International Journal of Travel Medicine and Global Health
Volume:2 Issue: 1, Winter 2014

Nosocomial infections are responsible for the much of the morbidity and mortality found in hospitals. The present study was conducted on 70 bacterial strains isolated from hospitalized patients in various medical units of Baqiyatallah Hospital in Tehran, Iran during a period of 12 months from; March to February 2009.
The bacterial sensitivity for meropenem and imipenem was evaluated using the E-test and explanations of the MIC values. All patients were included in this study that had been hospitalized with no signs and symptoms of infection within the first 48 hours of hospitalization and began presenting signs and symptoms of infection after 48 hours of hospitalization.
Resistance to meropenem and imipenem was confirmed with E-test (AB Biodisk, Sweden) and disc diffusion methods. Meropenem and imipenem were active against 61 (64.2%) and 62(65.2%) strains, respectively, of the 95 ESBL positive strains.
The activity of meropenem or imipenem against gram negative ESBL-positive bacilli is decreasing rapidly but even so these antibiotics are effective against nosocomial multiresistant organisms.

Medical tourism is one of the competitive and income industries in world and has the ability to attract tourists in the health sector and international markets are totally dependent on international accreditation. This study has been done to evaluate the capabilities of active public and private hospitals in Shiraz regarding attraction of tourists’ base on accreditation standards.
This is a descriptive-analytic and cross-sectional study which performed on four hospitals which were active in medical tourism in 2012. A checklist of international accreditation standards based on Joint Commission International (JCI) was applied for collecting data. Data were analyzed using descriptive analytic statistical tests. In descriptive statistics, frequency tables and standard deviation were used for scoring the hospitals. Independent student (T-test) was used to compare the mean of public and private hospitals in attracting medical tourists.
Hospital No.3 in the Patient-Centered Standards and Health Care Organization Management Standards was in the best position whilst hospital No.2 in the Patient-Centered Standards was in the worst state and hospital no.1 in Health Care Organization Management was in the worst position. Also there was a significant difference between public and private hospitals in attracting medical tourists according to Joint Commission International (sig=0.01).
Shiraz hospitals have good ability to attract medical tourists; these abilities are very good in most cases and in some cases there is a need to improve. Having recognized the strengths and weaknesses of these hospitals can use SWOT analysis model, which is used in medical tourism program of some countries, for improving their abilities in attracting medical tourists.

The aim of this project is to investigate the concepts of patient relationship management (PRM), patient satisfaction and their relationship. As healthcare industry has its own complexity, the so well defined idea in marketing which is CRM could not be implemented directly in health industry. Consequently the concept of PRM has been introduced.
Qualitative research has been executed over the recently developed methods. The main indices of patient satisfaction based on new findings have been discussed. Besides PRM method has been investigated. Finally via data mining on questionnaire that we have gained on a public hospital in Tehran we analyzed the case and based on the data we recommended a PRM solution to tackle the problems.
While CRM is the best practice for marketing segmentation, increasing customer satisfaction and avoiding customer retention, in the health industry PRM is the main template to improve patient satisfaction and consequently avoiding patient churn. It has been found CRM with the profit maximization motto could not be used directly in health industry. Instead, PRM with the main objective of using the patient data effectively for prediction of disease trend over time, classification of the type of disease and using follow up system could improve the quality of care that is provided for the patient. As a result this would directly lead to increased patient satisfaction and best retention strategy for health industry. In the case study we found that the main problems arise from the lack of efficient communication between medical staff and patients. A system of PRM to tackle this problem is provided.
PRM, Service quality and Patient satisfaction are inter related concepts. With the help of PRM it is possible to avoid the outbreak of new disease, improve the service quality and saving the time in process of care services which they result in increased patient satisfaction. Data mining on patient satisfaction questionnaire is an efficient way to find the main problem and obstacles in front of patient satisfaction. Via PRM method we can find a solution to alleviate the situation and increase patient satisfaction.

Health tourism is an organized travel we make from where we live to another place to keep, regain, and improve physical and mental health. It can be also a national strategy to improve national income and some believe that it can be an integral part of national security. The present study is an attempt to determine the relationship between observance of the standards of international Joint Commission regarding structural-centered fields and number of health tourists attracted to a country.
The study is a descriptive-analytical work of applied type, which was conducted as cross-sectional work in 2012 on some of Tehran-based hospitals. Sampling was carried out randomly and for data gathering the standard checklist of the commission was employed. The tool covered six Health Care Organization Management Standards. Reliability and validity of the checklist have been ascertained by previous works. Data was collected through observing, interviewing, and document reviewing. For data analyses, descriptive and deductive statistics were used in SPSS16.
Observance of the standard regarding its different aspects is not equal as regarding infection prevention and control (3.48) we found highest mean point and the lowest position was obtained by improvement of quality and patients’ safety (2.52). A relatively positive correlation (r=0.114) was observed between observance of the standards of the commission and attracting health tourists.
Given the results obtained, it is notable that the development and implementation of an accreditation system for health services centers nationwide, which is aimed to improve quality of health services in light of the standards of International Joint Commission is helpful in attracting more health tourists.

International travel has become increasingly common and accessible, hence, about two billion passengers undertake international and domestic air travel each year. Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a serious public health disorder which may occur following prolonged travel, especially after air travel. A direct relation between VTE development and prolonged travels has been documented, while some references did not confirm this relation. The travel-related VTE is a multi-factorial disorder, and the risk of thrombosis is higher in individuals with pre-existing risk factors. Some believe that hypobaric hypoxia was a more likely explanation for thrombus formation during prolonged travel. Other factors including immobilization, dehydration, excessive alcohol or coffee consumption, lower air pressure, and lower humidity can make the traveler prone to thrombus formation. Herein we tried to evaluate previous studies and available guidelines thereby providing information on the association of thrombosis and travel, risk factors, risk assessment, and strategies for the prevention of VTE following travel.

The purpose of the present survey was to review the important Non-pharmacologic treatments for fear of flying up to the present. This study is in the same way as some studies. Accordingly, some Non-pharmacologic treatments for fear of flying were assessed through this systematic review article. The general conclusion from the information provided by the  former studies, shows that a growing number of treatment facilities offer treatment programs for fear of flying, including combined treatment, Hypnotherapy, EMDR, Relaxation, information Providing, Cognitive-behavioral treatment, cognitive therapy, exposure therapy, Computer-based exposure therapies, Implosion therapy, Flooding, Systematic desensitization and Psychodynamic therapy. Nevertheless, little is known about which specific method or element of treatment programs works best; In addition, Psychological therapy should be employed under unique circumstances and according to the needs of individuals rather than applying identical treatment packages to any case.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO) report, acute depression disorders are the second largest health problem in the world which can cause disability and imposes huge costs on individuals and societies. This study aims to investigate the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of using psychotherapy in patients with depression for prevention of suicide and self harm commitment.

Cochrane library (Issue 10, 2012) and CRD (Centre for Review and Dissemination) were searched using Mesh. Studies that compared psychotherapy with different alternative methods such as antidepressant drugs and used outcomes such as self-harm or suicide rates were included.

Eighteen articles were included in this review. Most of them showed that using psychotherapy as only suicide preventive method cannot be sufficiently effective, so that in the one of the included meta-analysis was shown that the effect of psychotherapy on suicide imagination and the risk of suicide were small. In terms of cost-effectiveness, it seems that MACT (Manual-assisted cognitive behavior therapy) is a cost-effective method in prevention of self-harm.

Generally, it seems that using combination of therapeutic methods will increase the effectiveness of suicide and self-harm prevention methods.