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Mass-produced shoe inserts available on drugstore shelves and customised orthotics may not work for plantar heel pain, a research review suggests.

Plantar heel pain is one of the most common foot ailments, accounting for about 15 per cent of foot symptoms requiring medical attention and 10 per cent of running injuries, researchers note in the British Journal of Sports Medicine. Many doctors recommend shoe inserts to ease this pain by supporting the arches and taking pressure off the heel, but research to date has been inconclusive about the effectiveness of this approach.

For the current study, researchers examined data from 20 previously conducted experiments that randomly assigned some participants to wear shoe inserts and other participants to join a control group receiving no treatment, a sham insert or a different intervention.

Altogether they tested eight different custom or mass-produced shoe inserts.

Short-term pain relief was similar with and without shoe inserts, and there was not any difference between prefabricated models and custom versions, the study found.

“A patient might still prefer to try an orthotic and based on this study, could try a cheaper orthotic first as opposed to a more expensive one, which is custom made,” said lead author Nadine Rasenberg of Erasmus Medical Centre Rotterdam in the Netherlands.

While shoe inserts might be better than nothing, the current study was not designed to answer this question, Rasenberg said by email.

“Most patients prefer to try an intervention as opposed to a `wait and see’ approach,” Rasenberg added. “It remains unknown, whether orthotics are better than doing nothing.”

Orthotics did appear slightly better than sham inserts in the current study, but the difference was too small to rule out the possibility that it was due to chance.

This suggests that orthotics might work for some people, but not others, said Glen Whittaker, a podiatry researcher at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, who wasn’t involved in the study. More research is still needed to determine who might benefit, and under what circumstances, Whittaker said by e-mail.

“Appropriately contoured foot orthoses may reduce plantar heel pain by redistributing pressure away from the bottom of the heel to the arch, and may also prevent the arch from dropping, which may reduce tension in the plantar fascia,” Whittaker said.

One limitation of the current study is that it examined results from many small experiments with different methods for testing the effectiveness of orthotics. The small studies also differed in duration and how they assessed pain relief.

Even though they are widely used, orthotics are not the only option for plantar heel pain, said Dr Selene Parekh, a researcher at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina and partner in the North Carolina Orthopedic Clinic.

Patients can also try night splints or stretching exercises done at home or as part of a supervised physical therapy programme, Parekh, who was not involved in the study, said by email. Modified exercise and activity habits may also help avoid irritating the tissues around the heel that cause pain.

If they choose orthotics, patients should look for the cheapest option.

“It seems that patients can attempt to provide some relief to their plantar heel pain using cheaper, readily available orthotics found in grocery stores, online, and stores in their community,” Parekh added. “Based on this study, it appears that the cost of a custom orthotic, which can reach hundreds of dollars, is not medically necessary.”

HELSINKI — Finns have long been perceived as taciturn and introverted people in a country known for its dark, cold winters and high suicide rate. Today, they are also considered the world’s happiest.

In the just released 2018 UN World Happiness Report, Finland took the top spot followed by its Scandinavian neighbours and Switzerland, the Netherlands, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.

“When we heard about it, we thought it was a mistake,” laughed Ulla-Maija Rouhiainen, a 64-year-old retiree living in Helsinki.

The UN report found that Finland and the other countries at the top of the rankings all performed well on key issues that support well-being: income, healthy life expectancy, social support, freedom, trust and generosity.

Finns’ happiness, as often seen in acclaimed Finnish director Aki Kaurismaki’s emotionless films, is based on the fact that their basic needs are being met.

For philosopher Frank Martela, life satisfaction depends on how well a country’s institutions function, social equality, freedom, lack of corruption, trust in government and in each other.

Finland excels in each of these areas. Wage gaps are narrow, and the annual median salary in 2015 was 25,694 euros ($31,575). That compares to 21,970 euros in France and to 7,352 euros in Latvia the same year.

Along with Norway, Finland is the only European country to have succeeded in cutting the number of homeless people between 2014 and 2016, according to a study by the European Federation of National Organisations Working with the Homeless  published earlier this week.

Quality of life

Overall, Finns daily lives are generally harmonious.

They have an efficient healthcare system, flexible working hours and generous parental leave, making it possible to balance work and family life.

Neither the heavy tax burden, which pays for efficient public services, nor the centre-right government’s austerity measures, aimed at boosting economic recovery after years of slump, are questioned.

And they trust their welfare state: 81 per cent of Finns have confidence in the education system compared to an OECD average of 67 per cent. And 75 per cent trust the judicial system compared to the international organisation’s average of 55 per cent.

After spending 18 years abroad, Finland’s social welfare model drew Henrika Tonder, her French husband and their children back to the country.

“You can achieve a life balance between work and personal life where people finish work between 4 and 5 pm, which still leaves us time to do things for ourselves and to spend time with our families,” she told AFP.

In a nation where few people go to church, saunas, one of the most popular leisure activities, have replaced mass.

The 5.5 million Finns indulge in the steamy relaxation at least once a week.

“When you’re in a sauna, you feel really happy,” says 68-year-old Teri Kauranen, warming herself after a chilly dip in the sea.

“When it’s snowing I guess it might be hard to think that Finnish people might be the happiest in the world,” Frank Martela says with a grin.

Yet tough times require resilience, and Finns are known for their stoic attitude towards life, attributed to their cultural concept “sisu”: the ability to stand strong against adversity and recover from disaster.

If the UN definition of happiness ignored the main indicators and was based on measuring positive emotions, then Finland “would not reach the top ten”, according to Frank Martela.

The nation’s suicide rate (14.1 per 100,000 in 2014), consumption of alcohol and anti-depressants remains high.

PARIS — Do you prefer organic food? Did you study in Mexico? Do you like red shoes? Such bits of information about Facebook users may seem insignificant in isolation but, once harvested on a grand scale, make the internet giant billions. Here’s how:

‘If you are not paying, you are product’ 

Newbies signing up for Facebook are greeted with the promise that the social network is “free and always will be”. 

But if users do not pay, then how does Facebook generate its massive profits, nearly $16 billion last year, up 56 percent from 2016? The answer is: via advertising, which at the last count made up a whopping 98.5 per cent of the company’s total revenue.

Facebook puts into practice what marketing specialists have long summed up in the slogan: “If you’re not paying, you’re the product.”

The “product”, in this case, is all the personal data that users hand over to Facebook every time they react to a post by clicking “like”, add an emoji, post something themselves, or launch a search on the site.

Data, that treasure trove 

This mass of information is invaluable for online advertisers because they can use it to “target” people with messages that are more likely to get their attention because many of their tastes are already known.

This is a big selling point for Facebook, which gives advertisers detailed instructions on how to identify and target their preferred group.

“Find people based on traits such as age, gender, relationship status, education, workplace, job titles and more,” is one approach suggested by the company. “Find people based on what they’re into, such as hobbies, favourite entertainment and more”, is another.

“Two billion people use Facebook every month. With our powerful audience selection tools, you can target the people who are right for your business,” Facebook says.

It is all legal 

Facebook’s business model is perfectly legal: The network does not itself market any of the data, but instead sells access to the data to third parties, which often do not read or respect the terms and conditions of use.

This can lead to allegations of data breaches. The Cambridge Analytica firm is accused of misusing data of 50 million Facebook users for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, in violation of Facebook’s policies.

Facebook also only uses what users freely divulge about themselves.

“Facebook does not look for anything beyond what you yourself have put on the web, and that’s the user’s responsibility,” said Gaspard Koenig, head of GenerationLibre, a French think tank.

“But it’s all done in a way that people can’t change those terms of use,” he said.

Facebook does allow users to restrict advertisers’ access to their personal data in the Settings page of their account. This will not remove all ads, just the ones specifically targeted at them.

SAN FRANCISCO — Many Facebook users rely on the social network to figure out what is going on in the world. But what if the world Facebook shows them is wildly distorted?

