You might have enrolled or subscribed in an NDIS plan either for your loved ones or for your own self. After all, it is a great way to deal with any kind of situation when the case in point is for a specially abled person.

But before we begin discussing personal activities support, let’s understand what the core support category includes.

Core Support Budget
Core support budget in the NDIS covers support and assistance to the specially abled to help them lead a care-free life without any distress of everyday tasks.

It covers the daily living activities like personal hygiene activities or supervision of personal daily tasks that are instrumental for the participant to live independently.

Cost of support funded in the Assistance with daily living will be highly dependent on the participant’s need. For example- When a participant has complex needs then he may require additional support.

The timing when the support is needed like in the morning and even at night will impact the costing. Under the NDIS price guide, weekends are more expensive and therefore costs get affected accordingly.

The type of funding considered is related to building an individual skilled with independent living skills. The objective is to reduce the number of supports required and help them be more independent.

Personal care support covers-
Assistance with personal hygiene like showering, bathing, oral hygiene, dressing and grooming.
Toileting, menstrual care.
Cooking, eating and drinking
Attending regular appointments
Use of appliances, or communication devices
Support for mobility
This category of support often requires a variety of management and settings. When a participant requests for personal care support then the NDIS has to take into consideration the degree to which support must be provided.

Support for daily personal activities are generally limited to a maximum of 6 hours per day.

This includes the activities we just discussed above. But in certain circumstances NDIA may decide to fund a higher level of the required support.

NDIA will also consider whether the participant requires assistive technology or home modification support that can be critical to reduce the level of assistance that may be required by the participant.
NDIS has carefully formulated plans and services to accommodate all sorts of pressing needs for the participants. There are many reliable support care services in Australia.

Choose the right home health agencies after all is related to the life and expectations of your loved ones. So what are you waiting for, go ahead and be open to discuss your requirements with your service provider in Australia.

The Evolution of Cancer Care: Precision Medicine and Targeted Therapies
Cancer treatment has undergone a significant transformation with the introduction of personalized and precision medicine. Unlike traditional approaches, these treatments consider the unique genetic makeup of both the patient and the tumor. Precision medicine allows for a more targeted attack on cancer cells, sparing healthy tissues and potentially reducing side effects.

Personalized and Precision Medicine: A Tailored Approach
Research has shown that cancer behaves differently in each patient, necessitating a customized treatment plan. Personalized medicine, also known as precision medicine, involves analyzing the genetic profile of a patient’s tumor to identify specific mutations and select treatments that target those changes. This approach has been particularly effective in cancers with identifiable genetic markers, such as breast cancer with HER2 mutations or lung cancer with EGFR mutations.

Targeted Treatments: Hitting Cancer Where It Hurts
Targeted therapies are a cornerstone of advanced cancer treatment. These drugs or other substances interfere with specific molecules involved in tumor growth and progression. By focusing on the unique characteristics of cancer cells, targeted treatments can be more effective and less harmful to normal cells compared to traditional chemotherapy. For instance, drugs like trastuzumab (Herceptin) target the HER-2 gene mutation in breast cancer, while cetuximab (Erbitux) and panitumumab (Vectibix) are used to block the EGFR protein in colorectal cancer.

Immunotherapy: Unleashing the Body’s Defense Mechanisms
Immunotherapy represents a groundbreaking shift in cancer treatment, leveraging the body’s immune system to combat the disease. This approach has shown promise in treating a variety of cancers and continues to be a focus of extensive research.

Monoclonal Antibodies: Guided Missiles Against Cancer
Monoclonal antibodies are laboratory-produced molecules engineered to serve as substitute antibodies that can restore, enhance, or mimic the immune system’s attack on cancer cells. They can be very precise in targeting specific parts of cancer cells, and some are attached to chemotherapy drugs to deliver treatment directly to the cancer, minimizing damage to normal cells.

Checkpoint Inhibitors: Releasing the Brakes on the Immune System
Checkpoint inhibitors are a type of immunotherapy that block proteins that stop the immune system from attacking cancer cells. These treatments have been effective in treating cancers such as melanoma, non-small cell lung cancer, and more. They work by exposing cancer cells to the immune system, which can then attack and destroy them.

Cancer Vaccines: Preventive and Therapeutic Strategies
Cancer vaccines are designed to elicit an immune response against cancer-specific antigens. There are two main types: preventive vaccines, like the HPV vaccine to prevent cervical and other types of cancer, and therapeutic vaccines, which aim to treat existing cancer by strengthening the immune system’s response to the disease.

