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LONDON – Based on two dozen clinical trials, US researchers find that expensive mattress covers make no difference in reducing dust mite allergies or their symptoms.

Up to 40 per cent of the world population has allergies, and dust mites are thought to be one of the most common causes. Doctors often tell patients to buy special mattress and pillow covers despite a lack of evidence they relieve the problem, the authors say.

“Based on this analysis which combines data from many different studies, there doesn’t seem to be any benefit to using dust mite covers to prevent allergic disease or to prevent symptoms,” lead author Whitney Arroyave told Reuters Health.

Arroyave, a researcher with the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine in New Orleans, and her colleagues combined results from 24 trials of methods to reduce dust mite exposure and prevent allergy signs and symptoms

The study team found that use of the mattress covers had a large effect in reducing exposure to house mite dust levels — about 20 per cent — but this reduction had no statistically significant impact on house dust mite sensitisation, or symptoms such as wheezing, asthma, runny nose or dermatitis.

The results are published in the Annals of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology.

Arroyave said it isn’t clear why dust mite covers don’t seem to be effective in relieving allergies, but it’s possible they don’t lower mite levels enough to improve symptoms, or maybe beds aren’t the main source of exposure for the dust mites.

“Or maybe it’s not the dust mite at all — maybe they’re not causing the problems,” she said.

Arroyave said that dust mite covers cost around $100, which is a burden, particularly for very low-income people.

“It’s expensive to ask them to pay for this,” she said.

She added that other researchers have done bigger studies, looking not just at dust mite covers, but all kinds of dust mite prevention measures.

“They didn’t find any results either,” Arroyave said, “so I think we’re just saying, you know, look at this again — maybe we need to revisit the recommendations.” Dr Samuel Friedlander, an allergist with University Hospitals Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital and Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland, Ohio, said he doesn’t plan on giving up recommending dust mite mattress covers.

“What’s important to understand is that avoidance measures are very important for allergy controls, and one of the three ways we treat allergies by avoiding your allergies, medication and immunotherapy or allergy shots,” said Friedlander, who was not involved in the new study.

“This article is helpful to show a single measure to control allergies is not always effective — we have to use multiple measures,” he said.

“So the take home message for me is that dust mite covers are still very important, but they should be part of a comprehensive treatment plan,” he said.

Researchers try to modify one thing at a time, to show a cause and effect, but in real life, allergists make multiple recommendations necessary to resolve patients’ symptoms, Friedlander said.

“If you do a single thing like dust mite covers, but you’re still exposed to dust from other sources in your house or work, or if you have other allergies like pets or pollens, then of course a single measure like dust mite covers is not going to be effective,” he said.

Friedlander said he doesn’t want people to think that dust mite covers are not important.

“I think the point is that we need to make multiple recommendations to relieve multiple allergies that our patients are allergic to,” he said. “Dust mite covers are very important, but they have to be part of a comprehensive treatment plan.”

It’s important to see an allergist to determine what your allergies are, Friedlander added, so the allergist can make a treatment plan to take care of all of your allergies.

BARCELONA – Bigger than a telephone yet smaller than a personal computer, tablets were supposed to usher in a new world of mobility; yet they have hardly budged off the couch.

Four years after their launch, tablets remain overwhelmingly stuck at home and connected by WiFi, frustrating mobile operators who are deprived of a potential new source of revenue.

At the February 24-27 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, manufacturers such as Japan’s Sony, China’s Lenovo and Taiwan’s Asus again unveiled a range of new tablet models, now considered essential to their mobile device offerings.

Sony Mobile revealed its Xperia Z2, proudly describing it as “the world’s slimmest and lightest waterproof tablet”.

“It is perfect if you want to take it into the bathtub, to the beach, to the pool,” Sony Mobile official Almos Szabo said at the Japanese manufacturer’s stand in the world’s largest mobile industry fair.

The ease with which tablets can be used outside is always stressed by manufacturers, said Julian Jest, analyst at the technology research house Informa.

“During the last iPad launch, Apple showed a promotional video with thousands of different ways that people can use their iPad including mountain bikers, surfers, doctors,” Jest said.

