Lawford Kidd's Blog

A new project was launched recently to help inform future research into the best way to treat and care for mesothelioma sufferers.

The survey is being conducted by the ‘Mesothelioma Priority Setting Partnership’ (PSP), which was recently set up by non-profit group the James Lind Alliance and is being funded by the National Institute for Health Research, a government body.

A deadly disease

Mesothelioma is a form of cancer that mainly affects the lining of the lungs and is caused by breathing in asbestos fibres. The disease is usually fatal, and symptoms do not become apparent until decades after the initial exposure, by which point it is too late for surgical intervention.

The Government's response to Sir Bruce Keogh's recommendations for overhauling the cosmetic treatment industry is welcome as far as it goes, but overall is ""too little, too late" according to the patient safety charity, Action against Medical Accidents (AvMA).

AvMA has had to advise and support people who have been harmed by sub-standard cosmetic treatment, and submitted evidence to Sir Bruce's review.

Whilst the Government has accepted the vast majority of Sir Bruce's report "in principle", it has not committed to full regulation of the industry or ensuring appropriate avenues for redress for patients who have been harmed.

A new approach to health and safety prosecutions has meant that employers who commit serious breaches of health and safety are now receiving much tougher penalties, according to a recent Government report.

Impact of Health and Safety Offences Act

The report covers the five years following the introduction of the Health and Safety Offences Act in 2009, which increased the maximum penalties the courts could impose for certain health and safety offences as a deterrent for would-be offenders.

In particular, the Act:

A new study from the University of Surrey has highlighted the potential risk to worker health from shift work after it found that the daily rhythms of our genes are disrupted when sleep times shift.

Researchers placed twenty-two participants on a 28-hour day in a controlled environment without a natural light-dark cycle.  As a result, their sleep-wake cycle was delayed by four hours each day, until sleep occurred 12 hours out of sync with their brain clock and in the middle of what would have been their normal ‘daytime’. The team then collected blood samples to measure the participants’ rhythms of gene expression.

During this disruption of sleep timing, there was a six-fold reduction in the number of genes that displayed a circadian rhythm (a rhythm with an approximately 24 hour period). This included many regulators associated with transcription and translation, indicating widespread disruption to many biological processes.

The Faculty of Advocates has published details of its response to the consultation over the Inquiries into Deaths (Scotland) Bill, which has been proposed by MSP Patricia Ferguson to make reforms to the current system of fatal accident inquiries (FAIs).

In its response, the Faculty acknowledged that there was room for improvement in the current system, but warned that the proposed legislation could have a number of “unintended and unwelcome” consequences.

The Faculty said it did not support the proposal to extend the requirement for an FAI for a work-related death to include deaths caused by industrial disease. In its response it said: