Israel Active

A team from the Israel Trauma Coalition has gone to the Boston suburb of Watertown to help develop “a recovery process” for the local school system. Watertown was the epicenter of the manhunt for the Boston Marathon bombers. Children in the area are still reeling from the event.

Professor Pnina Klein of Bar-Ilan University has developed an innovative in-home training program for caregivers and HIV-infected mothers. Children in their care gained significantly improved language skills, memory and cognitive abilities.

Reuth Medical Center in Tel Aviv announced that, following a six-month trial of Cupron’s anti-bacterial copper-embedded linens, it will be the world’s first hospital to fully deploy copper-embedded textiles in all its patient-related hospital textiles. (see current JPost blog)

All nine varieties of dates grown in Israel are better than other varieties at helping protect those who consume them against cardiovascular diseases. Researchers from Haifa’s Rambam hospital and Israel’s Technion have proved this in a study published in the prestigious Journal of Agriculture Food Chemistry. Three dates a day reduce triglycerides and improve cholesterol.

World ORT Kadima Mada in Israel now provides educational facilities in all 35 Israeli hospitals with children’s units. The Swiss-based SASA Setton Foundation has just made a $3.2 million investment to cover youngsters at psychiatric hospitals and mental health units.

Israel marked “International Week for Encouraging Vaccinations” by announcing that the Prevnar vaccination introduced in 2009 had reduced annual cases of pneumonia by 70%. The rotavirus vaccine, added in 2010, has reduced gastrointestinal illness in children by 60%.

A group of researchers from the Hadassah Medical Organization has located a gene that explains the reason for recurrent life threatening infections and the bone marrow failure in children.

Israeli hospitals have imposed a strict set of procedures to prevent the spread of the super-bug MRSA. Isolation wards, dedicated staff, mandatory hand-washing and daily reports have cut the incidence of the bacteria by over 70 per cent.

Ten percent of babies are born with vascular defects, of which most are incorrectly diagnosed and can be life threatening. With the opening of a new unit in Jerusalem at Hadassah Medical Center, these children no longer need to be sent abroad for this type of surgery.

Israel’s Elad Systems has developed a smart-phone app to enable doctors at Tel Hashomer’s Sheba Medical Center to view the medical files of patients in real time. It will show data on hospitalization, operations, clinic visits, medical tests, prescriptions and sensitivities to help speed diagnosis.