VALLEY STREAM, N.Y. (PRWEB)
April 29, 2020

SRX, a healthtech company that helps the long-term care industry control pharmacy costs, is taking a stand in defense of the industry. In response to much of the negative criticism being aimed at nursing homes and long-term care operators, the company is publicly standing up for the efforts being made by facilities to care for residents and protect staff in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.

In an open letter, made public on the company’s website on Friday, and scheduled for public release in ads in major news outlets across the country, the company highlights what it sees from many operators and facilities as incredible achievements to adapt and innovate solutions during a crisis that has never before been seen at this scale. Scott Taylor, CEO, explains, “There is no escaping the criticism the industry is facing. It’s everywhere. The reality is that facilities are charged with caring for the most vulnerable patient population, with the same limited access to personal protective equipment and supplies as hospitals, with less public funding and financial support. That isn’t right.”

The letter details many of the other difficulties facing the industry, including staffing shortages, and limited access to hospital beds for patients requiring acute care. It also illustrates the many successes and achievements the industry has seen during this time. “From where I stand, this is a community that has pulled together. We have been witness and participant to the collective efforts to share resources, pool staff, and donate time and money. Innovative solutions have already been developed in agile response to the devastating effects of this virus. Staff are working tirelessly to provide compassionate care for their elderly residents, largely without the support or recognition their peers in hospitals are receiving from state and federal agencies. As much as hospitals are rightfully being heralded for their heroics on the frontlines, the healthcare heroes in long-term care must also be commended,” Taylor concluded.

SRX is a health technology company that helps long-term care and skilled nursing facilities to realize the lowest net cost on their pharmacy spend. For more information visit srx-tech.com

Contact:

Jennifer Diehl

jdiehl@aftonkleingroup.com

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BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (PRWEB)
April 29, 2020

The American Board of Nursing Specialties (ABNS), which represents 31 nursing certification boards and over 920,000 board certified LPNs, RNs and advanced practice nurses, today announced that its 2020 Janel Parker President’s Award winner is the National Board of Certification and Recertification for Nurse Anesthetists. This annual ABNS award recognizes an individual or organization within the ABNS membership that has made significant contributions to specialty nursing certification and to the association.

“The NBCRNA is very deserving of the Janel Parker President’s Award, said ABNS President and Board of Certification for Emergency Nursing Executive Director Janie Schumaker, MBA, RN, CEN, CPHQ, CENP, FABC. The award nomination is quite impressive and demonstrates both industry leadership and deep commitment to specialty nursing certification and the patients who benefit from it.”

Some highlights from NBCRNA’s award nomination that really stand out are their commitment to excellence in certification. Not only does NBCRNA adhere to the industry standards, they strive to surpass them and set best practices for others to emulate. NBCRNA is also a leader in the area of research in the specialty nursing certification industry by providing funding for research, hiring qualified individuals to carry out the work and publishing findings.

NBCRNA is a visionary when it comes to volunteer leadership. NBCRNA staff at all levels serve on numerous boards and committees that define and implement certification and recertification practices, standards and regulations. NBCRNA staff represent the industry with strength at various conferences and industry meetings annually and assert a strong voice at these gatherings.

The ABNS Board of Directors could not be more excited to present NBCRNA with this prestigious award. “We commend their work and are in awe of their contributions and commitment to the patient population served by their certificant holders and our industry”, Schumaker said.    

About ABNS

The American Board of Nursing Specialties (ABNS) is a not-for-profit membership organization governed by an elected group of member representatives. With a mission to promote the value of specialty nursing certification, ABNS serves as a forum for nursing credentialing organizations to connect and dialogue about the specific issues that certified nurses and those seeking certification face.

About the National Board of Certification and Recertification

The National Board of Certification and Recertification for Nurse Anesthetists (NBCRNA) is the nation’s certifying body for the initial and continued certification of the nearly 54,000 Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetists (CRNAs). Our primary responsibility is to guard the well-being of the public by seeking to ensure that those who secure the CRNA credential have the necessary knowledge and skills to practice safely and effectively. We accomplish our mission through the development and implementation of credentialing programs that support lifelong learning among nurse anesthetists. The NBCRNA’s CRNA credential program and its Nonsurgical Pain Management (NSPM-C) credential program are accredited by both the National Commission for Certifying Agencies (NCCA) and the Accreditation Board for Specialty Nursing Certification (ABSNC).