That’s the question raised after a former employee of a data mining firm that worked for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign alleged the company used Facebook to bombard specific individuals with misinformation in hopes of swaying their political views.

The accusations raised alarm across the Atlantic on Monday, sparking an investigation into the firm, Cambridge Analytica, by the United Kingdom’s Information Commissioner’s Office. In the US, Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat-Oregon, sent a letter asking Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg whether the social media giant was aware of other data violations on its platform, and why it failed to take action sooner.

The controversy drove Facebook’s stock price down nearly 7 per cent on Monday, suggesting that investors are feeling skittish about the regulatory liabilities of a company that has spent the last year dogged by questions of fake news and Russian propaganda.

The scope of Facebook’s problems ballooned after Christopher Wylie, a political strategist who used to work for Cambridge Analytica, alleged on NBC’s “Today” show on Monday that the firm believed that if it could “capture every channel of information around a person and then inject content around them, you can change their perception of what’s actually happening”.

By mining Facebook user data, Wylie said the company could tailor the ads and articles individual users would see — a practice he calls “informational dominance”.

In a video secretly recorded by Britain’s Channel 4, Mark Turnbull, managing director of Cambridge Analytica’s political division, suggests users targeted by the firm would not know their online experience was being manipulated.

“We just put information into the bloodstream of the Internet… and then watch it grow, give it a little push every now and again … like a remote control,” he said. “It has to happen without anyone thinking, ‘that’s propaganda,’ because the moment you think ‘that’s propaganda,’ the next question is, ‘who’s put that out?’”

Turnbull, according to Channel 4, also bragged about the firm’s practice of recording politicians in compromising situations with bribes and sex workers.

In a statement sent to The Los Angeles Times, Cambridge Analytica accused Channel 4 of entrapment and rejected the allegations made in the report. In a separate statement, also issued on Monday, the firm said it did not carry out “personality targeted advertising” for President Donald Trump’s campaign.

The company obtained the Facebook data from millions of accounts through a Cambridge University psychology professor who had permission to gather information on users of the social media platform, but violated Facebook guidelines by passing it on to a third party for commercial purposes. Although Cambridge Analytica said in a news release over the weekend that it deleted this data as soon as it learned it broke Facebook’s rules, Wylie alleged that the firm continued to use the information.

What’s worrisome about Cambridge’s alleged practice, say social media and psychology experts, is that it works on even the most rational of people.

“Attribution theory teaches us that if you hear the same thing from multiple sources, then you start believing that it might be true even if you originally questioned it,” said Karen North, a social media professor at the University of Southern California who has also studied psychology.

In Cambridge Analytica’s case, Wylie on Monday accused the firm of going beyond simply serving targeted ads to people on Facebook. He alleged that the firm “works on creating a web of disinformation” so that unwitting consumers are confronted with the same lies and false stories both on and off Facebook.

“Even if you thought it was just one biased person or one paid ad, when you start to see it everywhere, you start thinking there’s a critical mass of people or experts that buy into the same position,” North said. “You start to believe there must be a groundswell of support for it.”

The ability to target ads at individuals isn’t unique to Facebook. But what makes the social media giant’s role profound is the breadth and depth of information it collects and the sheer number of people who use the service. Last year 67 per cent of Americans told Pew Research that they get at least some of their news on social media. In 2016, 64 per cent of those who got their news from social media got it from only one source — most commonly Facebook.

Since the 2012 presidential campaign, Facebook has been the “No. 1 destination” for digital media strategists looking to influence politics, according to Laura Olin, a digital strategist who ran social media strategy for former president Barack Obama’s reelection campaign.

Prior to that election, campaigns spread their focus among Facebook, Twitter and traditional media outlets, she said. But in 2012, three things became clear:

— People were spending more of their online time on Facebook than anywhere else.

— It reached a broader demographic than its competitors.

— Ads could be targeted more effectively on Facebook than on other platforms.

The Obama campaign that year was able to aim advertisements and messages at voters based on gender, location and existing political beliefs.

“We showed people what it could look like,” said Olin, who ran Obama’s Facebook pages during the campaign. 

