Simple measures cut infections caught in hospitals

CHICAGO (AP) — Preventing surgery-linked infections is a major concern for hospitals and it turns out some simple measures can make a big difference.

A project at seven big hospitals reduced infections after colorectal surgeries by nearly one-third. It prevented an estimated 135 infections, saving almost $4 million, the Joint Commission hospital regulating group and the American College of Surgeons announced Wednesday. The two groups directed the 2 1/2-year project.

Solutions included having patients shower with special germ-fighting soap before surgery, and having surgery teams change gowns, gloves and instruments during operations to prevent spreading germs picked up during the procedures.

Some hospitals used special wound-protecting devices on surgery openings to keep intestine germs from reaching the skin.

The average rate of infections linked with colorectal operations at the seven hospitals dropped from about 16 percent of patients during a nine-month phase when hospitals started adopting changes to almost 11 percent once all the changes had been made.

Hospital stays for patients who got infections dropped from an average of 15 days to 13 days, which helped cut costs.

"The improvements translate into safer patient care," said Dr. Mark Chassin, president of the Joint Commission. "Now it's our job to spread these effective interventions to all hospitals."

Almost 2 million health care-related infections occur each year nationwide; more than 90,000 of these are fatal.

Besides wanting to keep patients healthy, hospitals have a monetary incentive to prevent these infections. Medicare cuts payments to hospitals that have lots of certain health care-related infections, and those cuts are expected to increase under the new health care law.

The project involved surgeries for cancer and other colorectal problems. Infections linked with colorectal surgery are particularly common because intestinal tract bacteria are so abundant.

To succeed at reducing infection rates requires hospitals to commit to changing habits, "to really look in the mirror and identify these things," said Dr. Clifford Ko of the American College of Surgeons.

The hospitals involved were Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles; Cleveland Clinic in Ohio; Mayo Clinic-Rochester Methodist Hospital in Rochester, Minn.; North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System in Great Neck, NY; Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago; OSF Saint Francis Medical Center in Peoria, Ill.; and Stanford Hospital & Clinics in Palo Alto, Calif.

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

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Baby girl hospitalized after nearly drowning in toilet

A 6-month-old baby was recovering at Children's Hospital Los Angeles on Tuesday after she fell in a toilet and nearly drowned at her Sun Valley home, police said.

The baby's mother called police shortly before 10 a.m. and said her daughter had fallen in the toilet, LAPD Officer Luis Garcia said. The woman said her 2-year-old daughter was playing with the infant in the bathroom and locked the door, and the mother had to kick the door down to get inside.

When officers arrived at the home in the 8200 block of Laurel Canyon Boulevard, the baby wasn't breathing, Garcia said. They performed CPR and managed to resuscitate the girl before she was airlifted to an area hospital.

Garcia said Tuesday afternoon the girl was in stable condition and was expected to be released from the hospital later in the day.

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— Kate Mather

Follow Kate Mather on Twitter or Google+.

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Protesters Gather Again in Cairo Streets to Denounce Morsi

CAIRO — Thousands of people flowed into the streets of Cairo, the Egyptian capital, Tuesday afternoon for a day of protest against President Mohamed Morsi’s attempt to assert broad new powers for the duration of the country’s political transition, dismissing his efforts just the night before to reaffirm his deference to Egyptian law and courts.

By early Tuesday afternoon in Cairo, a dense crowd of hundreds had gathered outside the headquarters of a trade group for lawyers, and thousands more had filed in around a small tent city in Tahrir Square. In an echo of the chants against Hosni Mubarak, Egyptian’s ousted president, almost two years ago, they shouted, “Leave, leave!” and “Bring down the regime!” They also denounced the spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist group allied with Mr. Morsi.

A few blocks away, in a square near the American Embassy and the Interior Ministry headquarters, groups of young men resumed a running battle that began nine days ago, throwing rocks and tear gas canisters at riot police officers. Although those clashes grew out of anger over the deaths of dozens of protesters in similar clashes one year ago, many of the combatants have happily adopted the banner of protest against Mr. Morsi as well.

Egyptian television had captured the growing polarization of the country on Monday in split-screen coverage of two simultaneous funerals, each for a teenage boy killed in clashes set off by disputes over the new president’s powers. Thousands of supporters of Mr. Morsi and his allies in the Muslim Brotherhood marched through the streets of the Nile Delta city of Damanhour to bury a 15-year-old killed outside a Brotherhood office during an attack by protesters. And in Tahrir Square here in Cairo, thousands gathered to bury a 16-year-old killed in clashes with riot police officers and to chant slogans blaming Mr. Morsi for his death. “Morsi killed him,” the boy’s father said in a video statement circulated over the Internet.

“Now blood has been spilled by political factions, so this is not going to go away,” said Rabab el-Mahdi, a professor at the American University in Cairo and a left-leaning activist, adding that these were the first deaths rival factions had blamed on each other and not on the security forces of the Mubarak government since the uprising began last year. Still larger crowds were expected in the evening, as marchers from around the city headed for the square. Many schools and other businesses had closed in anticipation of bedlam, and on Monday, the Brotherhood called off a rival demonstration in support of the president, saying it wanted to avoid violence.

Egypt’s Supreme Judicial Council met again on Tuesday to consider its response to the president, and the leader of Al Azhar, a center of Sunni Muslim learning that is regarded as the pre-eminent moral authority here, met with groups of political leaders in an effort to resolve the battle over the president’s decree and the deadlock in the constitutional assembly, which is trying to draw up a new constitution.

But even as Mr. Morsi met with top judges Monday night in an effort to resolve the crisis, a coalition of opposition leaders held a news conference to declare that preserving the role of the courts was only the first step in a broader campaign against what Abdel Haleem Qandeil, a liberal intellectual, called “the miserable failure of the rule of the Muslim Brothers.” Mr. Morsi “unilaterally broke the contract with the people,” he declared. “We have to be ready to stand up to this group, protest to protest, square to square, and to confront the bullying.”

Mr. Morsi’s effort to remove the last check on his power over the political transition had brought the country’s fractious opposition groups together for the first time in a united front against the Brotherhood. But the show of unity papered over deep divisions between groups and even within them, said Ms. Mahdi of the American University.

“This is not a united front, and I am inside it,” she said. “Every single political group in the country is now divided over this — is this decree revolutionary justice or building a new dictatorship? Should we align ourselves with folool” — the colloquial term for the remnants of the old political elite — “or should we be revolutionary purists? Is it a conflict between the Muslim Brotherhood and the pro-Mubarak judiciary, or is this the beginning of a fascist regime in the making?”

Mayy El Sheikh contributed reporting.

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What Does Brad Pitt Think of the Parodies of His Chanel No. 5 Commercial?

Stylewatch
Style News Now

11/27/2012 at 11:00 AM ET

Saturday Night Live spoofed him. Several times. Heck, even dogs did it. But Brad Pitt still stands by his not-so-popular Chanel No. 5 commercial.

“I kind of liked it,” he told Access Hollywood on Monday. “I respect what [Chanel does]. They do some really quality things.”

However, he also respects the people who’ve made fun of it.

“I haven’t [seen the parodies],” he added, “but I say absolutely fair play.”

Yep — the man who made millions off the trippy 30-second spot hasn’t had the chance to catch SNL on Hulu yet. “I’ve been overseas,” he shared, “so I’ve been blissfully protected.”

But that’s not to say he won’t have a chuckle eventually; he told Extra he would probably watch the SNL spoofs (starring Taran Killam) when he wasn’t working so much. And we’ll look forward to hearing his reaction. Tell us: Are you still not so into the Chanel No. 5 ads?

PHOTOS: FIND THE BEST FALL FRAGRANCE FOR YOU!

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CDC: HIV spread high in young gay males

NEW YORK (AP) — Health officials say 1 in 5 new HIV infections occur in a tiny segment of the population — young men who are gay or bisexual.

The government on Tuesday released new numbers that spotlight how the spread of the AIDS virus is heavily concentrated in young males who have sex with other males. Only about a quarter of new infections in the 13-to-24 age group are from injecting drugs or heterosexual sex.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said blacks represented more than half of new infections in youths. The estimates are based on 2010 figures.

Overall, new U.S. HIV infections have held steady at around 50,000 annually. About 12,000 are in teens and young adults, and most youth with HIV haven't been tested.

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Online:

CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns

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Husband who cooked wife on stove wore dresses, jewelry

A strange portrait was emerging of a 68-year-old Oceanside man accused of killing his 73-year-old wife, then cooking her body parts on their kitchen stove.

Frederick Joseph Hengl was seen by neighbors dressed in women's clothes and wearing makeup, according to neighbors.

