March 9th, 2010 | 
Author: September 2008
The Danish businessman and entrepreneur Bjorn Stiedl, who now mainly lives in Paris, has initiated a new charitable organisation, Foundation Ours en Peluche, (“the Teddy Bear Trust”) to raise funding for a more comforting environment when young children are submitted to hospital.
It is the aim to raise enough funding to secure that all children will be receiving a teddy bear when submitted to a Parisian hospital.
Being admitted to a hospital is often a scaring and intimidating experience, especially for a child. Although parents and staff alike do their best to alleviate the children’s anxieties as well as their ailments, they can’t be around them 24/7. And it is often during the small hours of the morning that the children feel most scared and insecure.
Studies have shown that teddy bears have a positive effect on children who are admitted to a hospital. The teddy bear gives the children something safe and secure, and also a “companion” who can support and comfort them on their own level. Furthermore, health workers can explain the child’s illness through the teddy bear. This also alleviated the children’s anxieties.
Therefore giving the children a teddy bear when they are admitted to the hospital for long-term treatment is a very simple and humane way to improve the children’s experience when being in the hospital.
It is Mr. Stiedl’s hope that all formalities can be finalised by January 2009 so that negotiations for delivery of teddy bears with individual hospitals in Paris can commence.
“Hospitals are big and bureaucratic organisations, and implementing new routines and procedures take time”, Mr. Stiedl says “Issues regarding safety and health such as fire proofing, hygiene, etc. is of course also issues that has to be dealt with”
Bjorn Stiedl continues; “When we have an overview of the level of interest among the various clinics and hospitals, and when we approximately know how many teddy bears we have to hand out on a yearly basis, we will commence the fundraising.”
Bjorn Stiedl has already developed a model for the funding. “I will arrange for successful restaurants to add 1 Euro per bill they hand out during lunch and dinner service. It is entirely voluntary for the restaurant guest if he wants to pay the 1 Euro teddy bear donation. If the restaurant guest doesn’t want to pay, fair enough, 1 Euro will immediately be deducted from the bill, but I’m convinced that this will be a very small minority”.
As soon as all formalities are in place, staff will be engaged to engage participating Parisian restaurants.
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Posted in children hospital | 
Tags: Bear, Comfort, French, Hospital, Kids, Teddy, Trust | 
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Volunteering in Vietnam is quite a thrilling experience! A thriving and bustling East Asian Country, Vietnam has been a favorite of tourists and adventure seekers since many years. The main reason for the attraction of Vietnam is its sublime beauty and natural setting of the Red River Delta in the north and the beautiful Mekong Delta in the south. The coastal line is a beautiful patchwork of bright green paddy fields that are tended by farmers in conical straw hats. Vietnam is as famous for its rice and paddy fields as it is for its majestic beaches. However, despite being a small country, Vietnam is bless by Mother Nature and has a diverse geographical terrain that includes inland mountains often shrouded in mystery by dense and misty forests, wonderful varieties of flora and fauna, and ancient architecture and history. The south of Vietnam is the economic engine of the country and is centered on the capital city: Ho Chi Minh. The city of Dalat, also an ex-French retreat is the largest city in the Central Highlands. It has a great green golf course with the backdrop of the tallest mountain adding to its allure! Volunteering in Vietnam can offer you all of this and much more
Why Volunteer In Vietnam
While Vietnam is a growing industrial power, it is also a country where poverty seems to be looming large and casting a shadow on the country’s economy. A poor country ravaged by a long lasting war, Vietnam is slowly rebuilding itself. As a volunteer in Vietnam, you can help many underprivileged children, poor farmers, and women to find their rightful place in the society. Volunteering in Vietnam involves working with orphans, underdeveloped children, teaching English to the children and the locals, serving the community, volunteer or intern in a medical facility or hospital among other projects. Some of the other interesting volunteer in Vietnam
Types Of Projects Available
If you’re interested in volunteering in Vietnam, you’ll find an almost limitless inventory of volunteer opportunities. Whether you enjoy working with children, women, animals, or want to gain valuable work experience, building homes, or teaching English, you can most certainly find volunteer Vietnam projects available to suit your personal needs.
- Community Development in Vietnam: A broad area, it covers many different issues. But large chunks of such projects involve working with children and adults. Community development includes working at orphanages, old age homes, education institutions, among other things. You need to have patience, a warm and friendly disposition, and high levels of tolerance and compassion. Perfect for those who love interacting with people.
- Teaching in Vietnam: Focused solely on education, Volunteering in Vietnam for teaching typically involves teaching English. However, a few projects also include learning creative skills such as drama, music, crafts etc.
- Building Homes in Vietnam: As a volunteer in Vietnam for building homes/buildings project, you get the opportunity to leave a lasting mark as a reminder. You can help build homes or educational set ups for underprivileged families and orphans. Such kind of volunteer Vietnam projects help you build relationships at the personal level with the local residents. If you have building knowledge that a huge plus!
- Conservation in Vietnam: Conversation work is a broad term applicable to environmental conservation as well as architecture and natural heritage conservation. While most volunteering in Vietnam conservation projects include animal conservation such as animal rehabilitation centers, or reserves, you can also work with specific spices of animals such as lions, sea turtles, manatees, dolphins, monkeys or pandas. Love for animals is necessary!
- Health in Vietnam: If you are a medical intern or have completed some certification course in health then volunteering in Vietnam as a health worker is the best experience. You get to work in clinics that are set up in very poor neighborhoods with limited resources. This gives you the opportunity to assist the locals in variety of ways.