If you are the type of traveller who worries about catching the flu or another dreaded disease from a fellow airline passenger, a new study should put your mind at ease.

If a plane takes off with one infected flier, it is likely to land on the other side of the country with only 1.7 infected fliers, researchers found.

What you really need to watch out for is a flight attendant with a cough or runny nose. A single one of them can infect 4.6 passengers during a transcontinental flight.

A group that dubbed itself the FlyHealthy Research Team came to these conclusions after flying back and forth from Atlanta to the West Coast on 10 flights and paying extremely close attention to the movements in the economy-class portion of the cabin.

Ten researchers boarded each flight and spaced themselves in pairs five to seven rows apart, sitting in seats on opposite sides of the aisle. From these prime vantage points, they took copious notes on who went where. Then they recorded each step in an iPad app.

Over the course of the 10 flights — which lasted between three hours and 31 minutes and five hours and 13 minutes — several patterns emerged:

— Passengers seated along the aisle were much more likely to move about the cabin than passengers seated next to a window. Overall, 57 per cent of those in window seats stayed put for their entire flight, compared with 48 per cent of those in middle seats and 20 per cent of those in aisle seats.

— There were two main reasons for people to get up during the flight — to go to the lavatory or to access the overhead bin.

— Among all 1,296 passengers on all 10 flights, 84 per cent had “close contact” with another passenger seated more than 1 metre away. The typical number of such contacts was 44, and they tended to last for 24 seconds. For most travellers, these encounters added up to between 18 and 98 minutes, with a median time of 47 minutes.

— Crew members typically spent 67 minutes — about one-third of their flight time — “in contact with passengers”, the researchers wrote. However, their total amount of contact with passengers added up to 1,149 “person-minutes” on a typical flight, compared with only 206 minutes of contact with fellow crew members.

The researchers used all this data to simulate what would happen if a passenger in seat 14C (an aisle seat) were sick. To be conservative, they used a transmission rate that was four times higher than a real-life example from 1977, when 54 passengers and crew were forced to sit on the tarmac for 4.5 hours, and 38 of them became sick with an influenza-like illness as a result.

Even under these circumstances, the odds that a single passenger would start an outbreak were extremely low.

For the 11 closest passengers — those seated in rows 13, 14 or 15, in seats A through D — the odds of being infected were “high”, the researchers wrote. But for everyone else on the plane, the odds of being sickened by the person seated in 14C were less than 0.03.

For the plane as whole, the simulations showed that on average, only 0.7 additional passengers would become sick over the course of the cross-country flight.

The researchers repeated their work with simulations that placed sick passengers in other seats. In the worst-case scenario, only two people became infected as a result of their in-flight exposure to another passenger.

A sick flight attendant was another story, however.

Since these crew members move all around the cabin and get close to so many passengers, they have much more opportunity to spread disease-causing germs. The researchers calculated that one sick crew member would infect 4.6 passengers, on average, even though these simulations used a lower transmission rate.

“A crew member is not likely to come to work while being extremely sick,” the researchers explained. “If she or he came to work, she or he would be more likely to take medication to reduce or eliminate coughing.”

That may seem like wishful thinking, but tests of airplane germiness revealed the cabins were so clean that they were unlikely to have been serviced by sick workers.

Over the 10 flights, the researchers took 229 samples of cabin air and swabs of surfaces such as tray tables, seat belt buckles and lavatory door handles. None of those samples contained genetic evidence for any of 18 common respiratory viruses — a striking finding considering that eight of the flights occurred during flu season.

The researchers cautioned that their results could only be applied only to transcontinental flights on planes with a single aisle and three seats on either side. (All of the planes in this study were Boeing 757s or 737s.)

Passengers would likely behave differently on shorter-hop flights or on longer-haul flights from one continent to another. That would affect the disease transmission dynamics in the cabin, as would other cabin configurations with more aisles (and thus fewer seats that are far from an aisle).

