Doctors are regularly prescribing two powerful psychiatric drugs, risperidone and olanzapine, to elderly dementia patients despite 2004 safety warning

Doctors 'ignoring drugs warning'
Article on BBC website

Extracts:

"File On 4 questioned 355 GPs and found more than half prescribed the drugs risperidone and olanzapine.

The former Committee on Safety of Medicines (CSM) warned the drugs risked strokes in elderly dementia patients.

Prescribing the drugs was indefensible for many dementia patients, Ivan Lewis, Minister for Care Services, said."

"Dr Tim Kendall, of government agency NICE (The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence), said it was horrifying that some GPs were prescribing these drugs for up to 90% of their dementia patients and it was an "awful indictment."

He added: "I think the doctors should be disciplined.

"A doctor prescribing for 90% of their patients an anti-psychotic when there is enough guidance to say don't - it's unacceptable.""

NHS hospitals are throwing away as much as half of their food

Hospitals throw away 13m meals

Extract from the Sunday Telegraph:

"Close to 13 million meals were thrown away last year, with 33 hospitals dumping more than a quarter of their food, including two that discarded more than was eaten.

Meanwhile, almost 140,000 patients left hospital malnourished, double the figure a decade ago.

Last year, Ivan Lewis, the health minister, admitted that many elderly people were in effect being starved in hospitals. He said that some were given a single scoop of mashed potato as a meal, while others were "tortured" with trays of food placed beyond their reach and no help with eating.

Now figures uncovered by The Sunday Telegraph show dozens of hospitals in England and Wales throwing away more than a quarter of their meals untouched. At Leeds General Infirmary, 55 per cent of meals are thrown away, while 53 per cent at nearby St James' University Hospital end up in the bin.

Their "cook-chill" convenience food is prepared at a factory in South Wales before being driven 220 miles to be "regenerated" on hospital ward kitchens in Yorkshire."

The meals I had in the Sheffield Northern General Hospital as a patient last year were mostly very poor. And almost all meal choices were high in salt, despite the head dietician's claims to the contrary...)o: As a steroid victim I must avoid salt and salty food. This meant that much of the time in the hospital I had very little to eat. My salt problem was not taken seriously and most of the kitchen staff were unaware that the meals they provided were high in salt.


Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk
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The government plans to produce a national dementia strategy

Government aims to bring dementia 'out of the shadows' - Guardian

Extract:

"The government is to produce the first ever national dementia strategy to bring the problem "out of the shadows".

Ivan Lewis, the care services minister, said: "The scale of our ambition must meet the scale of the challenge as demographic realities mean dementia will impact on an increasing number of families in our society. The current system is failing too many dementia sufferers and their carers."

Speaking during a visit to a mental health centre for older people in North Kensington, London, he said: "I am determined that this disease is brought out of the shadows. We need to minimise the shame and fear associated with dementia so that people and their relatives feel able to seek support at the earliest possible stage in the knowledge they will get expert help and be treated with dignity and respect."

In England, about 600,000 people have dementia and that figure is set to double in the next 30 years.

Also present during Mr Lewis' visit to St Charles' hospital was Barbara Pointon, whose husband, Malcolm, suffered from dementia and is the subject of the controversial ITV documentary, Malcolm and Barbara: Love's Farewell, which will be screened on Wednesday.

Mrs Pointon said that the new strategy was "wonderful", adding: "I hope at the heart of this will come the up-skilling of everyone who deals with elderly people in any context."

The strategy will address three key areas:

· Better awareness: addressing the stigma of dementia and ensuring the early signs of dementia are recognised.

· Early diagnosis: ensuring the diagnosis of dementia is made accurately and early.

· High quality treatment: improving services to maximise the quality of life for people with dementia.

Mr Lewis said: "Dementia is a unique illness with devastating consequences. We know that, as people live longer, an increasing number of families will have to cope with the harsh realities of dementia."

You can lower the risk of developing dementia by reducing your salt intake. This would benefit your health in many other ways too.

Lose weight by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
How to Lose weight!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/story.html - my 'political' page

http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/socio.html - wider implications

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See Sodium in foods and

Associated health conditions

I can be contacted via my website if you need my further help. My help is free.

The government has agreed to provide £220m a year from the NHS budget to resolve a row over long-term care costs

NHS cash to tackle row over long-term care - Guardian

Extract:

"The government has agreed to provide £220m a year from the NHS budget to resolve a long-running row about who pays for the continuing care of patients transferred from hospital to nursing homes.

Ivan Lewis, the care services minister, said yesterday that the decision would help up to 10,000 people with severe dementia or other incapacitating conditions, who were liable to pay for intensive support to carry out the basic routines of daily life.

Mr Lewis said the aim was to eliminate a postcode lottery whereby older people in some parts of England were provided with free care, while others who might be in greater need were denied it."


Lose weight, lower your risk of vascular dementia and stroke, lower your high cholesterol level and your high blood pressure, reduce your risk of heart disease and heart attack, and benefit your health in countless other ways by eating less salt! - Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better! -

How to Lose weight!

See my website http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/

Read my Mensa article on Obesity and the Salt Connection

See http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)

More than 700,000 elderly people are subjected to abuse in their own homes or privately run nursing homes, study finds.

700,000 elderly people 'are being abused' The Observer

Extract:

"More than 700,000 elderly people are subjected to abuse in their own homes or privately run nursing homes, according to the results of a new study to be published this week.

The report - the first investigation for a decade to look at the abuse of the elderly in the UK - will say the rate of violence, bullying and neglect is significantly higher than was thought.

Although the rates of serious physical abuse and injury are relatively low, there are high levels of neglect, verbal assaults and behaviour that strips people of their self-esteem. The results are so serious that ministers are planning an overhaul of the adult protection system, which could lead to more people being prosecuted.

Care Minister Ivan Lewis, who has campaigned within the government for the dignity and privacy of older people, said: 'We need to have a fresh look at the whole adult protection regime in this country. I want to see a situation where people are as outraged by the abuse of an older person as they are by the abuse of a child. Sadly, we are nowhere near that yet as a society, but that culture has to change.'

Researchers from the King's Institute of Gerontology in London spent two years collecting data on the prevalence of abuse in private homes. The work is the first research funded by Comic Relief, and it was supported by the Department of Health.

The report will say the harm is often done to those who are particularly vulnerable because they have had a stroke or have dementia and cannot communicate properly. It will suggest that relatives need to look out for signs of abuse."


Lose weight and safeguard your health by eating less salt! Go on! - Try it! - You will feel so much better!
See my website www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk and
http://www.wildeaboutsteroids.co.uk/conditions.html
(The site does not sell anything and has no banners or sponsors or adverts - just helpful information.)