by Ian Ingram: Complete Post through this link…

Vowst approved for preventing recurrent C. difficile infections after antibiotics.

The FDA approved the first oral fecal microbiota productopens in a new tab or window for preventing recurrent Clostridioides difficile infections in adults, the agency announced on Wednesday.

Developed as SER-109 and given the trade name of Vowst, the therapy is indicated for patients who have already received a course of antibiotics for recurrent C. difficile infections.

SER-109 — which involves four pills taken once a day for 3 consecutive days — contains live bacteria from donor fecal matter, with the donors and stool screened for a slew of pathogens. Despite that, the agency still warns that the product carries the potential risk of transmitting infectious agents or food allergens.

By Shruti Rajkumar: For Complete Post, Click Here…

Many schools have policies that leave behind vulnerable students and staff in the event of mass shootings, fires or other disasters.

n May 2022, disabled student Anja, 16, was in her school’s cafeteria, completely unaware that a student was headed toward her high school in Chicago with a gun.

Fortunately, the police apprehended the armed student before an active shooting could break out.

But Anja was terrified after hearing about the threat. She knew too well that, as a disabled student, she would not have been protected if that situation had escalated.

“The next day, I kept looking over my shoulder because I couldn’t shake the feeling that something would happen again,” Anja told HuffPost in an email interview. “And if it did, I knew there was no protocol or system in place to actually protect me.”

The K-12 School Shooting Database, run by The Violence Project, a nonprofit gun violence research center, has tracked 118 school shootings so far in 2023, with 85 fatalities or injuries on school property from gun-related incidents.

Schools across the U.S. have pre-planned emergency preparedness protocols for what to do in the event of emergencies such as active shooter threats, fires and natural disasters. But disabled students, as well as disabled teachers and staff, are consistently left out of such emergency preparedness plans, according to disability advocates.

These protocols and evacuation plans often ignore disabled people’s needs, which says a lot about how the people who create such plans value disabled lives, said Katherine Yoder, executive director of the Adult Advocacy Centers, an organization dedicated to improving access, care and equity for adults with disabilities who are victims of crime.

By Lawrence Mieczkowski, M.D.: Complete Post through this link…

Unfortunately, my experience is all too common. If you find yourself in a situation like I did, here’s what you should do.

y day had started early that Friday. My wife, Joanne, and I arrived at 7 a.m. for my 10-year follow up colonoscopy with Dr. Smith. Although I had referred a number of my patients to his group, I hadn’t worked much with him or even met him. As the nurse was going through her checklist of tasks, she casually mentioned that he was retiring that day and a party was scheduled that evening.

I was taken into the procedure room on time and 30 minutes later I woke up in the recovery room.

“Dr. Mieczkowski, everything went well,” Dr. Smith told me. “I removed one large polyp and a few smaller ones, but none of them concern me. My office will let you know the results in a few days.”

I thanked him and offered best wishes on his retirement, thinking that I would never see him again. I was relieved ― no signs of cancer.

Joanne and I went home to eat lunch. Since I felt well, we drove to the office to do some paperwork. Around 2:45 p.m., I had an urgent need to use the bathroom and passed streaks of blood. I knew this was common after a colonoscopy, so I didn’t tell Joanne or call the doctor’s office. Fifteen minutes later, I felt more urgency and made another hurried trip to the bathroom. There was more blood ― a lot more blood.

“Oh shit! Damn it,” I said out loud.

I told Joanne what was going on, and she asked, “Do you want me to call the EMTs? Are you feeling faint?” We decided to drive ourselves to a hospital only a few miles away. I called the physician’s office with an update while we were on our way.

Upon arrival, I was relieved to see that the waiting room was empty. I checked in at the desk and a few minutes later, a nurse opened the door. “Dr. Mieczkowski? Come on back,” she told me.

I made it. I’m going to be all right, I thought. I took a deep breath of relief as Joanne and I walked through the door and were led to my room. The nurse did the usual check-in tasks, connected me to the monitor tracking my heart rate and blood pressure, put an IV in my arm, and drew blood for testing.

“No running fluids?” I questioned. “That’ll be up to the doctor after he sees you,” she replied. As she finished, I felt an urgent need to move my bowels and requested a bedside commode. I quickly passed several pints of blood, which nearly filled the container. I had just lost nearly 20% of my blood volume. I was stunned and knew that I was in trouble.

By Aine Kenny: Complete Post through this link…

Touch screen card machines are making blind and visually impaired people’s lives more difficult, with some people having to disclose their bank card’s pin number to staff in shops and restaurants.

In the past ten years, the rising trend of sleek and ‘modern’ design styles has led to touch screens being introduced to more and more technology products, from phones, washing machines, microwaves, hobs, lifts and card machines.

While this style may suit some, it is leading to serious accessibility issues for the blind and visually impaired community.

Kevin Kelly, National Strategic Partnerships Manager at the National Council for the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) said the widespread use of touch screens has been a huge source of frustration for blind and visually impaired people like himself.