Cytokines: Signaling Molecules in Immunotherapy
Cytokines are proteins that play a critical role in cell signaling within the immune system. They can be used in cancer treatment to help stimulate the immune system to attack cancer cells. Interferons and interleukins are two types of cytokines used in cancer immunotherapy.

CAR-T Cell Therapy: A Personalized Immune Attack

CAR-T cell therapy is a form of immunotherapy that modifies a patient’s T-cells to attack cancer cells more effectively. This personalized treatment involves extracting T-cells from the patient, genetically engineering them to target cancer cells, and then reintroducing them into the patient’s body.

Advanced Radiation Therapies: Precision Targeting of Cancer Cells
Radiation therapy remains a mainstay in cancer treatment, but new techniques have improved its precision and effectiveness.

Intensity-Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT)
IMRT delivers high doses of radiation directly to the cancer cells while minimizing exposure to surrounding healthy tissue. This technique allows for more accurate targeting of tumors.

Image-Guided Radiation Therapy (IGRT)
IGRT uses imaging technologies such as MRI and CT scans to deliver radiation therapy with extreme precision, based on the tumor’s size, shape, and location.

Stereotactic Radiosurgery (SRS)
SRS is a non-surgical radiation therapy that can treat tumors in the brain and spine with a high dose of radiation while sparing the surrounding healthy tissue.

Proton Therapy: The Next Frontier in Radiation Treatment
Proton therapy is an advanced form of radiation therapy that uses protons instead of X-rays to treat cancer. It allows for precise targeting of tumors, reducing damage to surrounding healthy tissues. Proton therapy is particularly useful for treating cancers in sensitive areas such as the brain, spine, and eyes.

Robotic-Assisted Surgery: Enhancing Precision and Recovery
Robotic surgery has revolutionized the surgical treatment of cancer. Using robotic systems, surgeons can perform complex procedures with increased precision, flexibility, and control. This minimally invasive approach often results in less pain, fewer complications, and a quicker recovery for patients.

Cancers Treated with Robotic Surgery
Robotic surgery is effective in treating a variety of cancers, including:

Bladder cancer
Kidney cancer
Ovarian cancer
Prostate cancer
Throat cancer
Conclusion

The landscape of cancer treatment is rapidly evolving, with advanced therapies offering new hope to patients. From precision medicine to immunotherapy and robotic surgery, these treatments are redefining the fight against cancer. As research continues to advance, the future of cancer care looks increasingly promising.

For more information on advanced cancer treatments, you can reach out to reputable medical institutions or consult with healthcare professionals specializing in oncology.

If you or a loved one is facing a cancer diagnosis, it’s important to explore all treatment options. For further guidance, consider contacting organizations like the American Cancer Society or the National Cancer Institute.

Group Therapy- Benefits, Types and Activities

Group therapy is a form of therapy that involves one or more therapists working with several people at the same time. A circle created to pour your hearts out without any judgement, is group therapy. People sitting in a circle and talking about their problems without the fear of judgement? Yes, that is a close idea about group therapy.

Benefits of Group Therapy

Group therapy provides a social atmosphere similar to real life
It is cost-effective hence making it accessible to people with low income
It inculcates a sense of relief in the individual by assuring them of the fact that they aren’t alone.
Participants get to learn from everyone’s individual experiences.
Group Therapy decreases the feeling of loneliness and isolation
TYPES OF GROUP THERAPY

Groups can vary according to specific types of problems.

Some of them being:

Self-help group Therapy

Guiding others when you have overcome the problem is the motive of this therapy. Benefiting others from your experience and helping them overcome. Some examples of self-help groups can be self-help groups for alcohol dependence or self-help groups for parents with handicapped children.

Substance Abuse Group Therapy
A therapy for the addict people to overcome that addiction. In these therapy groups, recovering addicts gather to encourage one another and work through recovery programs and channels Some attendants are sometimes yet to get clean while others have been sober for years. Some groups include 12-step programs and sponsors to aid in recovery.

Group Therapy for Grief
When a loved one dies, the event can leave people feeling lost and alone. Helping each other in a group in those hard times. For example, a session may specifically help parents who lost children or surviving spouses.

Counseling Group Therapy

These groups focus on interpersonal strategies to help people resolve the usual, yet often difficult, problems of life. The primary task in the group is accomplished by the participants supporting and challenging each other in self-exploration. The group leader acts as a facilitator more than a mentor, leading the group through a series of developmental stages. Some examples of counselling groups are groups for those coping with divorce or groups for those navigating the transition to retirement.

