UNICEF, health care books, mesothelioma

By Carol Lindsay, RN
March 22, 2004

The United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund was founded in 1946 by the United Nations to meet the emergency needs of children in post-war Europe and China. In 1950, UNICEF changed its mandate to address the long-term needs of children and women in developing countries.

Priorities today include immunizations, child protection, HIV/AIDS, early childhood development, adolescent education, nutrition and gender equality. The site provides worldwide information by country, including a list of statistics about child and infant mortality, annual birth rates, nutrition and education, as well as general demographics.

Ethnic medicine

The EthnoMed site contains information about cultural beliefs, medical issues and other issues related to the health care of recent immigrants to the United States. Links to 22 different culture-specific pages provide a cultural profile, clinical topics and patient education materials.

Some education materials are available in languages such as Amharic, Cambodian, Oromo and Somali. The list of diabetic education topics in a variety of languages is impressive. Some of the information is also available in digital audio recordings.

Preventive services

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality allows access to scientific evidence and recommendations on clinical preventive services with information on how to implement the recommended preventive services into clinical practice.

Updates from 2004 include screening for family violence, pancreatic cancer and testicular cancer. Each screening update gives a summary of recommendations as well as supporting documents. Other topics can be accessed by clinical categories or an A-to-Z topic index.

Asbestos dangers

Mesothelioma is the legacy left by asbestos. For 50 years, Americans in industrial and building trades were exposed to asbestos by breathing asbestos fibers at their job sites, and each night they brought the asbestos home to their families on their clothes and hair. Now, every year, thousands of Americans are developing mesothelioma, a malignant tumor that aggressively invades the linings of the lungs, abdomen, heart or testicles.

The Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation formed in 1999 to restore hope to mesothelioma patients and their families, who had always been told that the disease was untreatable and incurable. MARF is working to find a cure by funding research, educating patients and increasing awareness. MARF’s site provides up-to-date information on the disease and its treatments.

Health and sciences press

The National Academies Press was created to publish reports issued by the National Academies of Sciences, Institute of Medicine, National Research Council and the National Academy of Engineering.

The site’s category link to medical sciences, public health and health care contains information on an extensive range of the latest hot topics in health care. Article topics include prions, patient safety, insuring Americans and reducing birth defects. The press publishes more than 3,000 books online that can be accessed free of charge.