Volunteer Requirements
The two main volunteer Vietnam requirements besides the standard set of requirements include:
1. You must be 18 or over 18 years of age
2. Should be free from all health problems
Fee and Other details
There are fees attached for every volunteering project you opt for. The fee is charged in advance and is applied for food, accommodation, comprehensive travel insurance, in country travel, fund raising ideas etc. The project coordinator is responsible for most of your needs as a volunteer in Vietnam.
Conclusion
Volunteer in Vietnam and explore the mystic and majestic bounties of this tiny East Asian Country!
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One cause of memory loss is from sleep deprivation, with the lifestyle which many of us lead it is critical to the development of memory and the enhancing of our ability to memorize things. Consider this, have you ever gone to school or work in your house shoes because you were too sleepy to remember to change shoes? Have you locked yourself out of your home because you were still groggy from lack of restful sleep only to remember (too late) that your house and car keys were still lying on the kitchen table? Have you put your sunglasses atop your head, then searched frantically for them because you forgot? These are prime examples of memory loss and why it is critical to always be paying attention to the development of memory.
Sometimes memory loss can be funny. It is sure to give you a few silly stories that produce giggles. Undoubtedly, memory loss will serve to uncover forgotten tales of another person’s experiences. Even little children can recall instances of memory loss resulting from lack of sleep.
Memory loss and the lack of the ability to memorize things can also be dangerous. Sometimes it will prove lethal, sometimes just unfortunate. The sleep deprived will suffer memory loss as though in a brain fog, walking around in a daze, unable to focus, sometimes with a blank expression. Observe a class of teenagers or college students after a popular festive weekend. There is sure to be someone in the crowd with a blank stare or head hanging from exhaustion, possibly with their mouth open as they ‘zone out’.
Worse cases of memory loss from sleep deprivation would be to forget medication you’d already taken, taking it again and suffering severe side effects, possibly becoming hospitalized as a result. If you became too sleepy to remember to turn off a burner on a stove, it could cause a house fire, possibly injuring some child you left home alone or an elderly person in your care. Maybe you’re a young mother and weren’t prepared to expect the sleep disturbances of a newborn and so have not been paying attention to the development of memory. If you forget to change your baby’s diaper, a horrible diaper rash could result, causing pain and rawness that might take several days to heal. If you get behind the wheel of your car while sleepy, you might forget to look both ways or forget momentarily which pedal is the gas or the brake and cause an accident.
Sometimes medications can cause sleep disturbances, which result in memory loss and the lack of our ability to memorize things, or the medication itself may make it harder to concentrate because of its effects. If you suffer memory loss on your job, you could cause an injury to a co-worker or possibly lose your job simply because of something vital you forgot, such as an important meeting you needed to have prepared for.
Memory loss and the lack of our natural ability to memorize things is caused by other things besides sleep deprivation, of course. But the most important thing is to find ways to remedy the problem. Take advantage of a short nap whenever possible. Learn to relax before its time for bed, instead of waiting on bedtime to begin relaxing as this aids in the development of memory. For the chronic work-a-holic, the new parents, or a college student burning the candle at both ends, learning to get the proper amount of sleep is essential to avoiding unfortunate events caused by sleep-deprived memory loss. Remember, if you don’t care for your body and mind, it can’t continue to function properly.
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When looking for medical providers abroad, a multitude of factors and considerations need to be addressed by each individual. Assessing the services, benefits, and drawbacks of any specific provider need to be fully researched by a medical tourist in order to gauge the quality of services and effectiveness of treatments. Medical travelers also need to take into consideration such things as location, services rendered, and patient care, post-op support and follow-up.
When looking for medical providers abroad, some of the first questions an individual may want answered include:
Convenience – where is the facility located? How will I get there?
Customized services – will the facility be able to meet my specific needs?
Acknowledging risks – what are the risks involved not only traveling to this destination, but of my specific surgical procedure or treatment? Is staff at this facility open and honest about all potential risks of such procedures or treatments?
Providing unique solutions – will the facility be able to cater their services to meet my specific needs?
Are they open to the prospect of working with me to solve my particular problem or issue?
Quality of service – is this facility accredited and approved not only according to their country’s accreditation levels, but also by international accreditation facilities such as JCI (Joint Commission International)?
The Joint Commission is an American healthcare accreditation organization that evaluates medical facilities based on standards of care. The international branch of the Joint Commission inspects facilities and takes into consideration key factors before offering their “stamp of approval”. Such considerations include but are not limited to:
Medical staff credentials and training
Nursing staff credentials and training
Medication Management
Infection Control
Environment of Care
Patient Rights
Provision of Care Treatment Services
Many American patients don’t take the time to check the credentials of their own physicians, surgeons, or medical care facilities, but it is strongly suggested that they do so. Even more importantly, anyone traveling overseas for medical care should research the credentials, experience, and expertise of doctors or surgeons who will be providing for their care.
A patient should be able to access adequate information to answer such questions. The basic questions for determining the acceptability of medical services abroad may include factors such as:
Pricing
Assurance and safety
Accommodations
Recovery support services
Accessibility
Don’t take anything for granted. Take the time and make the effort to research credentials and look for accreditations by domestic as well as international accrediting boards and organizations. Make sure the potential doctors or surgeons who may be providing care are credentialed, trained, and experienced in the field of surgery or in the treatments or procedures that are offered.
Superlatives, state-of-the-art and high-tech facilities may be found throughout the globe. The same goes for surgeons, physicians and healthcare professionals who offer excellent services for American and international travelers. While cost savings are a major consideration for medical travelers today, look beyond the dollar sign and make sure that services rendered provide quality health care technologies that will best meet your healthcare needs.
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