It’s something that we do so often, but are we always doing it the best way? Check out how to measure blood pressure (BP) correctly, with latest advice from the National Institute for Clinical Excellence and the British Hypertension Society.
Expanding the role of health care assistants in primary care
As practice nurses take on a growing role in the organisation and implementation of chronic disease management, they need more help in many of the routine – but important – tasks this involves. Health care assistants (HCAs) are providing growing support in this capacity. This article explores what HCAs are taking on and issues regarding their training and regulation.
Chest pain in Primary Care – would you and your team know what to do?
This article considers a possible scenario in primary care in which a patient presents with chest pain. Test yourself to see what you would do. Then check this against our recommendations, reflecting on your current procedures and policies within your practice.
Making sense of heart failure and its treatment
Heart failure is a high priority in primary care, with the National Service Framework for Coronary Heart Disease, the NICE Heart Failure Guidance, and the new General Medical Services contract quality indicators all setting clear standards for improving the management of patients with this increasingly common condition. This four-page pull-out supplement provides you with a need-to-know, need-to-keep guide.
Information on withdrawal of four insulins by Lilly
Drug and Therapeutics Bulletin and Treatment Notes go online
Stress and heart disease: check out the link
New online service for RCN members – The Oxford Dictionary of Nursing and A-Z of Medicin
Disease Focus on… Sleep Apnoea
Sleep apnoea is far more than just snoring associated with brief periods of suspended breathing while asleep. It is an important risk factor for cardiovascular disease and diabetes, so it is well worth asking patients whether they suffer breathing problems during the night and then following up those who do. More than one-third of people with sleep apnoea have hypertension, so measuring blood pressure is important in assessing risk factors and then establishing appropriate preventive treatment.
Protecting renal function in people with diabetes
Renal disease is common and is increasing in prevalence as the main risk factor for impaired kidney function – diabetes – affects more people. Approximately 30% of patients with type 2 diabetes develop some degree of nephropathy, with some ethnic groups at even higher risk. Diabetes is now the largest single cause of end-stage renal disease in the UK, accounting for 30–40% of all cases. The very early stages are asymptomatic and the disease process develops slowly over 15–20 years, so early screening and prevention strategies are paramount in reducing the burden of renal failure. Primary care nurses are well placed to play a pivotal role in this process.
New British Hypertension Society guidelines tighten cardiovascular risk management
New British Hypertension Society (BHS) guidelines on hypertension focus on cardiovascular risk rather than risk of coronary heart disease, in order to improve the prevention of stroke as well as heart disease.
Flora Fit Street
Welcome to another unique service helping your practice achieve QOF targets
Therapies for diabetes
New European diabetes nursing journal
BHF gets kids to get fit
Salt – facts for a healthy heart
Maintaining motivation: the long haul of weight loss
There is no doubt about it, achieving and maintaining weight loss long term is a great challenge. Primary care nurses have a significant role in motivating patients to adopt a healthy lifestyle and to persevere with weight management programmes. In the last issue of BJPCN we looked at how to raise the tricky subject of obesity with patients. This time, we continue the issue by exploring how practice nurses ensure a positive working relationship with their patients with weight problems and encourage them as they tackle the long-term issue of obesity.
Making full use of BJPCN online
Resources for smoking cessation
Aventis insulin withdrawals
Improving the primary care management of obesity
Over half of all adults in the UK are overweight, according to latest figures. The number of people who are obese has tripled over the last 20 years, and is still rising. But is weight management an issue for primary healthcare teams? There is clear evidence that it is – with obesity being directly related to increased risk of death and a range of chronic diseases. Obesity reduces life expectancy, on average, by nine years. At long last there is some encouragement for general practices to optimise detection and management of obesity. The new General Medical Services (GMS) contract includes 208 from a total of 1050 points available in the Quality and Outcomes Framework that are affected by weight loss, offering a major financial incentive to general practices to encourage patients to lose weight.
