Adventure Ausrama Blog

The Australian government is in trouble over its planned introduction of My Health Record, a centralized storage of personal medical history. Closure of the opt-out date has been pushed forward several times. There is no way the government can continue to claim that the system will be secure. This is impossible. The weak link in the chain is human. Doctors, nurses and general hospital staff will have access. They will be able to print out any one's record and take a copy home. International criticism revolves around the outdated methods to be used. The main storage medium will be PDF. Searching these for significant insights into a patient's history will be problematic. Ease of searching is paramount. Systems to be adopted in the US and China have separate computer codes for different medication, test results and diseases. This improves searching by clinicians. The FHIR system was developed in Australia but it is the only country not adopting it. As always, Australian ...

The medical community has just noticed a fact that many have known for years - Waiting a long time for an operation can lead to opioid addiction. It is easy to get opiates from GPs just by telling them that you are in excruciating pain and an operation is a long way off. Shane Jackson president of the Tasmanian Pharmaceutical Society says money should be spent on more pain management specialist. This is a waste considering they only tell patients to take paracetamol that does not stop strong pain. Setting up a data base will only lead to patients being denied opiates so they experience more pain and suffering. Blame the patients has always been easy to do. A data base will stop people getting morphine derivatives from all GPs. This creates an added problem. The solution is more medical staff and facilities to do more operations. Reducing the risk of opiate addiction can be solved by denying patients access to such drugs, Though they may turn up in the hospital emergency departme...

Griffith University is to construct a building that for the first time in the world has hydrogen power generation integrated into the structure itself. The sun will separate hydrogen from water by electrolysis. Later when the sun goes down the hydrogen will power fuel cells to generate the required electricity for air conditioning and other uses. A proven method of storing hydrogen in metal hydride powder will be deployed. This is safer than keeping hydrogen in tanks which can explode. Initial energy requirements will be met by photovoltaic solar panels on the roof and walls, as well as photovoltaic film on the windows. The hydrogen fuel cell technology has been available for quite some time. It will be fully tested in this new structure. The building itself will be substantial, being "home base" for 80 staff members and 40 PHD students. Eight seminar rooms and two 120-seat lecture theatres will be in use in the six level building. Construction begins in 2011. It will be op...