Avian influenza (bird flu) resources

Leicester City Council, according to a story in the Leicester Mercury of 22nd December, are putting up notices to ask the public to report dead ducks and other water birds.  This follows bird flu on a poultry farm in Lincolnshire some days ago.   Some brief notes about useful resources about avian influenza seems timely.

Leicester City Council's information, including how to report, is here.   Check your local council, of course, if you are not in Leicester!

Then look at UK Government information.  This will tell you the latest situation, about restrictions on movement, and gives advice for the public.  The site confirms that the farm is affected by the H5N8 strain.    Note added 5th January 2017 - there is an update from the UK government here.

There is no suggestion that I have seen that humans are affected, here in the UK or elsewhere in Europe (there have been cases among birds elsewhere in Europe).   So, purely on a "just in case" basis, therefore, I mention Public Health England's information on symptoms, diagnosis and management, and epidemiology, last updated earlier in 2016.

For more news on avian influenza, see news from CIDRAP, the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.  It does report cases from Europe, so will give you a wider picture.  It reports cases beyond Europe, as well, of course.

Another site for a global view is PROMED-Mail.  Look at the news feed on the left of the page, and click an item for more detail.   You can use the map to find information about infectious disease cases by location.  A larger map is here.

UHL appears in the Altmetrics Top 100

Altmetrics is a way to measure impact of an article.  It counts the number of times an article is mentioned on social media, in the news, or on blogs.

The Altmetrics Top 100 is the list of the 100 articles that have got the most attention in 2016.

I am grateful to my colleague Selina Lock at the University of Leicester Library for spotting that number 22 in the list is a paper with a co-author from UHL, Roger Kockelbergh in Urology:

Hamdy, F.C., Donovan, J.L., Lane, J.A., Mason, M., Metcalfe, C., Holding, P., Davis, M., Peters, T.J., Turner, E.L., Martin, R.M., Oxley, J., Robinson, M., Staffurth, J., Walsh, E., Bollina, P., Catto, J., Doble, A., Doherty, A., Gillatt, D., Kockelbergh, R., Kynaston, H., Paul, A., Powell, P., Prescott, S., Rosario, D.J., Rowe, E. & Neal, D.E. 2016, "10-Year Outcomes after Monitoring, Surgery, or Radiotherapy for Localized Prostate Cancer", N Engl J Med, vol. 375, no. 15, pp. 1415-1424.

The paper is open access. 

There is more about Altmetrics on our Writing Club blog.

Watch out for predatory publishers - Writing Club Blog Post

Keith Nockels, Clinical Librarian at UHL, has written a piece for our writing club blog on 'Predatory Publishing'.  Your thoughts and experiences of this would be welcomed.

Are clinical researchers publishing via Open Access?  Is there pressure to do this from funders?  Are clinicians being targeted by predatory publishers and are they using this route to publish their research?

https://uhlwritingclub.wordpress.com/2016/12/12/watch-out-for-predatory-publishers/

Awareness Days

It is December. The lights are up. The decorations and the displays in the shops and all around are all designed to increase our awareness of one message: Christmas is coming.

In the same way, health awareness  months, weeks and  days are geared  towards educating the general public, fund raising  and supporting  people with certain health conditions as well as their loved ones.

The awareness weeks and days for December are:

• Ø  Crohn’s and Colitis Awareness Week (December 1-7)
• Ø  World AIDS Day (December 1)

Evidence suggests that information requests from the public around topics of awareness increase during these awareness days and weeks. Consequently, clinicians and practitioners might be looking for medical updates and evidence in these areas.

A good place to look for information on Crohn’s and Colitis is Crohn’s & Colitis UK.  The Trip database also has a host of primary researches and systematic reviews.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and British HIV Association (BHIVA) have published guidelines on HIV testing. Public Health England has also published Reports about HIV in the UK. 

 The NICE Evidence search has not only provided NICE guidelines on these topical issues but also gives access to top quality and Impartiality publication and reviews.

Other useful information about the World AIDS day can be found on the World AIDS Day website, Terrence Higgins Trust, BASHH and Aidsmap.