They said they saw Hengl outside wearing a purple dress, pink makeup and various articles of jewelry, including a pearl necklace. The neighbors told Fox 5 News that his wife was once seen roaming outside with a knife making religious comments like “God will smite you.”

Hengl pleaded not guilty this week in court.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Katherine Flaherty told Vista Superior Court Judge
J. Marshall Hockett that police found pieces of meat cooking on the
stove at the family home and a severed head in the freezer.

Hockett ordered Frederick Joseph Hengl kept in jail on $5-million bail.

Police are unclear when Hengl's wife, Anna Faris, was killed. They
went to the couple's home after neighbors reported a strange smell and
hearing the sound of a power saw.

Several
people who live in the neighborhood said Anna-Maria Hengl had been
behaving bizarrely since last spring, exposing herself, wandering around
carrying a butcher knife and making religious pronouncements, telling
people such things as, “God will smite you.”

Her husband, meanwhile, had been going out dressed in women’s clothing, makeup and jewelry, area residents told news crews.

One neighbor said the one-time Home Depot employee, who had sold her a
ceiling fan, would sometimes wear blouses and makeup, including “hot
pink” lipstick. Another said he saw Frederick Hengl last summer clad in a
floor- length purple dress, pearl necklace and pearl earrings, carrying
an ornate purse.

Read more: http://fox5sandiego.com/2012/11/19/dismembered-womans-husband-to-face-judge/#ixzz2DLS2FbXM

Several people who live in the neighborhood said Anna-Maria Hengl had
been behaving bizarrely since last spring, exposing herself, wandering
around carrying a butcher knife and making religious pronouncements,
telling people such things as, “God will smite you.”

Her husband, meanwhile, had been going out dressed in women’s clothing, makeup and jewelry, area residents told news crews.

One neighbor said the one-time Home Depot employee, who had sold her a
ceiling fan, would sometimes wear blouses and makeup, including “hot
pink” lipstick. Another said he saw Frederick Hengl last summer clad in a
floor- length purple dress, pearl necklace and pearl earrings, carrying
an ornate purse.

Read more: http://fox5sandiego.com/2012/11/19/dismembered-womans-husband-to-face-judge/#ixzz2DLRAPQk6

 Flaherty told reporters that, "“There is no evidence of cannibalism at this time."

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Mitt Romney loses election, but still goes to Disneyland

Black family flees O.C. city after tires slashed, racial taunts

 -- Tony Perry in San Diego

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Egypt’s President Said to Limit Scope of Judicial Decree

CAIRO — President Mohamed Morsi agreed Monday to scale back a sweeping decree he had issued last week that raised his edicts above any judicial review, according to a report by a television network allied with his party. The agreement, reached with top judicial authorities, would leave most of Mr. Morsi’s actions subject to review by the courts, but preserve a crucial power: protecting the constitutional council from being dissolved by the courts before it finishes its work.

Ahmed Jadallah/Reuters

Protesters ran for cover during clashes with riot police at Tahrir square in Cairo on Monday.

Tara Todras-Whitehill for The New York Times

Egyptians mourned Mohammed Gaber Salah, an activist who died Sunday from injuries sustained during protests, before his funeral on Monday in Cairo.

The Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist group that sponsored Mr. Morsi and his party, announced that it was canceling a major demonstration in support of the president that had been planned for Tuesday.

Cracks appeared in Mr. Morsi’s government on Sunday over the decree after the justice minister, Ahmed Mekki, began arguing publicly for a retreat, and at least three other senior advisers resigned over the measure. The move had also prompted widening street protests and cries from opponents that Mr. Morsi, who already governs without a legislature, was moving toward a new autocracy in Egypt, less than two years after the ouster of the strongman Hosni Mubarak.

With a threatened strike by the nation’s judges, a plunge in the country’s stock market and more street protests looming, Mr. Morsi’s administration initially sent mixed messages on Sunday over whether it was willing to consider a compromise: a spokesman for the president’s party insisted that there would be no change in his edict, but a statement from the party indicated for the first time a willingness to give political opponents “guarantees against monopolizing the fateful decisions of the homeland in the absence of the Parliament.”

Mr. Mekki, the influential leader of a judicial independent movement under Mr. Mubarak and one of Mr. Morsi’s closest aides, actively tried to broker a deal with top jurists to resolve the crisis.