Psychoeducational Group Therapy

This group therapy focuses on developing group members’ thinking, feeling, and behaviour through a structured learning format within and across group sessions. People that attend psychoeducational group therapy are often high-functioning but have information lacking in a certain area, such as parenting skills or assertiveness. The group leader is a bit like a teacher in addition to a facilitator as he or she provides factual information, leads discussions and helps group members incorporate the information into their lives through skill-building exercises. In addition to parenting skills groups and assertiveness training, other examples of psychoeducational groups are stress management groups and caregiver training

Some Activities that can be done during Group Therapy:

Friendship Mural
This is an activity where friendship acts as an aid. Here children draw pictures, celebrating different cultures and leaving a message.

Treasure Map
On a piece of paper, label one corner, “The beginning” and another corner, “Success.” Draw a windy path between the two points. Using collage materials, create stations along the path with creative titles, such as “Crossing the desert of loneliness”, “Climbing the mountain of determination,”etc.

Inner Child
Imagine yourself as a child and give everything that you need. Give your child the right care, understanding, supporting and nurturing parent.

4.. My Perfect Life

Take a paper and pen down the dream which you want to accomplish. That dream home, job, relationship and achievement. Turn your paper over and write three steps that will help you accomplish this.

Suicide prevention
If you think someone is at immediate risk of self-harm or hurting another person:

Learning about Eating Disorders:

To ascertain that an individual suffers from eating disorder, the following points can be checked out:

1) If an individual is obsessed of eating, he suffers from an eating disorder.

2) If individuals deny food for themselves when they are hungry, they suffer from eating disorders.

3) If they over-exercise to the point of physical pain and injury after taking meals, they have an eating disorder.

4) When individuals vomit after taking meals, they suffer from eating disorder.

5) They can suffer from it when they eat large quantities of food uncontrollably.

6) If individuals use diuretics or laxatives regularly they suffer from an eating disorder.

Basics of an Eating Disorder -

Individuals suffering from an Eating Disorder adopt harmful eating habits which disturb their physical health. It is a syndrome, an illness, usually occurring in teenage girls and women, but can be found in men too. It is caused due to psychiatric and other disorders like depression and anxiety disorders, resulting in poor nutrition that damages body organs and even resulting in death in some extreme cases. Eating depends on several physical and psychological factors around the person and disturbs the bodily activities. Food intolerance test for allergy can easily identify & alert you for any sensitivity towards any food group.

Types of Eating Disorder -

Anorexia Nervosa: Anorexia Nervosa usually begins at a young age and involves starvation. The worst aspect of this disorder is that they are convinced that they are overweight and try shedding off the excess, which leads to excessive weight loss (at least 15% below the normal body weight). Individuals have the fear of gaining weight and so stick to rigorous exercise routines, get into the habit of measuring every food item for the calorie intake, and even adopt strange eating habits and refuse to eat in front of others. Women with this disorder may suffer from loss of monthly menstrual periods and men suffer from impotency.

Bulimia Nervosa: People with the condition Bulimia Nervosa consume excessive amounts of food and then get rid of excess calories by vomiting, using laxatives, diuretics or enemas or by way of rigorous exercise routines. Using any or combinations of all the forms of purging, individuals suffering from this condition secretly binge and purge, and manage to maintain normal or above normal body weight, so the problem remains hidden from others for a longer time. Anger, fear and depression can be commonly seen among such people. Ranging from once or twice a week, they can even binge and purge several times in a day. Heavy dieting between binging and purging can also be seen. About half of the people suffering from Anorexia are seen suffering from Bulimia. Beginning at adolescence, this can be seen in women and sometimes men too.

Binge Eating Disorder: Binge Eating Disorder resembling Bulimia Nervosa involves excessive consumption of food or binging. However, it differs from Bulimia – there is no purging of excess calories. Individuals in this condition lack self control while eating, consume excessive quantities of food until they are uncomfortable, and have difficulty losing weight and keeping it off. Obesity and weight fluctuations can be seen. Reportedly, about 2% of the population, more women than men and about 30% people undergoing medically supervised weight control programs suffer from this disorder.

Most popular profiles for Body checkups are Thyrocare Aarogyam A, Aarogyam B & Aarogyam C. It is advisable to go for a annual checkup for people above age of 40.