By Juliette V.: Complete Post through this link…

Anger is often a tricky emotion to express in adulthood, but for many, it was even trickier to express in childhood. If you can relate to having unaddressed anger from childhood, you’re not alone.

Maybe you grew up in a household where it wasn’t safe to express your emotions, so your anger went unaddressed. Maybe you grew up with a mental illness and because struggling was your norm, you didn’t realize you were actually deeply upset about your circumstances. Or maybe you were being abused and your deep anger was constantly repressed so you could survive.

Whatever your unique situation was, we want you to know your feelings matter and you are not alone in your experiences. We wanted to know how people knew, in hindsight, that they actually had unaddressed anger from childhood, so we turned to our community. Below they shared the signs they could recognize now as adults that they had unaddressed anger in childhood.

Here’s what our community shared with us:

From KH Green: Complete Post through this link…

Hello Livonia Neighbors and friends,

Please join AccessLivonia504/ADA to join in equal participation in City of Livonia (city owned) property public meetings.

Recently a friend tried to go to a public city meeting at Livonia City Hall and navigate the steep cement ramp using a manual wheelchair only to find that he could not get in the building due to lack of “access-ibility.” The ramp is too steep.

The auditorium ramp is also too steep. No closed captioning, no podium for wheelchair users, no sign language interpreters as required by state and federal law.

The City of Livonia discontinued virtual online meetings during its public meetings that had closed captioning. It’s time to get our house in order so everyone can participate in local city government.

There are so many things like this that make Livonia City unusable for wheelchair users.

Join AccessLivonia504, a newly formed citizens committee to make Livonia City Hall accessible to wheelchair, rollator, walker users able to attend public meetings, pay taxes inside, and more.

Bob has a decades long commitment to ADAPT direct action, and continues to lead in the struggle for Disability Justice...

Complete Post through this link…

POdcast recordings and transcripts on an amazing variety of topics in disability justice.

From MATP: Complete Post through this link…

We hope you will join us for our fourth #TechTuesday Training this year. Session 4 of the training series will be about AT For Gardening. You will learn about various Assistive Technology (AT) products and devices for gardening. We will be highlighting adaptation tips for accessible community gardens. Tuesday, April 25th, 2023, 12 to 1:00 PMThis training is free. CART captioning and ASL Interpreting will be provided.Register in advance for access to the live session and the recording for future viewing:

Click Here to Register

by Elizabeth Short: Complete Post through this link…

ngd-Another Phillips “turd in the swimming pool” that the company just doesn’t seem to be able to remove…

And some of the remediated breathing devices may not provide any treatment at all, FDA warns.

Certain Philips Respironics DreamStation breathing devicesopens in a new tab or window, commonly used for treating sleep apnea, may deliver the incorrect prescription or no therapy at all, the FDA warned in a recall announcement.

The recall, designated by the agency as Class I — the most serious type — involves over 1,000 DreamStation1 devices that provide both continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) and bilevel positive airway pressure (BiPAP). The respirators had been given either incorrect or duplicate serial numbers, leading to communication issues when connecting to the cloud-based care management application and potentially resulting in insufficient or a complete lack of therapy.

There is no device indication for the current user that their DreamStation may not operate properly, which poses serious health risks such as respiratory failure, heart failure, serious injury, and death, according to the FDA.

The DreamStation devices — used in hospitals, healthcare settings, and in-home by patients — help keep breathing at a regular rhythm and are often prescribed to obstructive sleep apnea patients to keep airways open while they sleep.

So far, Philips has received 43 complaints regarding this issue, though there have been no reported injuries or deaths.

Philips originally notified users of this recall on February 10, instructing them to locate their CPAP/BiPAP device’s serial number, contact providers about manual pressure resets, and to continue to use the current device as is until a replacement device is received or until device changes are made by their provider, “either remotely or in person (fastest).”

From GrayMatters: Complete Post through this link…

GrayMatters Health (GMH), developer of digital self-neuromodulation therapies for mental disorders, announced today that it has received a 510(k) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to market its flagship product, Prism for PTSD, the first non-invasive, self-neuromodulation adjunct digital therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

GMH is the first to use advanced statistical models fusing EEG and fMRI data to develop biomarkers of brain-mechanism-specific activity associated with mental disorders, named EEG-fMRI-Pattern (EFP). The company’s products use these biomarkers with an interactive audio/visual interface to help patients regain control (agency) over the relevant brain activity.

Prism for PTSD trains patients to lower the amygdala-derived-EFP biomarker, which is associated with the amygdala and emotion regulation system, using self-neuromodulation techniques (through neurofeedback).

“Prism for PTSD has the potential to improve the lives of the millions of Americans living with PTSD,” said Oded Kraft, Co-founder and CEO of GrayMatters Health. “Gaining FDA clearance affirms the value of bringing this innovative and clinically proven, non-invasive technology to mental disorder treatment. We are eager to place Prism in the hands of mental healthcare professionals, in the US and abroad, to help patients across the world living with PTSD”