The reaction to the decree had presented the most acute test to date of the ability and willingness of Mr. Morsi, Egypt’s first freely elected president and a former leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, to engage in the kind of give and take that democratic government requires. But he also must contend with real doubts about the willingness of his anti-Islamist opponents to join him in compromise. Each side is mired in deep suspicion of the other, a legacy of the decades when the Brotherhood survived here only as an insular secret society, demonized as dangerous radicals by most of the Egyptian elite.

“There is a deep mistrust,” said Emad Shahin, a political scientist at the American University in Cairo who studies the Brotherhood. “It is an ugly round of partisan politics,” he said, “a bone-crushing phase.”

The scale of the backlash against the decree appeared to catch Mr. Morsi’s government by surprise. “In his head, the president thought that this would push us forward, but then it was met with all this inflammation,” Mr. Mekki said. He faulted the president for failing to consult with his opponents before issuing it, but he also faulted the opponents for their own unwillingness to come to the table: “I blame all of Egypt, because they do not know how to talk to each other.”

Government and party officials maintained that Mr. Morsi was forced to claim the expansive new powers to protect the process of writing the country’s new constitution, and that the decree would be in effect only until the charter was in place. A court of judges appointed under the Mubarak government was widely rumored to be about to dissolve the elected constitutional assembly, dominated by Mr. Morsi’s Islamist allies — just as the same court had previously cast out the newly elected Islamist-led Parliament — and the decree issued by Mr. Morsi on Thursday gave him the power to stop it.

“I see with all of you, clearly, that the court verdict is announced two or three weeks before the court session,” Mr. Morsi told his supporters on Friday, referring to the pervasive rumors about the court’s impending action in a fiery speech defending his decree. “We will dissolve the entire homeland, as it seems! How is that? How? Those waywards must be held accountable."

He said that corrupt Mubarak loyalists were “hiding under the cover of the judiciary” and declared, “I will uncover them!”

But instead of rallying the public to his side and speeding the country’s political transition, as Mr. Morsi evidently hoped, his decree has unleashed new instability across the country. On Sunday, the first day of business here since the decree was issued, the Egyptian stock market fell by about 9.5 percent, erasing more than $4 billion of value.

Read More..

Angus T. Jones: 'Please Stop Watching Two and a Half Men'

TV Watch

11/26/2012 at 03:15 PM EST

Has Angus T. Jones pulled a Charlie Sheen?

The 19-year-old Two and a Half Men star has spoken out against the CBS sitcom in a manner that's sure to ruffle some network feathers.

"If you watch Two and Half Men, please stop watching Two and Half Men," Jones says in a video posted on YouTube by TheForerunner777 (watch it below) in which the actor discusses his Christian faith. "I'm on Two and Half Men and I don't want to be on it. Please stop watching it. Please stop filling your head with filth."

"People say it's just entertainment," he continues. "Do some research on the effects of television in your brain and I promise you, you'll have a decision to make when it comes to ... what you watch on television. It's bad news."

Jones, who in 2008 was paid roughly $1.2 million a season, then references "the enemy" and how someone like him cannot appear on a TV show. (Jones has played Jake Harper on Men since 2003.)

"A lot of people don't like to think about how deceptive the enemy is," says Jones. "There's no playing around when it comes to eternity ... People will see us and be like, 'I can be a Christian and be on a show like Two and a Half Men.' You can't. You cannot be a true God-fearing person and be on a television show like that. I know I can't."

On the subject of his series, Jones concludes, "I'm not okay with what I'm learning [about] what the Bible says and being on that television show. You go all or nothing."

A rep for CBS has not responded to PEOPLE's request for comment.

Read More..

Bounce houses a party hit but kids' injuries soar

CHICAGO (AP) — They may be a big hit at kids' birthday parties, but inflatable bounce houses can be dangerous, with the number of injuries soaring in recent years, a nationwide study found.

Kids often crowd into bounce houses, and jumping up and down can send other children flying into the air, too.

The numbers suggest 30 U.S. children a day are treated in emergency rooms for broken bones, sprains, cuts and concussions from bounce house accidents. Most involve children falling inside or out of the inflated playthings, and many children get hurt when they collide with other bouncing kids.

The number of children aged 17 and younger who got emergency-room treatment for bounce house injuries has climbed along with the popularity of bounce houses — from fewer than 1,000 in 1995 to nearly 11,000 in 2010. That's a 15-fold increase, and a doubling just since 2008.

"I was surprised by the number, especially by the rapid increase in the number of injuries," said lead author Dr. Gary Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio.

