November 29th

After the ICU, More Patients Face a Second Recovery: In hospitals, doctors have created more sophisticated treatment for sick patients in ICU. When patients go to the hospital, they get the treatment that they need, but after they come home, they have to go back to the hospital again, but for symptoms of something that doctors call post-intensive care syndrome. This illness is now becoming more common in ICU patients. While in ICU at a hospital, a patient may be constantly attached to ventilation systems, heavily sedated, or there may be medicine constantly circulating throughout their blood system, from an IV. Although all of these forms of treatment help a patient survive, they also may cause a temporary brain injury doctors call "ICU delirium." ICU delirium is basically just a cognitive or brain dysfunction that occurs for up to 80% of the survivors of ICU. These cognitive and brain dysfunctions include post-traumatic stress, depression, muscle weakness, and more. Now doctors are realizing that ICU patients most likely need treatment similar to the treatment used for recovery from heart attacks and strokes, so that the patient does not end up with a permanent impairment. Now, the ICU Program has been created in Vanderbilt, where ICU patients go through a 12-week rehabilitation program, so that instead of going home, and being a couch potato due to the inability to move, the patient goes home, feeling better, and being able to move around independently. Although it make take a while, each step in recovery from ICU treatment is important.

November 21st

Genetic Testing Leaves More Patients Living In Limbo
         Due to new technological breakthroughs, scientists have started using genetic testing more often. For example, if a patient has symptoms for a disease, but a doctor can't figure which disease, they may do a genetics test to see if it is a hereditary disorder. But, the problem is, that doctors are telling patients that they may have dangerous genetic diseases such as cystic fibrosis, although the patient shows absolutely no symptoms. After the doctors find out the possibility of a patient having a genetic disease, they track the patient for a while to make sure that the proper treatment is given. But, the problem is, that doctors are finding out that patients may have hereditary disease, but the patient shows no symptoms, so the doctors do not know whether to give the patients treatment, or track them and only treat the patient once they show symptoms for the disease. This is a major problem for many families. One example is four year old Laura Inestroza. She is believed to have a high chance of having cystic fibrosis, and the doctors found this out from her genetic test. But, when the doctors did another test, called the sweat test, which checks for the amount of chloride in your perspiration, the results turned up saying that she didn't have cystic fibrosis. This is an example of how the genetic testing is effecting families badly, because the Inestrozas don't know whether to tell people that their daughter is sick with cystic fibrosis or not, which is a problem when sending a child to day care, or any place where people need to know about a child's health problems. So, now due to genetic testing, there are many doctor patients forced to sit in waiting, and wait until they get symptoms for the diseases that they are diagnosed with from genetic testing. Although new medical technology can be effective in many ways, genetic testing isn't helping doctor patients very much at this point of time.

November 6th

Porsche SUVs to Overtake Its Racers
Porsche AG is a german car company that is well known for their high end sports cars such as the Panamera.(shown below)

Porsche, owned by Volkswagen AG, usually sells brawny sports cars with a starting price of a $75,000 Cayenne, to the $100,000 911. Although some members of society would like to drive one of these cars, the starting price is just too high for the average car buyer. So, Porsche is coming out with a new car model, which is more like the SUV's that BMW and Audi sell, and it is called the Porsche Macan.

This vehicle's starting price is going to be around $40,000, which is approximately three quarters the price of the Cayenne. This model is also expected to be appealing to younger buyers, and it is believed to possibly be more appealing to female buyers. Although the price is quite a bit lower than the other porsche models out there, it still has a six-cylinder engine and a steeply sloped rear roof, like the other porsche models. It is going to be out in stores for sale in the U.S. sometime during the 2014 spring, and the company is aiming for world wide sales of 200,000 cars by 2018, which is forty percent more than the number of vehicles sold in 2012. Creating slightly cheaper cars such as cheaper SUV's is a common move for luxury car makers to make. Mercedes_Benz created the R-class, which was a car with three rows of seats, and was similar to a minivan. But, due to the unsuccessful sales, they ended the line in America. BMW also has a cheaper model called the AG-series, which is a small car whose sales were aimed for car buyers in Europe. Although its sales weren't as unsuccessful as the Mercedes R-class, the car sells for $500 a month in lease. Sometimes, these lower priced cars can make the car brands less exclusive, making the owners of the fancier model cars feel less special, because they are in an exclusive group of people who can afford to buy a fancy car. But, porsche salesmen don't really think that this is a problem, because it will interest more car buyers, which will increase sales, and make many of the buyers who have always wanted a porsche, happy.