“I think that is how they would like to show the iPad is being used, but it is mainly in the home, streaming media, streaming movies.”

According to Informa, only 20 per cent of tablets are connected to the mobile network, the rest relying on WiFi.

The classic profile of a tablet user, is actually a person lounging on the sofa watching videos or playing electronic games.

In 2012, a poll by Google showed that only 21 per cent of users took their tablets out of the home.

It comes down to costs 

Technology research group Gartner Inc. found in a September 2013 survey that people use their tablets mostly between 7pm and 10pm, probably while watching television.

Tablets are not typically used as a mobile accessory carried around by owners, said Lawrence Lundy, analyst at Frost & Sullivan technology consultants.

“We see that a lot of the tablets are being used for video consumption because it is mainly at home and it does not have a 3G connection,” Lundy said.

For mobile operators, that means significantly less revenue than they had hoped for.

“It primarily comes down to costs, I think,” said Nick Dillon, analyst at the research group, Ovum.

Analysts said the operators have not been sufficiently creative, often proposing plans that are as costly as those for smartphones.

“I am not sure if operators see it as a challenge or a blessing,” said Carolina Milanesi, analyst at consumer research group Kantar Worldpanel.

“It seems clear that tablets are mostly used as entertainment devices which would suggest a potential bandwidth drain on video consumption,” she said.

In other words, if all the tablets were connected, 3G networks would be quickly overloaded.

Tablets may finally break free of the home, however, as sales grow of mini-tablets, which are easier to carry around. 

Manufacturers launched a string of such devices in Barcelona.

Chinese manufacturer Huawei showed off its MediaPad X1 and Finnish maker Nokia revealed its XL, for example, both of which will allow users to make telephone calls, too.

SEOUL, South Korea — Expect sharper, clearer selfies this year.

Samsung Electronics Co. has beefed up the camera in its Galaxy S5 smartphone due for April release and added smarter camera software, following Sony and Nokia in their upgrades of handset cameras. 

The tweaks mean smartphone photos, ubiquitous nowadays because of social media such as Facebook and Twitter, will be closer in quality to images captured by digital single-lens reflex cameras, also known as DSLR.

How to give a super-thin smartphone the power of a DSLR camera that can capture moving images with clarity is a key challenge for the likes of Samsung, Sony, Nokia and LG as they try to differentiate their offerings in a crowded handset market. Their efforts to make smartphone cameras more powerful have taken a toll on the compact, point-and-shoot camera market, but catching up to the high-end cameras used by professional photographers had appeared a far-fetched ambition.

The gap is getting narrower thanks mainly to improvements in camera software and other technologies, but may never close completely.

The global wireless show that wraps up in Barcelona on Thursday showed smartphone makers using software trickery to offset their camera weaknesses: inferior image sensors and lack of optical zoom lens. The companies are also making photo manipulation on the phone easier to learn than manually controlling DSLR cameras.

Instead of touting their smartphones as thinner, lighter or bigger screened, Samsung, Sony and LG were boasting how their latest mobile gadgets can record ultra-high definition videos known as 4K, take big-pixel pictures without a second of delay and capture clearer images even at a low-light settings and when a subject is moving.

One trend in smartphone camera this year will be phase detection auto focus, previously available only in cameras with interchangeable lens, said Chris Chute, a director at research company IDC.

Samsung showcased the feature in the Galaxy S5, the latest version of the South Korean company’s flagship smartphone. It reduces the time it takes to focus on a subject to 0.3 second so even when the subject is moving, the image can be captured with a sharp edge, said Seshu Madhavapeddy, Samsung’s senior vice president for US product and technology.

“Now that phones are starting to have this, consumers will only be more likely to use phones for not just everyday pictures, but more and more for special event photography,” Chute said.

With the 16 megapixel rear camera in the Galaxy S5, it is possible to preview the result of applying high dynamic range imaging to pictures. HDR imaging usually helps create better pictures in extreme lighting conditions but with digital cameras, it is processed after snapping a photo.

Samsung and LG also showed how their high-end smartphones can selectively blur and sharpen a picture by tapping the area a user wants to adjust. This feature, which adds depth to a photo, was a major trait in DSLR cameras. While DSLR cameras did this trick in the image’s raw data by changing the lens aperture, Samsung’s S5 and LG’s G Pro 2 do it through software. Nokia and Sony said their latest smartphones have similar features.

Nokia is also betting big on powerful camera features to lure buyers from Samsung and Apple Inc. Among Nokia’s major products is the Lumia 1020 smartphone announced last year, which can take 38 megapixel images. Larger pixels in the camera don’t necessarily mean a better picture, which also depends on the lens and image sensors. But bigger pixels allow taking photos with sufficient details for poster-size prints, something that professional photographers are keen on. Other high-end smartphone cameras are around or below 20 megapixels.

Sony’s Xperia Z2 smartphone, announced at the Mobile World Congress, has a rear camera with 20.7 megapixels, same as the predecessor Z1, but Sony upgraded the camera’s video-recording power to 4K. The Z2 is also equipped with technologies that allow users capture to moving subjects blur-free.

Smartphone screens that are so big that they aren’t portable anymore; pixel resolution and image sharpness that surpass the resolution of the human eye; this is what manufacturers are doing to keep selling — even if it doesn’t necessarily make sense.

In their aggressive war to win market shares manufacturers of digital devices are going to extremes when it comes to the quality and the size of the display or the screen. Often the whole matter is blown out of proportion. 

As long as hands and pockets are what they are, screens bigger than 4.5 inches (11.4cm) (diagonal) or so can’t really be considered as portable. Even if you are willing to carry them around and press them against your ear to talk, putting up with the strange look, you lose the essential, the original traits of the device: convenience and portability.

The just-announced Samsung Galaxy S5 sports a 5.1” (13cm)screen, and even the otherwise conservative Nokia has come up with a 5” (12.7cm) model, the brand new XL, the company’s flagship. 

Screen size is not the only battle manufacturers are fighting. Sharpness is another. However, most devices made after 2010 come with a quality of display and fine detail that equals or exceeds what the human eye is able to distinguish. Why then push for more? Just to keep selling?

Samsung’s Galaxy S5 comes with incredible density of 440 pixels per inch, providing unprecedented sharpness. This is four times more than what standard computer screens would deliver only 10 years ago.

Large, ultra-high-definition screens also come at a price, and it’s not only the initial purchase price that often rivals that of a laptop computer. Battery duration is negatively affected by all these excesses; this is a heavy price to pay. Wouldn’t you sacrifice a little screen resolution, especially when you can hardly notice it, for longer battery life?

Processor power and memory resources are additional issues. Understandably the larger the screen size, the higher the resolution and the more the processor has to work to produce the image. This results in less processing power and memory left for the programmes you want to run in the end. I for one would prefer a faster smartphone rather than one that has a too large screen.

Transposed to larger digital devices such as tablets, laptops and desktop computers the question of superlative screens takes an entirely different turn. Because we don’t really stuff such equipment in our pocket or press it against our ear — well, most of us at least — large screens are always welcome in these altogether different categories. Even if some would argue that tablets and laptops also are meant to be portable in a way, it’s definitely another kind, another level of portability here. 

Besides, even if we love to look at photos on a smartphone screen, we mainly enjoy these on larger devices. For slide show, for family album sharing and for photo processing, nothing beats a full size screen, and I don’t mean a 5” (12.7cm) smartphone but something that starts at 10” (25.4cm) at least, and preferably goes up to a good 22” (55.9cm).

LG, one of the main suppliers of quality screen for computers in Jordan, along with Samsung, Dell and Sony, has introduced this year absolutely gorgeous 22” (55.9) and 24” (61cm) monitors for computers and that sell between JD140 and JD180. Whether you are running a full-size desktop machine or a laptop, connect one of these monitors and immerse yourself in the beauty of truer-than-life images.

Only 10 or 15 years ago, we could only dream of such quality pictures on computers. And there’s no battery issue here since the machine is usually connected to the mains. The same goes for processing power, laptops and desktops have plenty of it today.

NEW YORK – Couch potatoes looking for a reason to forgo working out in the evening may no longer be able to use difficulty sleeping afterward as an excuse, according to a recent study.

Researchers found that people who exercised in the evening reported sleeping just as well as those who weren’t active in the hours before bed. People who worked out in the morning reported getting the best sleep, on average.

“Sleep recommendations suggest avoiding exercise prior to bed,” said Matthew Buman, lead author of the study from Arizona State University in Phoenix. “We found evidence to the contrary suggesting that individuals need not avoid exercise at night.”

He and his colleagues analysed responses collected from 1,000 adults participating in the 2013 National Sleep Foundation Sleep in America Poll. The telephone- and web-based questionnaire asked participants how well they felt they slept, how long they slept each night, how much time it took them to fall asleep, and whether they felt refreshed after waking up in the morning.

The poll also asked participants about their exercise habits, such as whether they worked out regularly and, if so, whether they were active in the morning, afternoon or evening. Evening was considered to be within four hours of going to sleep.

Based on the types of physical activity participants performed regularly, like tai chi, running or yard work, workouts were categorised by intensity as light, moderate or vigorous.

People who exercised vigorously in the morning were 88 per cent more likely to report good sleep quality than non-exercisers and 44 per cent less likely to say they woke up feeling unrefreshed.

Moderate-intensity morning exercisers were 53 per cent more likely to say they slept well overall, compared to people who didn’t exercise.

There was no difference in any of the sleep measures between moderate or vigorous evening exercisers and non-exercisers, according to findings published in the journal Sleep Medicine.

Experts said the study’s poll-based methods may not necessarily be the most accurate gauge of sleep quality, however.

“As strange as it may seem, self-reported sleep — whether good or bad — is not a very reliable indicator of what’s actually happening by objective measures with a person’s sleep,” Dr Matt Bianchi said. He directs the sleep laboratory at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston and was not involved in the new study.

“For example, only half of people with sleep apnoea will feel sleepy or non-refreshed about their sleep — and sleep apnoea is a fairly dramatic kind of sleep problem. I take with a grain of salt any ‘survey’-based studies such as this one,” Bianchi said.

Although the National Sleep Foundation’s sleep hygiene recommendations don’t preclude pre-bedtime workouts, they do advise sticking to relaxing exercises, such as yoga, in the evening hours.

Researchers said the online or printed resources to which some doctors direct patients advise against evening workouts.

“Generally, physicians do have patients get a sleep hygiene resource, and often not exercising close to bedtime will be on there,” said Dr James Mojica, director of the Spaulding Sleep Centre in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Mojica, who is also a sleep specialist at Massachusetts General Hospital, was not involved in the study.

LOS ANGELES  — Xbox One will soon be Twitchier than the PlayStation 4.

The popular video game broadcasting service Twitch is bringing a slew of fresh features to Microsoft’s newest console. An update next month will add the ability to live stream video games, join in on games with broadcasters, initiate game broadcasts with voice commands, archive game clips and watch Twitch streams broadcast from any device, including the PS4.

Previously, Xbox One users could only spectate Twitch streams and record game clips with the system’s Upload app.

“It’s complete integration,” said Emmett Shear, co-founder and CEO of Twitch. “It’s exciting because we’ve never had the ability to broadcast from a console like this with such a deep level of integration. The concept of being able to join a broadcasters’ party is really cool, and it’s another step in the direction of interacting more closely with broadcasters.”

The updated Twitch app will also include Twitch’s chat features and the ability for users to broadcast from their living rooms with Xbox One’s camera-based Kinect system. It’s scheduled to launch alongside the March 11 debut of “Titanfall”, the much-anticipated man-versus-machine shooter being released exclusively for Xbox One, Xbox 360 and PC.

It’s good news for Xbox One players, but what took so long?

The update is coming months after Microsoft Corp. rival Sony Corp. included Twitch streaming capabilities when it launched its PlayStation 4 ahead of the Xbox One last November. However, the PS4 version of Twitch — which Shear noted was crafted by Sony, not Twitch — only permits PS4 users to spectate other PS4s and doesn’t allow them to easily connect.

“That’s a very certain type of experience,” said Yusuf Mehdi, Microsoft’s vice president of marketing and strategy for Xbox. “For us, we thought that was too limiting for what our fans would want. Our fans really want the full next-gen service, so that’s why we decided to take our time, do it right and have it come out in this fashion.”

