new clinical guidelines portal

The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) has launched a new national Clinical Practice Guidelines Portal that will provide links to current Australian guidelines developed by governments, professional colleges, specialty societies and non-government agencies. The new portal hopes to provide a ‘one stop shop’ for clinicians, researchers, policy makers and consumers to access guidelines developed during the preceding five years for use in the Australian health care system. The portal will also provide a register for guidelines in development. A link to the portal has been added to the list of evidence based practice sites on the Library web pages.

National health reform plan

A national health and hospitals network report. Australian Government, 2010.
This document sets out the architecture and foundations of the Government’s National Health Reform Plan. These structural reforms will mean that the Commonwealth Government:

• becomes the majority funder of public hospitals;
• takes over all funding and policy responsibility for GP and primary health care services;
• dedicates around one third of annual Goods and Services Tax (GST) allocations currently directed to state and territory governments to fund this change in responsibilities for the health system;
• changes the way hospitals are run, taking control from central bureaucracies and handing it to Local Hospital Networks; and
• changes the way hospitals are funded, by paying Local Hospital Networks directly for each hospital service they provide, rather than by a block grant from the Commonwealth to the states.

Library bulletin distribution

Please let us know of any changes that need to be made to our Library Bulletin distribution list – additions and deletions. (email anne.mclean@austin.org.au)

new online

Donor breast milk banks : the operation of donor milk bank services. National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, 2010. (NICE clinical guideline ; 93)
The document makes recommendation on the ways in which milk banks should recruit, screen and support women who donate breast milk, also the handling and processing of breast milk received from donors. (It does not make specific recommendations on how donated breast milk is used after it leaves the milk bank, how mothers should handle and store breast milk for their own babies, or the care and treatment of babies who receive donated breast milk).

NEW ON DISPLAY @ Austin

Bonica’s management of pain / Scott M. Fishman, Jane C. Ballantyne and James P. Rathmell. 4 th ed. Wolters Kluwer/Lippincott Williams & wilkins, 2010.
Mount misery / Samuel Shem. Ballantine Books, 1997. (From the same author as “House of God”)
Transplantation / edited by John L.R. Forsythe. 4 th ed. Saunders Elsevier, 2009.

Display books may be reserved – call 9496 5393.

bmj evidence updates

Evidence updates from the BMJ Evidence Centre (based at McMaster University Health Information Research Unit) is a free service. You may search their database (records go back to 2002) to find the current best evidence based on research. You may also sign up for email alerts in your specialty. Worth a look! Here are the top ten papers accessed from this service during February:

1	A randomized placebo-controlled clinical trial of 5 smoking cessation pharmacotherapies. Arch Gen Psychiatry
2	Comparison of antiarrhythmic drug therapy and radiofrequency catheter ablation in patients with paroxysmal atrial fibrillation: a randomized controlled trial. JAMA
3	Performance characteristics of the new definition of diabetes: the insulin resistance atherosclerosis study. Diabetes Care
4	Effectiveness of extended-duration transdermal nicotine therapy: a randomized trial. Ann Intern Med
5	Interventions for acute otitis externa. Cochrane Database Syst Rev
6	Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and breast cancer mortality in women receiving tamoxifen: a population based cohort study. BMJ
7	Effect of periodontal treatment on glycemic control of diabetic patients: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Diabetes Care
8	Treatment of childhood obesity by retraining eating behaviour: randomised controlled trial. BMJ
9	A protocol of no sedation for critically ill patients receiving mechanical ventilation: a randomised trial. Lancet
10	Use of procalcitonin to reduce patients` exposure to antibiotics in intensive care units (PRORATA trial): a multicentre randomised controlled trial. Lancet