The FlyHealthy team also noted that their simulations included only transmission by droplet — cases of germs spreading via cough or sneeze, for instance. They did not try to model the transmission of “virus-laden particles”, which can travel further and linger longer.

Even the most powerful supercomputers have trouble performing the calculations necessary to take these into account, they explained.

Their study was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

A dash of cumin or dill might help convince high school students to load up their plate with vegetables during lunchtime in the cafeteria, a small study suggests. 

Researchers got about 100 high school students in rural Pennsylvania to taste a variety of plain vegetables seasoned with just oil and salt and then try the same vegetables flavoured with different spice blends. Participants rated how well they liked each dish and then indicated whether they preferred the plain or spiced up recipe. 

Students liked broccoli, cauliflower, vegetable dip and black beans mixed with corn better when recipes included a spice blend, the study found. 

When forced to choose between plain vegetables and vegetables seasoned with spice blends, students preferred the spicy versions for corn and peas, broccoli, vegetable dip, black beans with corn and cauliflower, the study also found. 

“This is important because we really need to make sure we are focusing on improving the vegetables served in schools to make sure students take interest in eating them,” said lead study author Juliana Fritts of Pennsylvania State University in University Park. 

“Vegetable intake is still SO low in adolescents and adults, and these are so important for health, so we really still need to be working harder at either making vegetables tastier or encouraging people to purchase and eat more vegetables,” Fritts said by e-mail. 

Teen girls should eat four servings of vegetables a day, and teen boys should eat five, US dietary guidelines recommend. One serving of vegetables could be one cup of leafy greens, a half-cup of cooked or raw veggies, or three-fourths of a cup of vegetable juice. 

Most students surveyed at the start of the study said the taste, the serving size, and the food’s appearance were “very important” characteristics of school meals. 

Roughly three in four students said disliking the taste stopped them from eating vegetables. More than half also said they did not like the vegetables served in school. 

Most students were familiar with common spices like cinnamon, garlic powder, black pepper, chili powder, oregano and basil, surveys also found. Very few of them were familiar with cumin, allspice, curry and sage. 

The students tasted different vegetables, sometimes plain and other times with added spices, during lunch periods on different school days. Cafeterias served canned or frozen vegetables similar to what they would normally prepare for school lunches. 

Sensory scientists and research chefs at the McCormick Science Institute, which funded the study, developed the recipes for the experiment. McCormick makes spices sold in grocery stores and to industrial and commercial customers. 

One limitation of the study is that participation was voluntary and it is possible students who agreed to sample different vegetables had different preferences or opinions about veggies than the kids who declined to participate, researchers note in the journal Food Quality and Preference. 

Another drawback is that researchers did not test whether a stronger preference for vegetables with spices translated into teens actually eating more vegetables. 

Still, the approach tested in the study would be a low-cost and simple strategy to try in school cafeterias because it is using products that are already staples of school lunch programmes, said Gregory Madden, a researcher at Utah State University in Logan. 

“Increasing the variety of vegetables served can modestly increase consumption,” Madden, who was not involved in the study, said by e-mail. “A more effective strategy is to get rid of competing foods on the plate.” 

Launched back in 2012 as Volvo’s gambit into the more premium end of family hatchback segment, the V40 effectively replaced its erstwhile C30 coupe/hatchback stablemate.

A larger, more practical and mainstream car than the stylish and leftfield C30 it effectively replaced, the V40 competes with cars like the Audi A3, Infiniti Q30, Mercedes-Benz A-Class and BMW 1-Series.

Updated with new engines since first launched with Ford-derived power units, the V40 is available in Jordan in T3 guise with Volvo’s in-house developed turbocharged 1.5-litre engine.

Snouty and sophisticated

The last Volvo built using a modified Ford Global C platform since the Blue Oval brand sold the Swedish auto maker to China’s Geely, the V40 will remain the last. Sharing its underpinnings with the superb handling and highly acclaimed current generation Ford Focus, the Volvo V40, however, carves out a separate identity, with an emphasis on refinement, comfort and luxury. A more mature counterpoint to the edgy Focus, the V40’s design is stylish and sophisticated, with an urgent wedgy and jutting demeanour.

