Home area network for optimizing telehealth services--empirical simulation analysis.

Telehealth applications such as Video-over-IP and remote sensor monitoring are rapidly growing in utilisation and it has now expanded to the patient's homes. These Telehealth applications are, however highly delay sensitive and require high quality (and bandwidth priority) in order to provide satisfactory performances. However, at the patient's home area network (HAN) environment, typically there is no Internet traffic management system which highly affects the quality of these applications. As HAN expands its capacity by adding new devices in its network, the need for a network management system become urgent and necessary. In this study, we propose an infrastructure based method to improve Telehealth application quality by managing the quality and distribution of the Internet traffic among the connected devices in a HAN environment. We setup a HAN environment using existing devices readily available at home and tested the setting with typical Telehealth application needs that includes Video-over-IP, VoIP, data and other multimedia traffic. Our simulation results showed that our method is capable of providing better services. Our method indicated that it can provide ~11% lesser packet-loss under 12Mbps background traffic, while increasing 10% of the CPU load for Traffic management.

The continuing medical education activities and attitudes of Australian doctors working in different clinical specialties and practice locations.

BACKGROUND: Currently, it is not clear which continuing medical education (CME) methods are being used by senior doctors and what their attitudes towards them are. The aims of this study were to investigate which modes of CME delivery senior Australian doctors utilise, to assess doctors' attitudes towards CME and to determine any differences in modes used and attitudes between clinical specialties and practice locations. METHODS: A 52-statement questionnaire enquiring about doctors' current CME activities and their attitudes towards CME was distributed to 1336 senior Australian doctors. RESULTS: 494 doctors responded to the questionnaire. Traditional forms of CME (eg, meetings, conferences, journals and lectures) were most commonly used. Doctors thought CME involving face-to-face interaction was superior to electronic forms of CME. All doctors, especially those in hospital practice, had a positive attitude towards CME but found lack of time a barrier to learning. Rural doctors found CME sessions more difficult to attend than did their metropolitan colleagues. CONCLUSIONS: Traditional forms of CME were more popular than modern CME approaches, such as e-learning. Australian doctors had a positive attitude towards undertaking CME despite struggling to find time to perform CME. The differences in attitudes towards CME demonstrated between specialties and different practice location will aid future CME planning.

Vitamin B12 malabsorption following bladder reconstruction or diversion with bowel segments.

BACKGROUND: Vitamin B12 is absorbed exclusively in the terminal ileum the resection of which may produce malabsorption of B12. The present study aimed to determine whether the length or specific segment of the intestine used in bladder reconstruction affects the overall incidence of B12 malabsorption. It was also aimed at the reasonable way of following these patients. METHODS: Seventy patients who underwent urinary reconstruction between 1988 and 1997 were studied: 28 had undergone orthotopic reconstruction, 14 had ileal conduit diversion, 8 had continent diversion and 20 had undergone enterocystoplasty. The median follow up was 65 months (10-137 months). Indications for operation included carcinoma of the bladder, neurogenic bladder dysfunction, idiopathic detrusor instability and interstitial cystitis. Schilling tests were performed, and serum B12 level and haematological indices were measured. RESULTS: Patients were classified depending on whether the ileocaecal junction was used. Group 1 included ileal conduit and entero-cystoplasty where 15-20 cm of ileum, 15-20 cm from ileocaecal junction was used. Group 2 consisted of orthotopic reconstruction and continent diversions where the ileocaecal segment was used. Group 3 comprised patients in whom long ileal segments (50-60 cm) had been used for reconstruction. Five patients in group 1 and one in group 2 had low B12 levels, but none had developed neuropathy or megaloblastic anaemia. One patient in group 1, and six patients in group 2 had low Schilling tests indicating intestinal malabsorption of B12. No patient in group 3 had a low B12 or an abnormal Schilling test. CONCLUSION: This study showed that use of ileocaecal segments results in intestinal malabsorption of B12. The length of ileum alone does not seem to be the determinant factor in causing B12 deficiency or B12 malabsorption.