The University of Kansas Health System is treating a total of 58 COVID patients today, 52 yesterday. Other significant numbers:
- 36 with the active virus today, 32 yesterday
- 5 in ICU, 3 yesterday
- 2 on a ventilator, 1 yesterday
- 22 hospitalized, but out of acute infection phase, 20 yesterday
Key points from today’s guests:
Dr. Steve Stites, chief medical officer, The University of Kansas Health System
- Chronic back pain is a widespread common problem, but it is not a one-size-fits-all approach to treatment.
- The University of Kansas Health System is part of a multi-center study, funded by the Institute of Health grant, and is looking for patients to be part of the research (BEST Trial).
- We also have to remember the Internet can be a powerful tool for education, for research, and for recruiting people for research studies like this so we can learn to advance the science for things like treatment of chronic back pain.
Danell Ragsdale, BEST trial participant
- Has had bulging disc issues due to a prior car accident. Since then, the pain has slowly gotten worse.
- Has tried physical therapy, epidurals and other treatments and Dr. Chadwick has been phenomenal, she says.
- Dr. Chadwick has done everything in her power to relieve the amount of pain.
- She gave Danell the opportunity to join this STEP study because she wants to help anybody to not feel this pain.
- Her goal, as a grandma, is to be able to function and stay active by playing with grandkids and living an active lifestyle.
Dr. Andrea Chadwick, anesthesiology and pain medicine, The University of Kansas Health System
- Chronic low back pain is very different in how it develops and presents in patients. This study is aimed at “personalizing” pain treatments for patients based on who they are.
- The beautiful part of being involved in clinical research that's funded through our government institutions like the National Institutes of Health is that the grant fully covers all of the tests and treatment visits.
- For participants who enroll in the study, no insurance is required because we don't bill anything to the insurance, and then all of their treatment costs, visits, etc., will be covered fully by the study.
- In terms of knowing the results of the study, it's actually required by the National Institutes of Health that those results are disseminated publicly. So all of the results that will come from this study and any other study will be publicly available.
Dr. Joshua Bunch, orthopedic and spine surgery, The University of Kansas Health System
- This study is a huge accomplishment and great for patients and the health system.
- It is important to have conditioning and a strong core, both in the abdominal muscles and the paraspinal muscles in the back. That's a huge part for folks that have back pain.
- Surgery is also an option if someone does have some kind of neurologic decline, meaning that their nerves aren't functioning quite right.
- If they have a lot of numbness or pain radiating down their leg, that can be a sign that maybe there's some impingement on the nerves or the nerves are being pinched. Sometimes doing surgery to take that pressure off can be beneficial.
- The actual most common cause of back pain is a muscular strain, and a strain of one of those muscles can just generate a tremendous amount of back pain.
- We have cushions in between our vertebral bodies, and those cushions can actually generate pain and they can become degenerative.
Dr. Dana Hawkinson, director of infection control and prevention, The University of Kansas Health System
- We know that hospitalizations do lag cases by a couple of weeks and we're seeing the brunt of that now.
- In addition, we have influenza and RSV that we're tackling as well.
- We are hoping that we've seen a peak in the RSV cases nationally, but the circulation of that virus still remains quite high.
- Very young patients are most at risk of hospitalization and severe outcomes, as are the elderly.
- New research released yesterday continues to reinforce the fact that those people who are fully vaccinated and up to date with their boosters really do have a reduced chance of hospitalization and severe outcomes such as death.
Thursday, December 8 at 8:00 a.m. is the next Morning Medical Update. Learn about one of the first proton therapy patients at the University of Kansas Cancer Center. How did it work on non-cancerous tumors threatening his brain and spine?
ATTENTION MEDIA: Please note access is with Microsoft Teams:
Join on your computer or mobile app
Click here to join the meeting
Meeting ID: 235 659 792 451
Passcode: 6CSfGE
Download Teams | Join on the web
Or call in (audio only)
+1 913-318-8863,566341546# United States, Kansas City
TVU Grid link: UoK_Health_SDI
Restream links: Facebook.com/kuhospital
YouTube.com/kuhospital
Send advance questions to medicalnewsnetwork@kumc.edu.