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HEALTHBEAT SHOW NOTES .... Episode #43 - Recorded May 5, 2006

Hello and welcome to this week’s edition of HealthBeat, Chiropractic OnLine Today’s Health, News and informational Podcast.

In this week’s news:  We’ll Look At –

• Podcasts for Emergencies

• Alternative Medicine in Crisis

• Trans Fats and Heart Health

• HIPAA and April 21, 2006 Compliance

• NBCE Opposes Senate Bill 1955

• And Finally, Health Corner looks the current state of Healthcare in the USA

For HealthBeat, This is Dr. Todd Eglow.

Welcome to HealthBeat Podcast #43, recorded May 5, 2006.  HealthBeat is Chiropractic OnLine Today’s radio program, providing current news and commentary about Chiropractic and Health.

This week’s Episode is sponsored by DaVinci Laboratories.  Please surf to our web site at ChiropracticRadio.com and click on the DaVinci link for your Health and Nutritional needs.

If you are interested in creating personalized Healthbeat podcasts for your office or website, to help attract new patients, please surf to our web site and send us an Email ….

…. or Skype us by typing in “healthbeat”, all in small letters.

Finally, Chiropractic OnLine Today has always provided our news and education content for free and plan on continuing this policy.  However, we do request that if you are enjoying these podcasts, that you surf to ChiropracticRadio.com and consider clicking on our PayPal link to make a donation to keep these Podcasts airing.  We thank everyone for their continued support.

And Now for some news ….

Podcasting for Emergencies

The United Kingdom ’s Sussex Ambulance Service claims to be the first NHS Ambulance service to provide first aid advice in audio format.

While not a substitute for an actual hands-on training program, it may serve as a periodic tune-up for preparation for emergency situations.

To download these free MP3 files, surf to - http://www.sussexambulance.nhs.uk/

Alternative Medicine in Crisis

According to the April 22nd edition of the British Medical Journal, The Amsterdam Medical Disciplinary Tribunal has struck off one doctor and suspended two others for their exclusive use of complementary treatments—including "vegatests," homoeopathic medicine, and food supplements.

In the high profile test case for use of complementary medicine the doctors, who were not identified by the tribunal, were judged to have ignored existing standards for treating breast cancer, used unsatisfactory methods, and withheld information during their treatment of the patient.  The patient, identified in the full article,  opposed conventional medicine and sought help from a doctor who also practiced complementary medicine after she was given a diagnosis of breast cancer in May 2000.

For more information, surf to the April 22^nd edition of the British Journal of Medicine – located at http://bmj.bmjjournals.com - http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/short/332/7547/929-a?etoc

Trans Fats and Heart Health

In another news item from the British Medical Journal, there appears to be evidence that banning trans fatty acids will reduce risk of heart attacks.

According to the story, virtually eliminating the amount of trans fatty acids in industrially produced food could avert between 72,000 (6% of the total) and 228,000 (19%) coronary heart events each year in the United States, according to a new US and Dutch review study concludes published in the April 13, 2006 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine. ( N Engl J Med 354;1601-13).

Trans fats, unsaturated fatty acids with at least one double bond in the trans configuration, are formed during the partial hydrogenation of vegetable oils, a process that converts vegetable oils into semisolid fats for use in margarines, commercial cooking, and manufacturing processes.

From the perspective of the food industry, partially hydrogenated vegetable oils are attractive because of their long shelf life, their stability during deep-frying, and their semi-solidity, which can be customized to enhance the palatability of baked goods and sweets.

The amount of trans fats in packaged snack foods, bakery products, deep fried fast food, margarine, and packaged snacks such as tortilla chips increases consumers’ risk of cardiovascular disease, coronary heart disease, and sudden death from cardiac causes, say the researchers.

The researchers go on to say that “The evidence and the magnitude of adverse health effects of trans fatty acids are in fact far stronger on average than those of food contaminants or pesticide residues, which have in some cases received considerable attention ….”

For more information, surf to our Show Notes for links to this study - http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/extract/354/15/1601

http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/short/332/7547/931-b?etoc

HIPAA and April 21, 2006 Compliance

In case you missed it last week, another HIPAA deadline came and went.