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MATTHEWS, N.C. (PRWEB)
April 29, 2020

Harris Teeter today announced it will donate more than 640,000 pounds of much needed nutritious protein and produce to help feed community members in need amid the COVID-19 pandemic. With support from its vendor partners, nearly 20 truckloads carrying more than 534,000 meals were distributed to local food banks in its operating areas. The Company will also launch a Round Up campaign to support its food bank partners during this critical time.

“Harris Teeter is committed to being there for our communities when they need us most,” said Danna Robinson, communication manager for Harris Teeter. “During this unprecedented time, we are proud to support our local food bank partners with their critical COVID-19 relief efforts. Our shoppers have asked us how they can give back, and this COVID-19 Relief Round Up will provide an easy way to donate change at checkout.”

Harris Teeter and protein suppliers Sanderson Farms and Tyson, as well as produce suppliers Sol Melons, Ayco Farms, Inc, NY Apple, Washington Fruit & Produce Co., Seald Sweet International, Pacific Trellis Fruit, LLC and California Giant Berry Farms joined forces to support various food banks in its operating areas to provide hunger relief to families, including children, seniors and veterans, within its communities facing food insecurity.

“Our retail heroes are working hard to provide our shoppers with the items they need most, but we also know many of our neighbors are struggling with food insecurity,” said Robinson. “With the support of our generous partners, these donations will provide relief to our food bank partners working around the clock to address the increased need for emergency food.”

While Harris Teeter is serving shoppers and communities, it’s also committed to supporting its supply chain partners working hard behind the scenes to ensure shelves are well-stocked and families are fed. For every truckload donated by its suppliers, Harris Teeter purchased a truckload for donation and distributed the meals among Second Harvest Food Bank of Metrolina in Charlotte, N.C., Manna Food Bank in Asheville, N.C., Food Bank of Central & Eastern North Carolina in Raleigh, N.C., Lowcountry Food Bank in Charleston, S.C., Food Bank of Southeastern Virginia in Virginia Beach and Capital Area Food Bank in Washington, D.C.

“Many restaurants are closed which means suppliers have a surplus of food service items available. Together, we’re able to divert this product from our landfills and place it in the homes of hungry families,” said Robinson. “We are deeply appreciative of the partnership and generosity of our suppliers.”

Harris Teeter’s COVID-19 Relief Round Up campaign will launch in all stores on Wednesday, April 29. Harris Teeter would like to invite shoppers to round up their transaction to the nearest whole dollar at checkout to support this effort. The campaign will benefit Harris Teeter’s local food bank partners in their efforts to meet emergency supply demands.

“Through hosting Round Up campaigns, we’ve seen that a little change can make a big difference for our nonprofit partners,” said Robinson.

To learn more about the precautions Harris Teeter is taking and how the Company is supporting its shoppers and valued associates amid the pandemic, click here.

http://www.harristeeter.com

Harris Teeter, with headquarters in Matthews, N.C., is a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Kroger Co. (NYSE: KR). The regional grocery chain employs approximately 30,000 associates and operates stores in North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Maryland, Delaware, Florida and the District of Columbia

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OAK BROOK, Ill. (PRWEB)
April 29, 2020

An unprecedented collaboration among two medical societies and over 60 volunteer neuroradiologists has resulted in the generation of the largest public collection of expert-annotated brain hemorrhage CT images, according to a report published in Radiology: Artificial Intelligence. Leaders of the project expect the dataset to help speed the development of machine learning (ML) algorithms to aid in the detection and characterization of this potentially life-threatening condition.

The creation of the dataset stems from the most recent edition of the Radiology Society of North America (RSNA) Artificial Intelligence (AI) Challenge. For the 2019 edition, participants were asked to create an ML algorithm that could assist in the detection and characterization of intracranial hemorrhage on brain CT. Accuracy in diagnosing the presence and type of intracranial hemorrhage is a vital part of effective treatment, as even a small hemorrhage can lead to death if it is in a critical location.

Rather than using an existing dataset, as had been done for the first two challenges, the competition’s organizers set out to create one from scratch. They compiled the brain hemorrhage CT dataset from three institutions: Stanford University in Palo Alto, California, Universidade Federal de São Paulo in São Paulo, Brazil, and Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

“The value of this challenge is to create a dataset that might lead to a generalizable solution, and the best way to do that is to train a model from data originating from multiple institutions that use a variety of CT scanners from various manufacturers, scanning protocols and a heterogeneous patient population,” said the paper’s lead author, Adam E. Flanders, M.D., neuroradiologist and professor at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. “In this case, we had data from three institutions and international participation. The dataset is unique, not only in terms of the volume of abnormal images but also the heterogeneity of where they all came from.”

