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News

Seven days in medicine: 13-19 September 2017

BMJ 2017; 358 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.j4325 (Published 21 September 2017) Cite this as: BMJ 2017;358:j4325

Patient safety

Trust pleads guilty over death of teenager who drowned

Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust has pleaded guilty to breaching health and safety laws in the death of Connor Sparrowhawk, 18, who drowned in a bath while in its care.1 The teenager, who had autism and epilepsy, drowned after a seizure at the Slade House care facility in Oxford. The trust will be sentenced at Oxford Crown Court on 12 October. A medical practitioners tribunal found last month that the psychiatrist Valerie Murphy failed to carry out risk assessments on Sparrowhawk. The case will go back to the tribunal in November.

Public health

NICE advises intensive lifestyle change for people at high risk of diabetes

Anyone in England with a fasting glucose concentration between 5.5 and 6.9 mmol/L should be offered a place on an intensive lifestyle change programme, but priority should be given to those with readings between 6.5 and 6.9 mmol/L, says updated guidance on prevention of type 2 diabetes from the UK National Institute on Care and Health Excellence. Anyone aged over 40 (except pregnant women), people aged 25-39 of south Asian, Chinese, African Caribbean, or black African origin, and people from other high risk ethnic minority groups should be offered a diabetes risk assessment, carried out at a general practice or a community pharmacy. (For full story see doi:10.1136/bmj.j4301.)

PHE starts drive to identify undiagnosed high blood pressure

Public Health England has asked the 44 sustainability and transformation partnerships (STPs) to work closely with pharmacists and other agencies to increase …

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