Gary Culliton reports on the Oireachtas Joint Health Committee’s recommendations to rejuvenate the flagging Primary Care Strategy {openx:269} The primary care strategy has come to a standstill and needs improvement, according to the Oireachtas Joint Health Committee.

Gary Culliton writes that a number of hospitals still have unacceptably long waiting lists that could be dealt with under the NTPF {openx:269} A patient on a waiting list to see a public-hospital consultant will not be treated by the same consultant in a private hospital under the National Treatment Purchase Fund (NTPF) as a result of checks, the Fund’s

The HPAT may actually be less inclusive than the Leaving Certificate system and should have been introduced gradually, writes Dr Gerard Crotty {openx:269} Since 2009, aspiring undergraduate medical students applying to any of the medical schools in the Republic of Ireland need to sit the HPAT-Ireland examination in addition to the Leaving Certificate (LC).

The Leaving Cert indirectly rewards desirable traits in future doctors, while the HPAT was devised to directly measure suitability for a career in medicine.

Dara Gantly believes the relocation of the Department of Health from Hawkins House is long overdue {openx:269} Sick building syndrome (SBS) is a combination of ailments associated with an individual’s place of work or residence.

Dr Mick Molloy highlights the work being done by volunteers in Haiti on his return from an aid mission in the devastated country {openx:269} Extreme events call for extreme responses and solutions.

Osteoporosis Supplement: Prof Moira O’Brien discusses the growing awareness of vitamin D as being essential to bone health and its necessity in the adequate absorpotion of calcium, as well as the most current research on calcium supplements {openx:269} In the last decade, the increasing importance of vitamin D to health, especially bone health, has been highlighted in several reports.

Osteoporosis Supplement: Prof Gerald H.

Osteoporosis Supplement: Researchers have found a potential new treatment for osteoporosis {openx:269} Using an investigational drug that inhibits serotonin synthesis in the gut cured osteoporosis in post-menopausal rodents, according to an international team led by researchers from Columbia University Medical Center in the United States.

Natalya Anderson reviews a study which found that the risk of vertebral fracture in young postmenopausal women could be reduced with strontium ranelate treatment {openx:269} Strontium ranelate may reduce the risk of vertebral fracture in young postmenopausal women with severe osteoporosis, according to study results published by the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases.