Residential elbow joint rehabilitation system by smartphone with cloud database

BACKGROUND: Physical therapy treatment has gradually become important in hospitals. This paper focused on elbow joint rehabilitation, as this form of rehabilitation is used most often. Moreover, most elbow joint rehabilitation programs could be conducted at home without going to a medical institution, which will economize medical manpower. OBJECTIVE: How to judge the correct rehabilitation motion becomes an issue for elbow joint rehabilitation at home. Therefore, this study proposed a residential elbow joint rehabilitation system (REJRS) by smartphone with a cloud database to address these issues. METHODS: REJRS has the ability to judge the correct motions and times of rehabilitation in real time. When the rehabilitation motions are incorrect, the number of rehabilitation repetitions is insufficient, or a timed rehabilitation session is insufficient, the patient will receive a warning text and light alert by REJRS. Then, the data of rehabilitation sessions are uploaded to the cloud database immediately. RESULTS: Patients can query their rehabilitation data at all times. Moreover, medical staff can track the status of each patient’s rehabilitation at any time and any place by downloading the data from the cloud database via the Internet. In our experimental results, the rate for detecting the correct elbow joint rehabilitation motion was up to 90%. CONCLUSIONS: The results show that REJRS could be applied for residential elbow joint rehabilitation. In the future, REJRS will be verified by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) for application to clinical treatment.

International Medical Graduates - Asset or Liability?

One of the gains of globalisation is its osmotic effect of equalisation motivating all the countries to reach their potential. Human resource especially, medical manpower, determines the health of the nation. Developing countries are becoming increasingly aware, of using their scarce resources to train a doctor, only to lose it to the Western world. The article highlights the exploitation, and possible wastage of highly qualified medical workforce who, are accommodated to suit the needs of the host country irrespective of their previous qualifications and experience. The article also makes suggestions to recover and retain the talents of the country.

Ophthalmology as a Career Choice of Rotatory Medical Interns at Two Tertiary Hospital in Nigeria Middle Belt

The distribution of medical manpower among the various specialties should be of interest to government, health care planners and medical education of any nation. With this in mind, this study was design to determine the factors that may influence this specialty choice amongst interns especially in Nigerian middle belt. Ophthalmology is a unique field of medicine that combines the hypothesis generating intellectual aspect of diagnosis with the opportunity to perform procedures both in clinic and in the operating theatre. A cross-sectional study was conducted at Benue State University Teaching Hospital, Makurdi and Federal Medical Centre, Makurdi with a semi structured questionnaire. A total of 61 questionnaires were given out with 52 completely answered and returned given a response rate of 85.2% over a two week period. The mean age of the rotatory medical interns was 30.08 years with the youngest, 23 years and oldest, 42 years and a range of 19. Forty four (44) (84.6%) were male and eight (8) (15.4%) were female. The respondents mean age was 30.08 years with a range of 19. This is a dynamic work force and if effectively utilized will go a long way in the efforts at providing quality health care to the populace. The study also shows a significant relationship between the medical school attended and the choice of specialty. Concluding, factors influencing interns’ specialty choice should guide government’s health administrators and educators as they may be responsible for mal-distribution of medical manpower across the various specialties.

Financial incentives as a governmental tool to bridge the medical manpower gap between Israel’s center and periphery

One of the major health disparities between Israel’s center and periphery relates to the physician to population ratio. To overcome it, the Israeli government launched a financial incentive program in 2011, in an attempt to encourage physicians to work in the periphery and in specialties experiencing major shortages. A recent IJHPR study found that residents who choose to work in a peripheral institution gave more weight to the grant in their decision-making process than did residents from central institutions. This finding lends support to the rationale behind the government program and suggests that it is an effective means of achieving the desired goal. This commentary details how the program was repeatedly adjusted during the 2011–2018 period, in light of changing needs. As financial and human resources are expected to remain scarce in the future, the program must continue to be constantly evaluated and adjusted in order to maintain its effectiveness.

THE ROLE OF PERSONNEL MONITORING IN THE EVALUATION OF INNOVATIVE MEASURES RELATED TO RESOURCES SUPPORT OF REGIONAL HEALTH CARE

The article presents calculation and analysis of medical manpower support of population as exemplified by such megalopolis as Moscow during implementation of the program of development of manpower of medical organizations and according to strategy of development of health care of the region. The time span of observation made up to 2013-2015 because up to that time the structural transformations in municipal health care system were factually finalized and conditions for analysis of achieved results took shape. It is established that higher support with physicians in the beginning of transformations, untypical on other territories, during three years moderately decreased and stabilized. The directions of optimization of number of physicians depending on types of medical organizations were reflected in predominant decreasing of number of established posts, in lesser degree - employed posts and in most lesser degree - number of individuals as workers. In polyclinics the process of division of labor between physicians and paramedical personnel increased. The conditions for amelioration of effectiveness of using physicians' resources and modes of remuneration of labor were organized. The presence of particular disproportions in physicians' manpower dictates necessity of proceeding monitoring of support of application of assessment and consideration of its results with the purpose of more rational distribution and priority directions of functioning of manpower resources.