Amusement parks and fairs have bounce houses, and the playthings can also be rented or purchased for home use.

Smith and colleagues analyzed national surveillance data on ER treatment for nonfatal injuries linked with bounce houses, maintained by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. Their study was published online Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Only about 3 percent of children were hospitalized, mostly for broken bones.

More than one-third of the injuries were in children aged 5 and younger. The safety commission recommends against letting children younger than 6 use full-size trampolines, and Smith said barring kids that young from even smaller, home-use bounce houses would make sense.

"There is no evidence that the size or location of an inflatable bouncer affects the injury risk," he said.

Other recommendations, often listed in manufacturers' instruction pamphlets, include not overloading bounce houses with too many kids and not allowing young children to bounce with much older, heavier kids or adults, said Laura Woodburn, a spokeswoman for the National Association of Amusement Ride Safety Officials.

The study didn't include deaths, but some accidents are fatal. Separate data from the product safety commission show four bounce house deaths from 2003 to 2007, all involving children striking their heads on a hard surface.

Several nonfatal accidents occurred last year when bounce houses collapsed or were lifted by high winds.

A group that issues voluntary industry standards says bounce houses should be supervised by trained operators and recommends that bouncers be prohibited from doing flips and purposefully colliding with others, the study authors noted.

Bounce house injuries are similar to those linked with trampolines, and the American Academy of Pediatrics has recommended against using trampolines at home. Policymakers should consider whether bounce houses warrant similar precautions, the authors said.

___

Online:

Pediatrics: http://www.pediatrics.org

Trade group: http://www.naarso.com

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..

Husband killed wife, cooked her on stove, police allege

A strange portrait was emerging of a 68-year-old Oceanside man accused of killing his 73-year-old wife, then cooking her body parts on their kitchen stove.

Frederick Joseph Hengl was seen by neighbors dressed in women's clothes and wearing makeup, according to neighbors.

They said they saw Hengl outside wearing a purple dress, pink makeup and various articles of jewelry, including a pearl necklace. The neighbors told Fox 5 News that his wife was once seen roaming outside with a knife making religious comments like “God will smite you.”

Hengl pleaded not guilty this week in court.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Katherine Flaherty told Vista Superior Court Judge
J. Marshall Hockett that police found pieces of meat cooking on the
stove at the family home and a severed head in the freezer.

Hockett ordered Frederick Joseph Hengl kept in jail on $5-million bail.

Police are unclear when Hengl's wife, Anna Faris, was killed. They
went to the couple's home after neighbors reported a strange smell and
hearing the sound of a power saw.

Several
people who live in the neighborhood said Anna-Maria Hengl had been
behaving bizarrely since last spring, exposing herself, wandering around
carrying a butcher knife and making religious pronouncements, telling
people such things as, “God will smite you.”

Her husband, meanwhile, had been going out dressed in women’s clothing, makeup and jewelry, area residents told news crews.

One neighbor said the one-time Home Depot employee, who had sold her a
ceiling fan, would sometimes wear blouses and makeup, including “hot
pink” lipstick. Another said he saw Frederick Hengl last summer clad in a
floor- length purple dress, pearl necklace and pearl earrings, carrying
an ornate purse.

Read more: http://fox5sandiego.com/2012/11/19/dismembered-womans-husband-to-face-judge/#ixzz2DLS2FbXM

Several people who live in the neighborhood said Anna-Maria Hengl had
been behaving bizarrely since last spring, exposing herself, wandering
around carrying a butcher knife and making religious pronouncements,
telling people such things as, “God will smite you.”

Her husband, meanwhile, had been going out dressed in women’s clothing, makeup and jewelry, area residents told news crews.

One neighbor said the one-time Home Depot employee, who had sold her a
ceiling fan, would sometimes wear blouses and makeup, including “hot
pink” lipstick. Another said he saw Frederick Hengl last summer clad in a
floor- length purple dress, pearl necklace and pearl earrings, carrying
an ornate purse.

Read more: http://fox5sandiego.com/2012/11/19/dismembered-womans-husband-to-face-judge/#ixzz2DLRAPQk6

 Flaherty told reporters that, "“There is no evidence of cannibalism at this time."

ALSO:

LAX union protesters arrested; delays anger travelers

Mitt Romney loses election, but still goes to Disneyland

Black family flees O.C. city after tires slashed, racial taunts

 -- Tony Perry in San Diego

Read More..