Framed by an x-like crease lines converging from the base of its A-pillars and front bumper lip, the V40’s snouty fascia features a slim wide grille flanked by wraparound headlights recessed further back. With a sharply rising waistline, sculpted bodywork and rakishly descending roofline with prominent tailgate spoiler, the V40’s urgent stance alternately, but vaguely, remind one of both a sporty coupe and muscular SUV. From rear view, its blacked out lower and upper fascias, boomerang-like light clusters and jutting bodywork further lend to its dramatic disposition.

Frugal and flexible

Powered by Volvo’s in-house developed turbocharged direct injection 1.5-litre 4-cylinder engine driving the front wheels, the V40 T3 develops 150BHP at 5000rpm and 184lb/ft torque throughout a broad 1700-4000rpm rev band. Comparatively low revving, despite a typically high-revving over-square design with bigger bore and shallower stroke, the V40 T3’s engine is efficient, smooth and versatile in mid-range. Accelerating through the 0-100km/h benchmark in 8.3-seconds and good for a 210km/h maximum, it returns low 5.5l/100km fuel consumption and modest CO2 emissions on the combined cycle. 

Small but potent, the T3’s provides quicker and more responsive performance than expected, and carries its approximate 1.4-tonne with confidence when operating in its flexible mid-range sweet spot. After a brief moment of turbo lag from idling, the T3 comes alive with a muscular shove and tug of the steering as its turbo spools and tyres scramble to put power down to tarmac. Capable of 6000rpm but not particularly eager revving beyond 5000rpm, the T3 is at its best being hustled along in mid-range, where it is welling with torque. 

Supple and subtle

A different proposition to the Ford Focus with which it shares a basic platform, the Volvo V40 T3 emphasises comfort and ride pliancy, if not quite the same hard-edged handling directness and steering tactility. Soaking imperfections with suppleness, the V40 is admirably forgiving fluent over some of Amman’s worst sudden potholes once speed picks up somewhat. Smaller, high frequency imperfections are also dispatched very well, but with slightly more firmness. Stable at highway speed, the V40 is smooth, refined and forgiving. Meanwhile, compressions and crests are dispatched with settled rebound control. 

Composed and comfortable, yet, alert and balanced threading through winding switchbacks, the V40 leans slightly more than more overtly sporting, harder sprung hatchbacks, but seems adept, eager and adjustable. Turning tidy into a corner with correctable understeer setting in only if pushed too harshly, it seems to respond well to turning early and riding close to an apex. Lifting off the throttle to shift weight rearwards and outwards, the V40 settles nicely into a corner as one points it towards the exit and comes back on throttle early.

Classy comfort

Maneuverable through snaking lanes and city streets, the V40’s quick ratio 2.73-turn steering is well damped, refined and light. Subtle rather than direct or meaty, it weighs up nicely through corners and offers decent intuition and feel. Ample front visibility allows one to easily place the car. Reversing visibility is not as generous owing to a rising waistline and descending roofline, but reversing camera and sensors well compensate. Meanwhile, its six-speed automatic is slick and smooth, but could be more responsive to kickdown at low speed, only when in default driving mode.

Classy and comfortable, the V40 has an ambiance of quality and stylish understatement, with intuitive layouts and functions, good leather finish and equipment levels, including curved “floating” centre console. With clear instrumentation, highly ergonomic driving position and chunky steering wheel, it is comfortable and supportive for long distances. Front space is generous, but rear headroom is not particularly generous — at least not for large, tall adults with panoramic sunroof, as tested. Well equipped, Volvo’s City Safety driver-assistance system is standard, and can detect, brake and prevent frontal collision at up to 50km/h.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 1.5-litre, turbocharged, transverse 4-cylinders

Bore x stroke: 82 x 70.9mm

Compression ratio: 10.5:1

Valve-train: 16-valve, DOHC, direct injection, variable valve timing

Gearbox: 6-speed automatic, front-wheel-drive

Ratios: 1st 4.044:1; 2nd 2.371:1; 3rd 1.556:1; 4th 1.159:1; 5th 0.852:1; 6th 0.672:1