The deadline for small health plans to comply with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) arrived last week. The security standards are a corollary to the HIPAA Privacy Rule, which created national standards to protect individuals’ medical records and other personal health information and give patients more control over their health information.

HIPAA’s security standards specify a series of administrative, technical, and physical security procedures for covered entities to use to ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of PHI in electronic format. The security standards for all but small plans had to be in place by April 25, 2005. Small plans had until April 21, 2006, to comply.

A small health plan is defined as a plan with annual receipts of $5 million or less. (Group health plans with fewer than 50 participants and that are administered by the employer are exempt from the HIPAA privacy, electronic transaction, and security standards.)

The standards require covered entities to implement basic safeguards to protect electronic PHI from unauthorized access, alteration, deletion, and transmission. The various standards may have either required or addressable implementation specifications.

For more information, surf to our Show Notes and make sure that you have been in touch with a qualified provider, knowledgeable in HIPAA rules and regulations to make sure that you are in compliance - http://hipaablog.com/archives/2006/03/17/april-21-deadline-for-small-health-plans-to-comply-with-hipaa

NBCE Opposes Senate Bill 1955

In HealthBeat’s continuing coverage of Senate Bill 1955, the National Board of Chiropractic Examiners (NBCE) has expressed its strong opposition to Senate Bill 1955.

According to the NBCE Board of Directors, passage of S.1955 would create an atmosphere in which the public would face severe obstacles when seeking chiropractic care.

Also known as the “Health Insurance Marketplace Modernization and Affordability Act,” S. 1955 would preempt state insurance laws and allow employers to eliminate or place caps on chiropractic benefits, require higher deductibles or require pre-authorization by a medical doctor prior to receiving chiropractic care.

The bill would allow employers to deny chiropractic care, along with all alternative health care treatments, even where state-enacted mandates allow those benefits.

According the NBCE Press release, all state licensing authorities within the United States recognize chiropractic as a primary health care profession distinct from medicine. In 1998, the Journal of the American Medical Association reported that 42.1 percent of the U.S. population had sought some form of non-traditional medical care, most commonly chiropractic. Those visits surpassed the number of visits to traditional medical physicians.

The NBCE Board of Directors also points out the harmful effects that passage of the bill could have on the economy. If passed, S.1955 would cause a decline in numbers of patients seeking chiropractic. Those patients would then be forced to increase their usage of pharmaceuticals to alleviate symptoms that chiropractors could have eliminated without drugs. The loss in business caused by S.1955 could create vast numbers of chiropractors unable to repay their student loans.

Surf to NBCE.org for more information - http://www.nbce.org/

As always, please surf to our Podcast Show Notes at ChiropractiRadio.com for a full listing of web references mentioned in today’s show.

And remember - COT’s Healthbeat always recommends discussing any nutritional or exercise lifestyle modifications with a qualified healthcare professional.

Health Corner –In this edition of HealthBeat’s Health Corner, we look at the current state of Healthcare in the year 2006.  An April 23^rd airing of the McLaughlin Groups’ Sunday show had a special panel of allopathic oriented guests, discussing the current state of healthcare in the United States .

While the discussion focused on the current Medical system, with little mention of alternative healthcare, it was very interesting, and possibly very instructive for leaders of the Alternative system, to hear about the constant mention of Prevention and Exercise and Nutrition.

Again, this discussion focuses on Allopathic, meaning mainstream Medicine in the year 2006, but Alternative healthcare, Chiropractic in particular, have been advocating many of the Preventative approaches that are mentioned.

Thank you for listening…. As always, We Want to hear from you.  Please send us emails…. Simply surf to our Web Site at ChiropracticRadio.com and click on the Email link.

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If you have an idea for a future Health Segment, please feel free to contact me directly via email …. The address is: healthbeat@chiropracticradio.com

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Finally, I leave you with the following quote:

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."

- Albert Einstein

For Chiropractic OnLine Today’s HealthBeat, This is Dr. Todd Eglow.

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