Twitch, which features one million live broadcasters and 45 million viewers a month, has become an ESPN for gamers. The service’s live and recorded broadcasts include such content as comically narrated clips of games, matches from seasoned e-sports athletes, “speed runs” — clips of players plowing through games — and streams of everyday gamers playing online.

“This will open up the social aspect of Xbox One in a new way,” Mehdi said. “The community of Twitch is huge, and this allows us to type into that, and frankly do something that’s never been done before on consoles. You’ll be able to broadcast to any device and consume anyone’s broadcast from any device. It’s a console experience unique to the Xbox One.”

Microsoft and Sony have both billed their latest consoles as more social and interactive machines with no technological barriers to sharing live game footage because the PS4 and Xbox One, which respectively sold 4.2 and 3 million units worldwide last year, don’t require additional technology like video capture hardware to stream content. It’s built in.

Twitch said last month that 20 per cent of its broadcasts between December 23 and January 3 were from PS4 owners and that more than 1.7 million streams have been broadcast through PS4 since the console’s November 15 launch. Shear said he hopes the new capabilities of Twitch’s app Xbox One will eventually come to other devices, including the PS4.

BARCELONA – A small band of upstarts is chipping away at Google’s mighty Android, hoping one day to overthrow the system that runs eight in 10 smartphones sold worldwide.

Mozilla’s Firefox OS and the Samsung-promoted Tizen staked a small claim to the market at the industry’s largest fair, the February 24-27 Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.

If there is a threat to Android’s dominance, however, it could emerge from a slowdown in saturated smartphone markets and the birth of a new interest in smart watches, bracelets and glasses, analysts say.

Android powered 78.4 per cent of all smartphones sold in 2013, according to industry analyst Gartner Inc. Apple’s iOS mopped up most of the rest, taking 15.6 per cent.

“There is little doubt that 2013 was the year of Android,” said a report by industry research house Strategy Analytics. 

“However, Android’s annual growth rate slowed to 62 per cent in 2013, its lowest level in the platform’s history,” it added.

“We expect Android’s growth to slow further in 2014 due to market saturation, and rivals like Microsoft or Firefox will be ready to pounce on any signs of a major slowdown for Android this year.”

California-based Mozilla would not disclose how many Firefox OS smartphones have been sold since the first such handset was launched last July.

In Barcelona, however, it announced that Firefox, which is targeting emerging markets, would power a new category of smartphones priced at around $25 (18 euros), and relying on integrated circuits made by Chinese electronics manufacturer Spreadtrum.

Mozilla also unveiled new Firefox OS devices, two smartphones made by China’s ZTE and five Alcatel OneTouch tablets.

“It is not enough to have two operating systems in the telecoms world,” Firefox chief operating officer Jay Sullivan told a news conference.

No ‘great success’ for Firefox 

Despite the buzz around Firefox, Greenwich Consulting senior partner Magnus Rehle said it had not seen “great success”.

Samsung, the world’s biggest smartphone manufacturer and leader of a consortium developing the rival Tizen operating system, could be a more important rival to Android.

“They have the muscle to do it. But what added value does it give to the consumer?”, asked Rehle. “Nothing, I would say.”

Samsung seems to be drawing the line at allowing Android to run other smart devices such as its newly unveiled smart watches.

On Sunday, it revealed a new smart watch, the Samsung Gear 2, which runs on Tizen, and boasts a camera, sports tracking software and even a heart rate monitor.

But even in smart watches, Android remains the king, powering 61 per cent of the roughly two million sold in 2013, according to Strategy Analytics.

Most of that growth, ironically, was due to the sales of Samsung’s first smart watch, the Samsung Gear, which relied on Android.

Android has several challengers in the smart watch industry including Firefox and Pepple Technology’s Pebble OS, which lets its own watches communicate with Apple’s iOS and Android, said Woody Oh, senior analyst at Strategy Analytics.

“But none of them are a major threat at this stage because of their relatively limited ecosystems and modest retail presence,” Oh said.