Reverse/final drive: 3.193:1/3.234

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 150 (152) [112] @5000rpm

Specific power: 100.1BHP/litre

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 184 (250) @1700-4000rpm

Specific torque: 166.9Nm/litre

Rev limit: 6000rpm

0-100km/h: 8.3-seconds

Top speed: 210km/h

Fuel consumption, combined: 5.5-litres/100km 

CO2 emissions, combined: 129g/km 

Fuel capacity: 62-litres

Length: 4370mm

Width: 1867mm

Height: 1420mm

Wheelbase: 2647mm

Overhang, F/R; 908/815mm

Track, F/R: 1559/1546mm

Ground clearance: 144mm

Aerodynamic drag co-efficient: 0.29-0.32

Headroom, F/R: 984/932mm

Loading height: 532mm

Kerb weight: 1391-1486kg

Steering: Electric-assisted rack & pinion

Turning Circle: 10.8-metres

Lock-to-lock: 2.73-turns

Suspension, F/R: MacPherson struts/multi-link

Brakes: Ventilated discs, 278 x 25mm/discs, 280 x 11mm

Braking distance, 100-0km/h: 37-metres

Tyres: 205/50R17

Price, on-the-road: JD29,900

VALENCIENNES, France — Wearing a big grin, Marame clambers into the small electric sports car and drives off — to the operating theatre. 

The five-year-old girl is a patient at the public hospital in the northern French city of Valenciennes, which has begun using toys rather than drugs to alleviate children’s fears of surgery.

The new scheme for youngsters aged 18 months to eight years is based on similar programmes in the United States and Australia.

The playful approach, implemented in December, has wiped out the need for anti-anxiety medication often administered before an operation, according to the hospital.

“It allows [children] to arrive in the operating theatre in a fun manner and avoids the stress associated with the context,” anaesthetist Fanny Defrancq told AFP.

Sat on a hospital bed, Marame looks worried ahead of her surgery to remove a metal pin inserted into her arm after she broke her elbow. 

But then a nurse comes in and leads her to three small vehicles parked in the corridor.

“Which one do you prefer?” the nurse asks Marame, dressed in a blue hospital gown and with a white cap covering her hair.

After carefully inspecting the models and testing out their horns, the little girl gets behind the wheel of a black racing car and cruises off under the envious glances of other young patients. 

A remote control in hand, a medical staff member steers Marame down hallways and around corners all the way to the operating theatre.

“She doesn’t even take any notice of me,” says her bemused mother, Hassiba Mazouzi, after giving her a last hug.

“Last time [she went into surgery] I cried,” Mazouzi says. “But now... she went without crying, without any problem. So frankly, I’m happy too.”

‘You’re the hero’

Doctor Nabil El Beki, who heads the emergency unit in Valenciennes, insists the programme is not a “game”.

A study is under way to “scientifically assess” the benefits of the project, he told AFP.

“We know that anxiolytic drugs reduce anxiety but they also intensify the anaesthetic and delay the waking-up process. Avoiding them is better for the recovery,” he said.

Julie Dupuis, whose 18-month-old son, Issa, needed testicle surgery, also hailed the hospital’s novel scheme. 

“He’s like at home, he’s playing and it’s nice to see him like that,” she told AFP. 

“It’s reassuring for me too. I feel less stressed about his going into the surgery.”

Other clinics in France are also experimenting with ways of avoiding pre-surgery medication for children.

A hospital in the western city of Rennes has developed an app called “You’re the hero” for children aged three to 10.

The young patients search for hidden objects in a virtual room, while they are being brought to the operating theatre on a stretcher. 

The distraction method has seen a major drop in children’s anxiety and led to an 80-per cent decrease in the use of medication, the Rennes hospital said.

“Children’s self-evaluation with emoticons showed that anxiety curves were very low and stable,” anaesthetist Severine Delahaye told AFP.