RSNA and the American Society of Neuroradiology (ASNR) collaborated to curate the dataset and organizers issued an open call for volunteers within the ASNR membership to annotate the images. A day-and-a-half later, they had 140 volunteers from which they selected 60 to annotate a vast trove of 874,035 brain hemorrhage CT images in 25,312 unique exams. The volunteers marked each image as normal or abnormal. For the abnormal images, they indicated the hemorrhage subtype.

“It was a nail-biter all the way along,” Dr. Flanders said of the process. “We were building the airplane while it was in flight. When you consider the number of images that we had to de-identify locally, consume, curate, label, cross-check and then organize into just the right datasets to release to the contestants, there was a lot of work involved by the volunteer workforce, the RSNA Machine Learning Subcommittee, data scientists, contractors and RSNA staff.”

The dataset’s release attracted interest from far and wide. Organizers received more than 22,200 submissions from 1,787 individual competitors in 1,345 teams from 75 countries. Dr. Flanders was particularly struck by the international reach of the project and the level of enthusiasm even from people outside of the medical realm.

“The 10 top solutions came from all over the world,” he said. “Some of the winners had absolutely no background in medical imaging.”

The dataset was released under a non-commercial license, meaning it is freely available to the AI research community for non-commercial use and further enhancement.

Dr. Flanders said the objective of engaging with a subspecialty society to leverage their unique expertise in developing a high-quality dataset is an effective and useful pathway to follow for future collaborations. The model worked so well that organizers are using it again for this year’s competition, a collaboration with the Society of Thoracic Radiology seeking improved detection and characterization of pulmonary embolism on chest CT.

“I was really impressed by the huge volunteer effort and the tremendous worldwide interest in this project,” Dr. Flanders said. “The dataset we created for this challenge will endure as a valuable ML research resource for years to come.”

###

“Construction of a Machine Learning Dataset through Collaboration: The RSNA 2019 Brain CT Hemorrhage Challenge.” Collaborating with Dr. Flanders were Luciano M. Prevedello, M.D., George Shih, M.D., Safwan S. Halabi, M.D., Jayashree Kalpathy-Cramer, Ph.D., Robyn Ball, Ph.D., John T. Mongan, M.D., Anouk Stein, Ph.D., Felipe C. Kitamura, M.D., Matthew P. Lungren, M.D., Gagandeep Choudhary, M.D., Lesley Cala, M.D., Luiz Coelho, M.D., Monique Mogensen, M.D., Fanny Morón, M.D., Elka Miller, M.D., Ichiro Ikuta, M.D., M.M.Sc., Vahe Zohrabian, M.D., Olivia McDonnell, M.B., M.Ch., Ba.O., Christie Lincoln, M.D., Lubdha Shah, M.D., David Joyner, M.D., Amit Agarwal, M.D., Ryan K. Lee, M.D., and Jaya Nath, M.D.

Radiology: Artificial Intelligence is edited by Charles E. Kahn Jr., M.D., M.S., Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, and owned and published by the Radiological Society of North America, Inc. (https://pubs.rsna.org/journal/ai)

RSNA is an association of radiologists, radiation oncologists, medical physicists and related scientists promoting excellence in patient care and health care delivery through education, research and technologic innovation. The Society is based in Oak Brook, Illinois. (RSNA.org)

For patient-friendly information on brain CT, visit RadiologyInfo.org.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (PRWEB)
April 29, 2020

Peqish Food Company, the better-for-you food brand, has rapidly shifted its production capacity from a business-to-business, healthy pre-prepared meal model to being able to feed essential service providers and those most vulnerable due to the COVID-19 pandemic, part of the Canada Safe Food Consortium (canadasafefoodconsortium.ca) effort to address food security.

Peqish is a company founded by two clinical scientists with the mission of making society healthier by offering better nutrition with modern convenience. “Due to the changing situation as a result of the global pandemic, Peqish, together with our partners has shifted our attention to leveraging our infrastructure to support frontline responders and best manage the risks of transmission as it relates to food preparation,” says Dr. Anthony Marotta, Peqish CEO.

The partners in this effort are members of the Canada Safe Food Consortium, of which Peqish is a founding member. The consortium’s goal is to supply ready-made meals at high volumes in the safest way possible, handled with the highest degree of stringency, beyond normal food safety practices, as this is of utmost importance at this time.

Peqish is able to leverage a deep scientific and clinical expertise and produces all its products in CFIA and HACCP accredited facilities. This enables Peqish to focus on minimizing viral transmission during preparation and consumption of their ready-made meals.

Peqish has mobilized resources to be able to deliver more than 30,000 meals a day. This capacity is in addition to currently providing meals to a number of Vancouver-based academic and institutional organizations.

Peqish is looking to work with more hospitals, governments and health authorities across Canada to deploy this food service program and expand the success of the Canada Safe Food Consortium’s effort to address healthy eating during the COVID-19 crisis.

MEDIA CONTACT:

Dr. Anthony Marotta, CEO and Health Advisor, Peqish Food Company

amarotta@peqish.com

About Peqish

Peqish was founded by two Vancouver-based clinical scientists who saw the harm poor eating habits caused and desired to create an alternative solution with the potential to impact the wellbeing of those individuals consuming Peqish foods. Peqish’s mission is to allow people leading active and busy lifestyles to “Eat Healthy-on-the-Go”.

Leveraging their 25+ years in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industry together with the extensive hands-on clinical experience and knowledge base of the company’s health and wellness advisory team, Peqish is able to create innovative better-for-you foods.

Peqish’s offerings for breakfast, lunch and snack time are intended to taste great, be nutritionally dense, of ideal portion size, and personalized to accommodate various dietary restrictions based on clinical and/or personal choices.

https://www.peqish.com/

About Canada Safe Food Consortium

With a shared commitment to community service and well-being, the principles within the Consortium organizations recognized the imminent need for scalable action with respect to community food security. Leveraging our joint networks, this partnership has the capacity to develop systems, protocols and procedures to implement and execute a large-scale solution to ensure the most vulnerable in our community have access to a secure, and nutritious food supply. The end game of this project is to assist in the creation of a National Food Security Plan that provides a comprehensive supply chain solution to serve those in need for the long-term as well as throughout the current crisis.

https://www.canadasafefoodconsortium.ca/

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SiO2 Material Science

AUBURN, Ala. (PRWEB)
April 29, 2020

SiO2 Materials Sciences launches a line of specialty vials for biological drugs and vaccines. The SiO2 vials solve significant challenges in the commercialization of vaccines and biological drugs which presently cannot be solved by glass or plastic vials.

According to Chief Scientist Chris Weikart, “Many drug development and drug formulation innovations can be limited due to variables associated with traditional glass vials (lot to lot material variability, leachables, etc.). These variables result in lost time and money due to extensive formulation studies. With the SiO2 Vials, we eliminate these variables and allow our drug development partners to bring their innovations to life.”

Thermal Stability & Integrity: with a thermal stability range of -196˚C to 121˚C and with a seal integrity of -80˚C to 25˚C, the SiO2 vials provide the ideal primary container for therapies which require cold storage

Chemical Stability: safe and suitable for a wide range of drug characterizations including pH ranges from 3-12; there is no risk of delamination as observed with glass vials

Gas barrier: SiO2 vials have gas permeation properties like glass and therefore provide the required shelf life and stability required by many therapies

Mechanical durability: SiO2 vials can withstand 1,500 pounds of direct force saving millions from breaking on filling lines and minimizing loss in the supply chain

No Breakage: the vials are shatterproof making them safe for healthcare staff and the patient

“While the vials themselves share many properties of both glass and plastic, we have conducted and passed all the studies required for regulators to approve the SiO2 Vials as a like for like to glass,” stated Pete Sagona, Senior Vice President.

According to Lawrence Ganti, Chief Business Officer, “SiO2 is dramatically ramping up capacity to meet customer demands and to ensure that the surge seen due to the COVID19 vaccine developments can be accommodated. We have very short lead times, so we can accommodate the surge in demand for glass or plastic vials.”

For further technical information visit: http://sio2ms.com/technology.

About SiO2 Materials Science

SiO2 Materials Science is a privately-owned U.S. advanced materials science corporation, managed by the same family over the last 100 years always involved in introducing breakthrough disruptive technology. The company is currently located in Auburn, Alabama close to Atlanta, Georgia and is in the process of developing a new facility located near Basel, Switzerland to manufacture the same six-sigma plus quality in all of its facilities. The company has deep partnerships with leading professors in the leading research universities such as University of California, University of Chicago, MIT, and CalTech. For more information visit http://www.sio2ms.com.

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