Health

One in seven people in England who need hospital care are not receiving it because their GP referral is lost, rejected or delayed, the NHS’s patient watchdog has found. Three-quarters (75%) of those trapped in this “referrals black hole” suffer harm to their physical or mental health as a result of not being added to the waiting list for tests ...

Rajshahi Medical College Hospital (RMCH) has inaugurated psychiatry ward to treat mental health patients on Wednesday (3 December). It was establishedin the former ICU building under the initiative of outgoing director Brigadier General F M Shamim Ahmad alongside the new director, Brigadier General P K M Masud-ul-Islam. The new ward features 25 beds, including 10 for men, 7 for women, ...

Five-year-old Sumaiya should have been racing to school with children her age. Instead, she lies curled up in a small room in the Begunbari slum in Dhaka’s Hatirjheel, falling ill far more often than any child should. Her stunted height and frail frame tell the story her family struggles to hide: years of undernutrition, and a daily battle to afford ...

A doctor has been charged with sexually assaulting 38 patients while working at major hospitals in the West Midlands, the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) has said. Nathaniel Spencer, 38, of Quinton, Birmingham, has been charged with 15 counts of sexual assault, 17 counts of assault by penetration and nine counts of sexual assault of a child under 13. Mr Spencer ...

The government is set to strengthen reproductive health and family planning services across the country with the introduction of a major new initiative titled “Climate Responsive Reproductive Health and Population Services Improvement and System Strengthening Project for Result.” The project, to be implemented by the Directorate General of Family Planning (DGFP), aims to build a climate-resilient, equitable, and high-quality service ...

Health Secretary Wes Streeting is launching an independent review into rising demand for mental health, ADHD and autism services in England. It will look at both whether there is evidence of over-diagnosis and what gaps in support exist. The government said it was already investing in expanding services, but there are long waits for therapy in many areas. NHS figures ...

Bangladesh ranks seventh in the world in terms of diabetes patients, posing a growing multi-faceted challenge, the latest Diabetes Atlas estimate reported. The number of people affected by this long-term, insulin-dependent disease is rising rapidly worldwide, putting pressure on healthcare systems everywhere. The spike in healthcare cost of diabetes has hit $1 trillion across the world, the latest Diabetes Atlas ...

The National Institute of Cardiovascular Diseases (NICVD) has added 39 new Coronary Care Unit (CCU) beds and a 10-bed emergency centre with support from the Chinese government. The newly established one-stop emergency centre and fully renovated CCU were inaugurated on Tuesday as part of a broader health cooperation initiative between Bangladesh and China. The launch also marked the opening of ...

Almost four per cent of street-involved boys in Dhaka are victims of commercial sexual exploitation, according to new national research launched on Monday by The Freedom Fund in collaboration with government agencies, research institutions and child protection organisations. The findings, drawn from two major studies titled “Through Her Eyes and Beneath the Surface”, were presented at a national dissemination event ...

Twenty-one children are among 33 people who have died in Cuba of the mosquito-borne chikungunya and dengue viruses since July, authorities said Monday. Most of the deaths were attributed to chikungunya — characterized by fever and joint pain that can be debilitating but rarely fatal — while the flu-like dengue claimed 12 lives, the country’s deputy health minister Carilda Pena ...