Nurse

To get a sense of the monumental challenges facing kids in Boston public schools, spend a few hours in the nurse's office at the Thomas A. Edison K-8 School in Brighton. There, between the hours of 8:15 and 2:45 each weekday, the unflappable Kim Brown-Lynch sees everything that could possibly ail a student - and a city. Sore throats, headaches, bellyaches, burns, scratches, chills, boredom, anxiety, sleeplessness, hunger, isolation, neglect: All of these and more find their way to her waiting room on a recent morning.

Finding the right nursing home is a daunting task most of us will face, as two-thirds of people over 65 will need nursing home care, at least temporarily, according to AARP. It's best to research facilities in advance, but a sudden illness or injury may force you to confront things sooner than you expect. Here are several key considerations:  ■ Stay close. The biggest influence on the quality of care nursing home patients receive is often the frequency of visits by friends and family.

LONDON - British police arrested a nurse on murder charges yesterday after three patients at the hospital where she works received saline contaminated with insulin and died. Greater Manchester Police said they detained a 27-year-old woman, whom the Nursing and Midwifery Council identified as Rebecca Leighton, a registered nurse. It said she would be suspended "as quickly as possible. " Crime scene investigators were searching her apartment. The contamination was discovered last week after a nurse at Stepping Hill Hospital in northwest England reported a higher-than-normal number of...

Unionized nurses at Boston Medical Center are protesting a new round of job cuts, following a hospital decision to shut down an acute-injury rehabilitation unit on July 1. Overall, the Boston University teaching hospital will eliminate nearly 40 positions, including 31 full-time equivalent positions at the rehab unit and about nine others from closing beds and converting double rooms to single rooms at the hospital's Newton Pavilion. With more than 300 open positions at the hospital, however, Boston Medical Center officials said many of the nurses and therapists whose jobs are...

The family of Edward Harrigan, a patient who died at Tobey Hospital in Wareham after no one responded to warnings on his cardiac monitor, filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the hospital and a nurse. Harrigan, 87, was a patient at the hospital in September 2008. His electrocardiogram displayed a "flat line" for more than two hours because the battery in his heart monitor had died, but no one changed the battery despite that warning, according to state Department of Public Health investigators.

PAYING IT FORWARD: After a routine mammogram led to a diagnosis of breast cancer in March 2011, Lexington resident Megan MacInnes took six weeks off from her job as a certified nurse-midwife at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge to recover from surgery. Two months later, she began chemotherapy at Mount Auburn Hospital's Hematology/Oncology Center. She continued to work, but had to rest for four days following treatment sessions, which were every other week for four months. The support that MacInnes received at home was complemented by that of...

British police arrested a nurse on murder charges Wednesday after three patients at the hospital where she works received saline contaminated with insulin and died. Greater Manchester Police said they detained a 27-year-old woman. The Nursing and Midwifery Council identified her as Rebecca Leighton, a registered nurse. It said she would be suspended "as quickly as possible. " Crime scene investigators were searching her apartment. The contamination was discovered last week after a nurse at Stepping Hill Hospital in Stockport, northwest England, reported a...

SAN ANTONIO - A former nurse has been charged with injecting 10 patients with bleach, killing five of them, at a Texas dialysis clinic that temporarily closed last year after deaths mysteriously spiked. Since the deaths over a four-week span last April, Kimberly Saenz had been the focus of the investigation at the DaVita Inc. clinic in Lufkin. She was charged in May with aggravated assault involving bleach injections in two patients who survived, but she had not been charged in any deaths until late Tuesday.

NORFOLK, Va. -- Tuberculosis testing will begin Monday for hundreds of people who may have been exposed to the disease by a hospital nurse who died of TB a week ago. A federal health official called it shameful that anyone should die of TB, a curable disease. In the United States, fewer than 1,000 people die of tuberculosis each year. Yet, the nurse at Chesapeake General Hospital remained undiagnosed and untreated "until it was in a very late stage," said Dr. Nancy Welch, health director in Chesapeake, a community near Norfolk.

