PABC Physio Info-blog.

In an interview this morning on CBS's The Early Show, the President spoke about his own experiences with fitness and how his fitness has benefited not only his physical health, but also his mental health. Speaking to Hannah Storm, the President, who will turn 61 on July 6th, had this to say:

I believe strongly in exercise. I exercise a lot because it's good for my mind and good for my soul. But I hope I set a good example to others that exercise is good for you.

I also respect another quote by Mr. Bush:

"I also think that since we spend a lot of money on food in the education system, then we should insist upon better food," the president said. "A lot of the dietary problems are just obviously what people eat. And so it's not just a lack of exercise, or obesity problem, it's not just a lack of exercise, but a bad diet."

It would be even nicer, if Mr. Bush could have mentioned physiotherapists as the gurus of exercise :)

See the interview on CBS and the video here

Have a great long weekend! Happy Canada Day! I am off to Okanagan next week for some teaching and might not be able to blog till later next week...

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 11:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I am leaving to Okanagan early next week to present three (3) workshops to PABC folks in: Kelowna, Vernon and Penticton.

Details:

Kelowna, Tuesday, July 3rd (hands-on seminar in computer lab) :
• Mastering Google for Physiotherapists. 1:30 PM - 2:45 PM in UBC Okanagan Library LIB111 (Learning Lab). See more info and register here - http://toby.library.ubc.ca/booking/description.cfm?sessionid=4106
• Mastering PubMed for Physiotherapists. 3:00 PM - 4:15 PM in UBC Okanagan Library LIB111 (Learning Lab). See more info and register here - http://toby.library.ubc.ca/booking/description.cfm?sessionid=4107
I still have 6-7 spots available if you are interested to attend. Here is the map of UBC Okanagan for your navigation - http://www.maps.ubc.ca/PROD/images/pdf/ubc_okanagan_campus_map.pdf

Vernon, Tuesday, July 3rd (not hands-on session)
• “Staying up-to-date with professional information – using alerts and current awareness services.” This is a new ½ hour workshop on staying up-to-date. I will present it during my slot at the PABC evening in Vernon Art Gallery. Please contact joan.russell@telus.net if you are planning to attend

Penticton, Wednesday, July 4th (not hands-on session)
• We will have both Google and PubMed sessions running at the Sports Clinic at #207 - 399 Main St. in the City Center Bldg (special thanks to Gary Weare and Mike Yates for arranging this special session). The Google session will run from 6pm till 7:15 pm, and PubMed session will run from 7:30pm till 8:30pm. To register, please email me. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get a computer lab for this session (Okanagan college wanted a fortune and I don’t have any contacts in local high schools, etc.) If you have any contacts to get us a computer lab, it would be VERY appreciated – it is so much easier to learn all those things when you sit with a computer!

If you already registered to any of those, please don’t register again. This is just the last call to those folks who missed earlier emails and still want to attend.

Folks, I make a real effort to get to as many places as I can in those two days, and money-wise I can do it only once a year, so please, if your schedule allows, come to our workshops and learn some new and useful stuff!

Thanks, eh?

** Photo by orangejack

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here is a very recent article from the Aust J Physiother. 2007;53(2):121-6 about the Australian physio workforce.

Only the abstract of this article is free, however, it is interesting enough!

They found that: "The physiotherapy workforce has aged significantly since 1986 (p < 0.001), and women are older than men (p < 0.001). Forty-one percent of the 2001 physiotherapy workforce is predicted to retire by 2026, although around one-third of physiotherapists continue working after age 65. While physiotherapy remains a female-dominated profession, the proportion of males is increasing and has risen from 16% in 1986 to 27% in 2001. Physiotherapists are working longer hours than they did in the past, and while this is partly due to the increasing proportion of males in the workforce, generation X and Y females are also more likely to work longer hours than their predecessors."

Read the abstract here.

Is Canadian physio workforce different? What do you sense out there in the field?

** Photo by benjamincarylewis

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Take a look on this interesting video. It makes you think and prepare for the world to come....are you ready for the new reality?

Have a great weekend!

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The new issue of Journal of Manual and Manipulative Therapy (Volume 15, issue 2) is up online on their site. What I like about this particular journal is that they provide some of the very interesting content freely on the site, aka Open Access.

