Guest Editor Jeff Hughes
Table of contents (Vol 4, No 4)
EDITORIAL

Challenges to Pharmacists and Pharmacy Practice in Pakistan
 
The role of the pharmacist as a member of the healthcare team and in direct patient care does not exist in Pakistan. This is a major challenge for the graduating pharmacist and a possible reason for the lack of enthusiasm among medical and para-medical staff to regard the pharmacist as a healthcare provider.
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By Tahir Mehmood Khan

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Writing for Publication
 
The readability and style of papers impacts both the reputations of individual authors and the work published in a journal. Many authors benefit from advice when revising their papers for grammar and style. With this in mind, we offer the services of a distinguished expert working independently of the journal. This offer applies only to papers destined to be submitted to or published in the AMJ.
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By Moyez Jiwa, Devesh Oberoi, Elizabeth Cottrell, Akshay Sharma, Gill Clark, Gillian Hanson

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REVIEW (Multimedia Presentation)

Community Pharmacies and Bowel Cancer
 

Jeff Hughes, Head of School of Pharmacy at Curtin University explores the role of community pharmacies in the early diagnosis of colorectal cancer. 

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By Jeff Hughes

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REVIEW

Clinical Senate of Western Australia - Position Statement on Alcohol
 
The Clinical Senate as the peak multidisciplinary clinical body in Western Australia is uniquely placed to bring a critical clinical perspective to key health issues. More than 75 clinicians and two consumer members drawn from all health professions and all sectors of Health meet regularly to debate and form recommendations to influence health policy and service deliver. At our December 2010 debate, the Senate considered, in light of the very concerning data on alcohol related harm in WA, the role clinicians can play in the societal debate on this issue. As a result the Senate recognised the need for cultural change and resolved to form a Position Statement on Alcohol to empower clinicians to act through all their spheres of influence.
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By Clinical Senate of Western Australia

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An Expanded Prescribing Role for Pharmacists
 
Research data on pharmacist prescribing in Australia, has reported that pharmacists’ and their clients’ views are strongly positive towards expanded pharmacist prescribing. These data provides considerable insight for the relevant policymakers in order for the agenda of expanded pharmacist prescribing to be moved forward. Further research assessing pharmacist prescribing roles for a limited range of infections and pain management should be the next step.
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By Kreshnik Hoti, Jeff Hughes, Bruce Sunderland

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Provision of Opioid Substitution Therapy Services in Australian Pharmacies
 
Opioid dependence, despite being the subject of significant public funding, remains a costly burden to Australian society in human and economic terms. The most successful and cost-effective public health strategy for managing opioid dependence is OST, primarily involving the use of methadone or buprenorphine. Supervised dispensing and administration of OST in community pharmacies play a crucial role in enhancing compliance, treatment monitoring and minimising diversion.
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By Betty Bouad Chaar

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Dose Administration Aids: Pharmacists’ Role in Improving Patient Care
 
This paper reviews the repackaging of medications into DAAs and the role that the pharmacist plays in this process to improve patient care, in addition to presenting the Australian research that has contributed substantially to the body of information available internationally on the quality implications, relating to the stability of repackaging medicines into DAAs.
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By Beverley Dawn Glass, Alison Haywood, Victoria Llewelyn, Sherryl Robertson, Martina Mylrea

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RESEARCH

Role of Community Pharmacists in Asthma
 
A decade of coordinated research into community pharmacist delivered asthma care in Australia has indicated the value of this role. Many diverse models have now been trialled using robust research designs. Most of these studies showed significant benefits for patients with improvement in clinical, humanistic and economic asthma outcomes.
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By Bandana Saini, Ines Krass, Lorraine Smith, Sinthia Bosnic Anticevich, Carol Armour

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Prevention Practices and HIV/AIDS in Karnataka
 
Positive prevention is at the centre of prevention efforts among people living with HIV (PLHIV), this study aims to study four important aspects of positive prevention. Karnataka state has one of the highest rates of HIV prevalence in India, yet published information on positive prevention is limited.This study provides a platform from which further exploration of the barriers to adopting positive prevention practices among PLHIV can occur and it can guide existing programmes to prioritise certain groups for care and support outreach and services.
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By Manjunatha Ramu

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Treatment Outcomes for Tuberculosis in Mangalore
 
India has the highest tuberculosis burden in the world. For successful implementation of the Revised National Tuberculosis Control Programme (RNTCP), treatment outcomes and factors which influence them need to be assessed on a regular basis. This study was thus done to find out the sputum conversion rates, treatment outcomes and sociodemographic factors of new smear positive cases (NSP) and retreatment cases of pulmonary tuberculosis of the Mangalore Tuberculosis Unit (TU) registered at the District Tuberculosis Centre (DTC), Mangalore.
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By Nitin Joseph, Kondagunta Nagaraj, Jayashree Bhat, Raghavendra Babu Y P, Shashidhar M Kotian, Ranganatha Y P, Avin Anak Hocksan, Nursyamimi Mohmad Zaki, Viplav V Shetty, Nora Fariza Hamzah, Swasthik K S

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Assessing Hospital Performance in Iran
 
One of the most important and useful models for assessing hospital performance is the Pabon Lasso Model, a graphical model that determines the relative performance of hospitals using three indicators: 1. Bed Occupancy Rate (BOR); 2. Bed Turnover (BTO); 3) Average Length of Stay (ALS). The aim of this research is to investigate the performance of the hospitals affiliated with Urmia University of Medical Sciences in Iran during the year 2009 based on the Pabon Lasso Model.
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By Mohammadkarim Bahadori, Jamil Sadeghifar, Pejman Hamouzadeh, Seyyed Mostafa Hakimzadeh, Mostafa Nejati

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Neuronal Injury in Wistar Rats
 

Paper Withdrawn.


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By Daphne Vincent Santhosh, MS Rao, I Bairy,

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BRIEF REPORT

Seven Years of P-drug Selection
 
The exercise of P-drug selection has not been widely implemented in health professions schools in South Asia. In this article the author describes his experiences with P-drug selection teaching-learning and assessment in two Nepalese medical schools, Manipal College of Medical Sciences, Pokhara and KIST Medical College, Lalitpur.
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By Ravi Shankar

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CASE STUDY

Conjoined Twins with a Single Heart
 
A case of abdomino-thoracopagus twins with single heart is described. The male twins were delivered in the 15th week of gestation following the desire of the parents to terminate pregnancy. This case is of particular interest because of the rarity of the abdomino-thoracopagus twins with a single heart, in the literature, that too, of male conjoined twins.
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By Sulekha Pandey, Shweta Mendiratta, Suruchi Pandey, Ruchi Sinha, Laxmikant Pandey

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Unusual Vascular Anatomy in a Human Cadaver
 
During routine dissection we encountered a rare variation in branching pattern of the common carotid artery (CCA) and external carotid artery (ECA) bilaterally. The knowledge of possible anatomical variations of CCA and ECA are especially important to accurately interpret cerebral angiography. The case and the clinical significance of this variation are reported in this paper.
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By Prajakta S Kishve, Sanjay P Kishve, Mohini Joshi, M M Aarif Syed, Piyush Kalakoti

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Polymyositis Associated with Non-Secretory Myeloma
 
Idiopathic inflammatory myopathies, a heterogeneous group of disorders characterised by weakness and inflammation of skeletal muscle, are often associated with malignancies. This association has been infrequently reported in Asian countries. We report a case of an Indian patient who presented with polymyositis in conjunction with non-secretory myeloma, hypercalcaemia and renal failure.
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By Saraschandra Vallabhajosyula, Ragini Bekur, Rama Bhat, Gnanadev N.C., Sushama Belurkar

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LETTER TO THE EDITOR

Letter to the Editor
 
In-hospital cardiovascular mortality in diabetic foot  patients
By Sabitha Panambur, Gurudutt U Nayak, Prabha M Adhikari

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Rapid Response
 

Psycho-Social Behaviour of Adolescent Girls during menstruation: Effect of Education

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By Samie Karimi, Hamidreza Mahboobi, Mahsa Bahr Hosseini

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