The main challenge to Android’s dominance in smart watches could come from Apple iOS, Microsoft, and perhaps Tizen or the Chinese state-sponsored COS –– or China Operating System, he added.

“These four brands have the potential scale or marketing power to offer a credible alternative to Google’s popular platform.”

BARCELONA — Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy S5 smartphone will be at least the third to have a fingerprint sensor for security but it’s alone in letting you use that for general shopping, thanks to a partnership with PayPal.

The sensor brings convenience for entering passcodes and could encourage more people to lock their phones. But fingerprint security isn’t foolproof.

Here’s what to know as you consider whether to place your trust in it:

How does it work?

The S5 has a sensor on the home button, just like Apple’s iPhone 5s. On the S5, you train the phone to recognise your finger by swiping on it seven times. You also enter a passcode as a backup, so you’re not locked out if the device doesn’t recognise your print. On the iPhone, that can happen if your hand is greasy or wet, for instance.

The phone then converts the fingerprint information into a mathematical representation, known as a hash, and stores that in a secured location on the device. Samsung says that information stays on the device and is never shared.

When you want to unlock your phone, you simply swipe on the home button. A hash is again created and must match the one the phone already has. Otherwise, the phone stays locked.

You can do this with up to three fingers on the S5, compared with five on the iPhone. On the S5, you must swipe down. On the iPhone, you simply hold your finger on the home button, and you can do that sideways or upside down as well.

What can you do with the fingerprint?

All three devices let you skip the passcode and unlock the phone.

You can also train the HTC phone to open a particular app automatically depending on the finger used. Apple lets you use the finger to authenticate purchases through its iTunes store, but it’s keeping the system off-limits to outside parties. Samsung lets you make PayPal payments.

If you’re at a retail store that accepts mobile payments through PayPal’s app, for instance, you can use the fingerprint instead of your usual password. That’s also the case with online transactions using PayPal on the phone. The hash doesn’t get sent to PayPal. Rather, the phone verifies for PayPal that the fingerprint has been verified.

Anuj Nayar, senior director for global initiatives with eBay Inc.’s PayPal business, says there’s usually a trade-off between security and convenience. Beef up security, and it’s tough to use. Make it convenient, and open up windows for breaches. With fingerprint IDs, he says, you can have both.

Are you really getting security?

It’s more secure than not locking your phone with a passcode at all. It’s also more secure than using a four-digit passcode, as there’s a greater chance of guessing that than the particular hash used. But there’s never a guarantee.

Shortly after Apple started selling the iPhone 5s, a German hacking group said it managed to bypass the fingerprint system by using a household printer and some wood glue to create an artificial copy of a genuine fingerprint.

The group said the fingerprint ID system was easy to trick, though it’s not something easily pulled off in the real world. You need to have that specific phone and the fingerprint, for one thing. And then you compromise only that one phone.

Security experts point out that once a finger’s compromised, you can’t replace it the way you can a passcode. That doesn’t mean someone can use an S5 breach to unlock an iPhone, though, as the hash formulas used are typically proprietary and kept secret.

But it’s not a threat to take lightly, either.

Should you use it?

PayPal officials point out that behind the scenes, it’s still performing the usual anti-fraud checks. If the account is used to buy a television in California just five minutes after you buy coffee in New York, it’ll suspect something is up.

If the phone is lost or stolen, or your fingerprint is somehow compromised, you can contact PayPal to de-register that device from future use.

Drew Blackard, director of US product planning at Samsung Electronics Co., says other forms of authentication have their flaws, too. Android phones let you swipe a pattern on the screen in lieu of a passcode, but Blackard points out it’s possible to guess the pattern by examining the screen for smudges.

It’s not bulletproof security, but it’s more secure than existing methods, he says.

Despite the risks, Bennett says he sees potential.

“If it results in more people locking their phone,” he says, “it improves security.”

PARIS – Investigations in nine European countries have given statistical backing to claims that patients’ lives may be at risk when nurses are overworked, specialists said on Wednesday.

Published in The Lancet, the study touches on a sensitive topic in countries where health budgets are under strain.

Researchers looked at survival rates after surgery in 300 hospitals, and matched these against the workload and education of their nurses.