MINNEAPOLIS — A nurse who was supposed to sedate a patient before kidney stone surgery took most of the painkillers for herself and told the patient to “man up’’ — giving him such a small dose he was writhing in pain on the operating table, according to criminal charges. Sarah May Casareto, 33, was charged with theft of a controlled substance, a felony. During surgery, the patient told doctors he was experiencing severe pain. Hospital staff told police Casareto was distracted, kept falling asleep, and was gesturing and talking loudly.

A loophole in Massachusetts law that allows nursing homes to advertise specialized Alzheimer's and dementia care units, even though their workers may have no training in caring for such residents, is one step closer to being closed. A proposal that would establish minimum standards for such units was approved by the state House of Representatives on Wednesday and is headed for the Senate. The bill would require the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, which regulates nursing homes, to establish minimum standards for facilities with dementia care units.

Three US senators are ratcheting up a campaign to slash the misuse of powerful sedatives, known as antipsychotics, in the nation's nursing homes. The three -- Senators Herb Kohl, D-Wis., Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. -- have filed a proposal that would require federal regulators to issue standardized rules for nursing homes to follow in seeking permission from patients, or their designated health care agents, such as a family member, before administering antipsychotics for so-called off-label use. The Food and Drug...

They Pedroia'd it forward. As tickled pinkish-red as 19-year-old Kylie Brough and mom, Kimberly, were to meet Red Sox star Dustin Pedroia and get his autograph during Fenway Park's 100th year Open House celebration on April 19, the Westminster residents couldn't help feeling something was very amiss about the moment, too. There had been those two young boys in Red Sox jerseys, one place ahead of the Broughs in line, who had excitedly yet...

Thousands of anti-NATO demonstrators are expected to converge at a downtown plaza Friday for a rally that promises to be a prelude to a much larger march Sunday, when world leaders begin two days of talks. Meanwhile, many office buildings will be shuttered after workers were told to stay home amid warnings about heightened security, snarled transportation and the possibility of unruly protests. National Nurses United officials have said they expect about 2,000 nurses to attend Friday's rally, where they will call for a "Robin Hood" tax on financial institutions'...

The Globe recently explored the overuse of antipsychotic drugs in nursing home patients with dementia. The two-part series — which included a database of facilities nationwide and their frequency of prescribing antipsychotic drugs inappropriately — prompted a flood of calls to the toll-free Alzheimer's helpline, 800-272-3900. Readers wanted advice on finding the right nursing home for their loved one, which can be the most heart-rending and perhaps toughest decision that many of us will ever have to make.

Dementia is a major health concern of our aging population. The safe, effective treatment of dementia's behavioral complications challenges those who care for the cognitively impaired. The front-page articles " A rampant prescription, a hidden peril " (April 29) and "Finding alternatives to potent sedatives" (April 30) informed the public of the hazards of using antipsychotic drugs in nursing homes without providing the balance necessary for understanding this issue. As geriatric psychiatrists, we support the view that behavioral interventions are...

ROCHESTER, N.Y. - A nursing supervisor enraged at two co-workers who accused him of sexual harassment drew a life sentence yesterday for killing a nurse and a bystander during a rampage that left four dead. “You’re a very frightening . . . very disturbing person,’’ Judge Frank Geraci said as he imposed the maximum penalty of life without parole on Frank Garcia. He is already serving a life term for a shooting later that day. Investigators say Garcia targeted nurses Mary Silliman and Kimberly Glatz after their harassment complaints led to him being fired from successive jobs.

A former Salem Hospital nurse who died more than two years ago bequeathed some $160,000 to the Salem Council on Aging, the city said. Irene A. Willey's house at 12 Oak St. in Salem was sold for $171,500 in 2009, and the Council on Aging recently received $160,532 after legal fees were deducted from the proceeds. The organization received the check last month. "It's an absolutely wonderful story," Mayor Kimberley Driscoll said in a statement. "We never would have imagined anything like this happening.

The body of a U.S. Army nurse who died suddenly in Afghanistan during a computer video chat with his wife arrived Saturday in western New York, in advance of his planned funeral. More than 100 mourners and admirers assembled at a Rochester airport to pay tribute to Capt. Bruce Kevin Clark. Many carried American flags. The group included veterans of four other U.S. wars, and members of Clark's family. Clark's wife, Susan Orellana-Clark, was in Texas chatting with him via Skype on April 30 when he collapsed.