This time, there is a very long editorial discussing chiropractic challenges to the PT scope of practice....very interesting - take a look :)

Moreover, Peter Huijbregts - the journal editor - says to me in his email that: "Open access content also includes an historical review paper by Dr. Thomas Terlouw on the early history of physical therapy in Europe and specifically in the Netherlands (http://jmmtonline.com/documents/v15n2/TerlouwV15N2E.pdf). This material discussed in this article that will likely expose some firmly held beliefs about our history as misconceptions has previously not been available to English-language readers due to the language barrier with most papers on this topic written in German, Swedish, and Dutch.

Book and multimedia reviews make up the remainder of the free online content.

Take a look yourself!

** Photo by opinionated indian

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 8:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Journal of the Canadian Health Libraries Association (JCHLA) has published another article of yours truly, this time co-authored with enthusiastic Allan Cho. The article tries to cover the phenomenon of social search in health context. Please take a look - it is free open access:

Introducing Web 2.0: social search for health librarians

The article continues the series of Web 2.0 coverage in health that I co-author with other health librarians:

* Introducing Web 2.0: RSS trends for health librarians >> http://pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/jchla/jchla27/c06-001.pdf

* Introducing Web 2.0: weblogs and podcasting for health librarians >> http://pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/jchla/jchla27/c06-013.pdf

* Introducing Web 2.0: social networking and social bookmarking for health librarians >> http://pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/jchla/jchla27/c06-024.pdf

The next article will cover one of the most controversial topics in social technology - wikis!

** Photo by Bushrat Steve

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The new issue of Physical Therapy is in PubMed now - Jun 6; [Epub ahead of print]

As usual, click on the right side "Top Physiotherapy Journals - Current Tables of Contents" link to view the list of seven top physio journals, and click on the title to view the latest articles from there.

Alternatively, click below to view the last issue of :

Physical Therapy

** Photo by creativity+

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here is a new study by Dutch physios published in the May issue of BMC Musculoskelet Disord. 2007 May 22;8:45.

The purpose was to investigate the ability to adherence to recommendations of the guideline Acute ankle injury, and to identify patient characteristics that determine adherence to the guideline. Interesting....there are so many good quality guidelines out there, however, do patients follow them closely?

The authors found that: "Adherence to individual recommendations varied from 71% to 100%. In 99 patients (57%) the physiotherapists showed adherence to all indicators. Adherence to preset maximum of six treatment sessions for patients with severe ankle injury was 81% (132 patients)."

The writers concluded that: "Adherence to the clinical guideline Acute ankle sprain showed that the guideline is applicable in daily practice. Adherence to the guideline, even in a group of physiotherapists familiar with the guideline, showed possibilities for improvement. The necessity to exceed the expected number of treatment sessions may be explained by co-morbidity and recurrent sprains. It is not clear why female patients were treated with more sessions. Experience of the physiotherapist reduced the number of treatment sessions. Quality indicators may be used for audit and feedback as part of the implementation strategy."

Read the whole thing in free full text here.

** Photo by kimberly hurst

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 10:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Canadian Physiotherapy Pain Sciences Group has published a new free issue of their newsletter a couple of weeks ago.

Please read the Volume 3 Issue 3 here.

In particular, take a look on "Cutaneous Innervation, Skin Ligaments, and Small Scale Neurodynamics" piece by Diane Jacobs

** Photo by redmann

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This is our Friday fun and learn for today....we are going to learn more about RSS feeds today. You have seen my article in the PABC newsletter, and might have even read a specific article that I wrote last year on RSS and health literature - "Introducing Web 2.0: weblogs and podcasting for health librarians"

In a nutshell, you will use RSS feeds to collect all new info that comes from all over the web in one place - your online RSS reader!

Today, take a couple of minutes to take a look on that simple video that explain RSS in regular language.

Have fun!

Click To Play

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The new issues of those two journals were out last week. As usual, click on the right side "Top Physiotherapy Journals - Current Tables of Contents" link to view the last issues.

Alternatively, click below to view the last issues of :

* The Australian journal of physiotherapy

* Physiotherapy research international : the journal for researchers and clinicians in physical therapy

** Photo by Stuart Yeates

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 9:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yours truly has been awarded the “Emerging Leader” award by the Canadian Health Libraries Association (CHLA) during the annual 2007 conference last week in Ottawa.

It is a great honour for me indeed, particularly being nominated by my colleagues!

It was also a great pleasure to see a colleague/friend/mentor of mine – Dean Giustini to be awarded the Canadian Hospital Librarian of the Year award by CHLA! He deserves it so truly!

** Photo by cruadinx

Posted by Eugene Barsky at 8:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)