At Louis Vuitton, Ghesquiere Takes Designer's Mantle

Louis Vuitton is a high end fashion company that owns many brands such as Louis Vuitton, Fendi, and others. Balenciaga, the company that Mr. Ghesquiere used to work for was a part of fashion brand Kering SA.The company LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy) was very popular back in the nineteenth century, and the twentieth century as well. But, Louis Vuitton wants to bring back the popular luxury labels. So, they have made Mr. Ghesquiere, former Balenciaga designer, the creative director of woman's fashion. Mr. Ghesquiere now also has to keep the brand Marc Jacobs appeal to buyers, after Mr. Jacobs himself stepped down a month ago. Mr. Ghesquiere thinks of the brand Louis Vuitton, as the ultimate symbol of luxury, and he is also in charge of the main brand Louis Vuitton. Louis Vuitton is the main brand from which LVMH gets its sales, but the international brown and gold bags are constantly knocked off, and the brand is believed to be the most overrated brand in luxury. Now, Louis Vuitton's sales are falling, and people are not buying as many of their leather goods. At Balenciaga, Mr. Ghesquiere's job was controlling every aspect about the brand Balenciaga, but his job at Louis Vuitton will most likely not be as wide. Mr. Ghesquiere is now trying to be creative for Louis Vuitton, while being tangled in a lawsuit, because Balenciaga sued him. He was sued, because he breached a company contract, and criticized the company management in a magazine interview.

November 2nd

'Politics Is A Feeling'  is an article that talks about how spending time with the governor of New Jersey was different than it was with the rest of the officials of the New Jersey Governor Chris Christie spent the previous three years in office going to community meetings, and things like that where he can help by listening to others and making a difference instead going to meetings and gatherings where he can't make a difference or help the people in any way. While there are many problems taking place in America, New Jersey's condition isn't as bad as some other states. In Jersey, there is ethnic diversity, and people of all countries are included, making Jersey much more liberal than some other states which are lacking in diversity, and the ethnicity of members of society doesn't vary as much. Mr. Christie has made New Jersey a different place by listening to people. Although in politics, it is up to the person with titles such as "Governor", "mayor", "president", "secretary" and many others, they can't be a good politician, unless they think about how it will affect the society, or what the people want, which would help society, and make the economy stronger, and enforce that the country is happy with itself, and there are not any internal feuds. Governor Christie is just one example of a politician who can feel the politics, and really make change for the better.

November 1st

The Senkaku Boomerang: Lately the Chinese have been sending out ships into the Japanese Senkaku territory. This is because they thought that this would result in the Japanese people following their demands, but the Chinese were very wrong, and now Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is planning to provide military aid to protect the Islands. Japan created an alliance with the U.S. and now they are going to work together to protect the series of islands which are slightly off the coast of the Japan. Prime Minister has created peace ties with more countries in North America and Southeast Asia, and these other countries are starting to join Japan so that they can help defend and ward off the Chinese. While the japanese don't think that the conflict that is going on is an emergency situation, they do not think that the Chinese are trying to make peace, so they have begun planning out some things that they can do, so that the Chinese people stop annoying them. Japan has to be careful, because if there is one miscalculation, then there is going to be a problem. During World War 2, the United States took the Senkaku Islands, but they eventually gave them back in the early 1970s, and now China is trying to do the same thing. If the japanese alienate the Chinese from other people, then things have a much higher chance of being peaceful.