They looked at data from the surgeries of more than 420,000 patients aged over 50 who had common operations such as hip or knee replacement, appendix removal or gall bladder surgery.

The number of patients who died in hospital within 30 days of admission was low, on average. It ranged from 1 to 1.5 per cent depending on the country.

Within a country, though, the death rate varied widely according to the hospital. In some hospitals it could be less than 1 per cent, in others more than 7 per cent.

Two big factors correlated with higher mortality –– a bigger workload for nurses and a lower level of nurses’ education.

Each patient added to a nurse’s workload increased the risk of a patient dying by 7 per cent. Every 10 per cent increase in bachelor’s degree educated nurses was associated with a 7 per cent fall in this risk.

“Nurse staffing cuts to save money might adversely affect patient outcomes,” said the paper. “An increased emphasis on bachelor’s education for nurses could reduce preventable hospital deaths.”

It offered this statistical scenario: In hospitals where nurses cared for six patients each, and 60 per cent of them had bachelor’s degrees, the risk of patient death was nearly a third lower than in places where nurses cared for eight patients and 30 per cent had a degree.

The investigation was carried out in Belgium, England, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

The findings in Europe closely mirror a previous probe in the United States, said Linda Aiken, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Nursing, who led the research.

“Our data suggest that a safe level of hospital nursing staff might help to reduce surgical mortality, and challenge the widely held view that nurses’ experience is more important than their education,” she said in a press release.     

What a wonderful scientific world we live in these days where medical advancement has ensured we have longer, pain free lives. Most of the diseases can be diagnosed and treated by the innate skills of the physicians and surgeons. Jordan is a country especially popular as a healthcare hub in the Middle East, where scores of patients troop in on a regular basis. The doctors are exceptionally brilliant and have a cure for almost all bodily ailments. 

There is no dearth of psychologists and psychiatrists here too. The shrinks, as they are commonly called in colloquial slang, are people who look after our mental well-being. So if one is suffering from depression, melancholy, despair or an unexplained bout of sadness, one seeks them out. 

I was always intrigued with the idea of visiting a shrink. The closest I have ever come to one is via a Woody Allen movie. For some reason, a majority of his films have scenes that are shot in a shrink’s chamber. The doctor usually sits behind a desk while the patient half lies on a couch-like sofa. In this posture, the specialist listens to the constant chatter that pours forth from the sufferer. Occasionally, he jots down notes on a writing pad or if the prattle subsides, he prods the talker with some pertinent queries. 

I liked this portrayal of psychologists; I really did. I mean, I lived in a house where nobody had the time or inclination to listen to my complaints. And here was a person whose sole occupation was to hear me out. I could not wait to get myself to a Hollywood-type shrink. All I needed was an appropriate ailment which would help me get an appointment with one of them. 

I am not really an unhappy person so depression was ruled out. I do not have much patience for melancholia and sadness also but I do call myself a perfectionist and like to keep my home and hearth spotlessly neat and clean. I do not think that is a negative quality but if I presented it as an obsessive compulsive disorder then maybe the doctor would give me that much needed chatter session on the couch.  

Moreover, I was fascinated with both the words obsession and compulsion. The former means being continuously preoccupied with a fixed idea, feeling or emotion and the latter is an irresistible urge to behave in a particular manner despite the consequences. I admired obsessive compulsion. The only disturbing thing was the “disorder” term associated with it. 

Next day I called up the clinic and fixed a scheduled time with the consultant. At the appointed hour I presented myself at the hospital. The doctor made me sit at his desk while he excused himself to make a call. 

I saw his table was cluttered with knick-knacks. Before I could stop myself, I tidied it all up, putting the magazines in a neat stalk, pens in the pen stand and the used coffee cup in the side tray. 

“What are you doing?” asked the shrink.

“I am just putting things in order,” I smiled. 

“Why?” he inquired.

“It was messy so I cleared it,” I replied.

“It was my mess,” he said belligerently. 

“But it was on my side of the table,” I insisted. 

“Confirmed OCD,” he stated.

“You or me?” I muttered under my breath.

“What did you say?” he thundered. 

“‘Nothing! I have to go, sorry,” I said, beating a hasty retreat.