured in a college game. The two founded The Miami Project which researches and performs clinical trials in an attempt to find a cure for spinal cord injuries. With ...

In recent years, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has been cracking down on the issue of employee misclassification. This renewed gusto comes in response to an increased number of wage-and-hour lawsuits filed by employees against their employers (over 7,000 filings in the first half of 2012 alone), many of which are challenging their exempt employee status. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), employees in a "bona fide executive, administrative, or professional capacity" are designated "exempt" and therefore not eligible for overtime pay. ...

"Life is like a box of chocolates," Forrest Gump's mother told him in the hit movie of that name. "You never know what you're gonna get." Forrest Gump had many adventures in the Oscar-winning film, but aging wasn't one of them. For senior citizens, however, the ultimate box-of-chocolates experience awaits: not knowing how their health and finances will hold out in their retirement years. For many seniors, getting old can become a source of great anxiety as declining income and increasing health problems trigger problems with medical debt. This ...

Ulster Rugby's flying start to the season has been given a turbo charged boost with the signing of a major new sponsorship deal with Aer Lingus. Details of the two-year support package were unveiled at a signing ceremony held at Ravenhill. As part of the new relationship, Aer Lingus will provide Ulster Rugby with air travel as well as supporting the development of travel and accommodation packages for Ulster supporters to away matches. Declan Kearney, Aer Lingus Director of Communications said the link-up with Ulster Rugby represented a significant sporting first ...

In just over three months' time a new law comes into force which will prevent insurance companies from pricing premiums based on gender. This is likely to mean higher car insurance premiums for young women, but new research reveals the majority of those who will be most affected by the change are completely unaware of it. The EU Gender Directive becomes law on 21st December. Diamond, a specialist in car insurance for women, surveyed 1,000 women motorists aged under 30 about the Directive, and found that many of them don't realise how much it will affect them. More ...

Dr. Melek R. Kayser, MD, FACS, has recently introduced into his practice the technique of breast enhancement with autologous fat grafting. This revolutionary procedure adds a totally new dimension to breast augmentation and reconstruction as a patient's own body fat is used exclusively to enlarge the breast! With this approach, the traditional breast implant is no longer used at all. "This is probably the hottest topic in plastic surgery right now," says Dr. Kayser, founder of Image by Design Plastic Surgery in Roseville, Michigan. "I have been using ...

A tenant can make or break a landlord's experience of owning a rental property, according to landlord insurance specialist Terri Scheer Insurance. Terri Scheer Insurance Manager, Ms Carolyn Majda, said finding good tenants and keeping them happy was one of the best investments a landlord could make. "Sourcing good tenants is one of the most important tasks for landlords who self-manage their own investment properties," Ms Majda said. "And by ensuring they have a positive experience while living at your property, they may be more likely to pay their ...

DENVER – A pilot study, published in the October 2012 issue of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer's (IASLC) Journal of Thoracic Oncology, showed that breath testing could be used to discriminate between benign and malignant pulmonary nodules. The study looked at 74 patients who were under investigation for pulmonary nodules and attended a referral clinic in Colorado between March 2009 and May 2010. Researchers from Israel and Colorado collected exhaled breath from each patient, analyzing the exhaled volatile organic compounds using gas chromatography ...

Family members who care for terminally ill patients at home can be helped by nurses throughout the course of the illness and particularly after the patient's death, according to Penn State nursing researchers. The death of a loved one can be particularly hard for those who were involved in the day-to-day care of the person. This transition can be eased by existing support from nurses and other medical professionals. "What we know is that the caregiver's primary contact with the health care system is during brief office visits [for the patient]," said Janice L. Penrod, ...

Children of immigrants are outperforming children whose family trees have deeper roots in the United States, learning more in school and then making smoother transitions into adulthood, according to sociologists at The Johns Hopkins University. Researchers Lingxin Hao and Han S. Woo tracked nearly 11,000 children from as young as age 13 into their early 30s, coming from families with diverse backgrounds. When comparing children with similar socioeconomic status and school conditions, Hao and Woo found that the best students, and later the most successful young adults, ...

Habituation refers to the ability of an organism to stop responding to repeated stimulation. A new study has examined the impact of maternal drinking on fetal habituation or learning abilities while still residing in the mother's womb. Results showed that those fetuses exposed to heavy binge drinking required significantly more trials to habituate, and also exhibited a greater variability in test performance. While it has become clear that drinking during pregnancy can damage the fetal central nervous system, these outcomes can also be influenced by factors such ...

Contact: Peter Malik, M.D. peter.malik@i-med.ac.at 43.512.504.81629 (Austria) Medical University Innsbruck Add'l contact: Sergei Mechtcheriakov, M.D. s.mechtcheriakov@i-med.ac.at 43.512.504.23636 (Austria) Medical University Innsbruck Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research Abstinence from alcohol plus physical exercise can help reclaim bone loss due to alcoholism Abstinence from alcohol plus physical exercise can help reclaim bone loss due to alcoholism Alcoholism is known to cause osteoporosis, or reduced bone mineral density (BMD). New ...

Contact: Kenneth S. Kendler, M.D. kendler@vcu.edu 804.828.8590 Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research Symptoms of alcohol abuse, not dependence, may better reflect family risk for alcohol use disorders Symptoms of alcohol abuse, not dependence, may better reflect family risk for alcohol use disorders Individuals with alcohol use disorders (AUDs) vary widely in their age of onset of use, patterns of drinking, and symptom profiles. AUDs are often 'divided' into two categories: alcohol abuse (AA) and ...

(Edmonton) The thud of a bird hitting a window is something many Canadian home owners experience. Up until now, little research has been done to document the significant these collisions for Canada's bird populations. A University of Alberta biology class project supervised by researcher Erin Bayne suggests that many birds meet their end in run-ins with Canadian homes. The U of A students estimate a staggering 22 million birds a year die from colliding with windows of homes across the country. The research was done in Edmonton and surrounding area using evidence gathered ...

EUGENE, Ore. -- Despite the disruptions they cause, large wildfires are a mixed economic bag for nearby communities, according to findings from a research project by the University of Oregon's Ecosystem Workforce Program and its collaborators. Wildfires disrupt the lives of workers, employers and families, and lead to longer-term instability in local labor markets, the project funded by Joint Fire Science Program found. But on the flip side of the coin, countywide employment and wages increase in some sectors during the wildfires, often mitigating the short-term employment ...

Work stress, job satisfaction and health problems due to high stress have more to do with genes than you might think, according to research by Timothy Judge, professor of management at the University of Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business. The lead author of "Genetic influences on core self-evaluations, job satisfaction, work stress, and employee health: A behavioral genetics mediated model," published in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Judge studied nearly 600 twins – some identical, some fraternal – who were raised together and reared apart. ...

The Eastern Pacific Ocean has become "tropically" alive on NASA satellite data today, Sept. 14. NASA's Aqua satellite captured an image of weakening Tropical Storm Kristy and another low pressure area that is developing and has the potential to become a new tropical depression. NASA's Aqua satellite passed over the eastern Pacific Ocean on Sept. 14 at 5:23 a.m. ED, and the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument captured an infrared image of Kristy and a new developing low pressure area. The infrared data indicated the strongest thunderstorms and heaviest rainfall ...