Volume 4, Number 2, March-April 2007
POPULAR
TOPICBACK TO BASICSHow drugs work in heart failure
POPULAR
TOPICDIABETES MANAGEMENTInhaled insulin: a breath of fresh air in diabetes
Sandra Waddingham EDITORIALEditorial
Jan Procter-King “A little knowledge that acts is worth infinitely more than much knowledge
that is idle,” to quote the Lebanese poet, Kahlil Gibran. Well, that’s what the
British Journal of Primary Care Nursing (BJPCN) is all about – putting
knowledge into action. And it sums up what primary care nurses do too. We
are not people who sit about debating what to do, we get on and do it. POPULAR
TOPICFOOD FOR THOUGHTReady, steady, go: making sense of food labels
Sue Baic If people are going to make informed decisions about what they eat, they need to know the
contents of the food they buy. Food manufacturers and supermarkets are starting to get the
message, with some adopting the ‘traffic light’ system of labelling on the front of food
packs. How do we interpret food labels and help our patients to make sense of what they
mean so they can eat more healthily? EVIDENCE IN PRACTICEEvidence in practice
There are just not enough hours in the day to read all the research journals, even if you wanted to. This section of the BJPCN –
Evidence in Practice – will keep you on top of relevant research without having to spend hours in the library.
Each journal review gives you a bite-size summary of new research, pulling out key points for primary care and recommending the
action that you might consider taking. HAVE YOU HEARD?Have you heard?
MONITORINGMaking sense of myocardial perfusion scans (MPS)
Dr Zaw Myo Htet More and more of our cardiac patients are having scans to check what is going on in
their hearts. There were about 1,200 single photon emission computed tomography
(SPECT) scans per million population in the UK in 2000, according to the British Nuclear
Cardiology Society (BNCS) survey. The National Institute for Health and Clinical
Excellence (NICE) has recommended this should increase to about 4,000 scans per million
population per year, based on current revascularisation and coronary angiogram rates. This article
explains what is involved in a myocardial perfusion scan (MPS), giving you the information to
answer your patients’ questions. PREVENTION IN PRACTICEStroke and TIA management
Bev Cox Tessa, age 68, rarely attends the surgery. She arrives on a Monday morning, however,
saying that she had a ‘funny turn’ over the weekend. “I couldn’t think straight and my
words came out all wrong. My arm was tingling like no-one’s business so I took to my
bed to sleep it off. I still feel a bit queer this morning so Pete said I should pop down and
get checked over.” What could be the problem with Tessa and what should you do? POPULAR
TOPICKEEP AND COPYYou and your treatment: starting on your statin
POLICY MATTERSMending hearts and brains: the clinical case for change
Professor Roger Boyle Over my lifetime, treatment for heart disease has improved beyond recognition. For the
last six years, I have had the privilege of leading a programme that has accelerated that
change, reducing waiting times, bringing in new treatments, training more specialists,
and ensuring patients have more and better
choices available. I am now working to repeat those
strides forward for stroke, the brain’s equivalent of
heart attack. There are a similar number of strokes
to heart attacks, but this equally devastating
condition has been slower to catch the medical and
public imagination in this country. With our ageing
population, it represents a growing challenge for
the future.
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