Born in a poor American family, John Smith depended on scholarships     1     (pay) for his tuition fees when studying in a medical college. After graduation, he rejected an offer in New York, came to Wuhan and     2     (hire) by a local hospital. He held the principle that he should never complain about the working pressure but make positive responses     3     his patients in need.

He tended them     4     (careful), organized first aid lessons, and saved many people’s lives with his professional knowledge. That impressed a girl     5     was working in a local clinic. She fell in love with this caring doctor. Two years later, they got married. A decade later, he was elected chairman of the local medical association, the first foreigner in that position. This chain of events made him the     6     (happy) man in the world.

Then came the outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan. With the number of     7     (infect) patients increasing sharply, he helped carry these people through the disease together with many other medical     8     (worker). After     9     great deal of effort, the majority of the patients recovered. However, he himself was badly infected. Having fought against COVID-19 for a month, he passed away, leaving his family in tears and in despair.     10     (hear) the sad news, many people sent flowers to the hospital in memory of his contribution.

3 . Thousands of lives have been saved by giving blood-thinning drugs to people with a heart condition that leaves them at risk of a stroke(中风), according to the head of the NHS.

Since January 2022 about 460,000 people in England who suffer from atrial fibrillation(AF)- a dangerously irregular heart rate-have begun taking one of four anticoagulant(抗凝血剂) drugs that are proved to reduce stroke risk. Speedy introduction of the drugs has kept 4,000 people alive who would otherwise have died and prevented about 17,000 strokes, according to Amanda Pritchard. Strokes kill about 27,000 people a year in England and lead to about 120,000 being taken to hospital.

A drive to encourage take-up of the drugs means 90% of the 1.5 million people in England with AF are using them. That should result in fewer strokes, which are a leading cause of death and disability, given that AF causes about one in five strokes.

“The rapid introduction of these drugs is a big step forward in providing the best possible care for patients with heart disease”, Pritchard, the leader of NHS(National Health Service) England, will say in a speech today at the King’s Fund health experts’ yearly conference.

The drugs, called direct oral anticoagulants, help stop blood from clotting(凝血), therefore reducing the risk of a clot developing and causing a stroke. In 2021 the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence recommended that doctors use four anticoagulant drugs.

Dr Maeva May, the Stroke Association’s director, thought the widespread use of the drugs as “fantastic news”, because AF accounts for one in five strokes and strokes in people with AF are more likely to result in death or serious disability.

NHS England has used its spending power to cut deals with the makers of the four drugs, which has made them much more widely available. The British Heart Foundation praised the NHS’s “great progress towards its goal of reducing stroke deaths”.

5 . “I never thought that I would beat the tumor.” says a cancer patient in Lanzhou in Northwest China’s Gansu province. The man adds that he is particularly grateful for heavy ion therapy he received, at a follow-up visit following several rounds of treatment revealing that his cancer cells had disappeared.

A research team from the Institute of Modern Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has developed the country’s first medical heavy ion accelerator with independent intellectual property rights, and put it into clinical application. Cancer treatments employing heavy ion accelerators can bombard a target with high-energy electrons to kill cancer cells. Compared to traditional therapy such as radiation, heavy ion treatment is considered to be more balanced, exposing healthy cells to less radiation. The treatment period is shorter and the therapy can more effectively control cancer cells.

In 1993, researchers proposed to carry out basic research on heavy ion cancer treatment during an academic conference held in Tianshui, Gansu. In 2006, China followed the United States, Japan and Germany to become the fourth country to successfully carry out heavy ion clinical treatment, when four cancer patients participated in preliminary clinical trials for heavy ion therapy. In 2015, China’s first such accelerator, with independent intellectual property rights, rolled off the production line in Wuwei, in Gansu. On March 26, 2020, the accelerator was put into operation, and by the end of June this year, more than 750 patients completed their therapy at Wuwei’s heavy ion treatment center, with remarkable curative effects. The follow-up statistics showed that the three-year local tumor control rate reached 84 percent among 46 clinical trial participants.

Heavy ion therapy is highly effective in treating a wide range of solid tumors and can be used in cases where surgery is not possible or unsuitable, when a patient is sensitive to conventional radiation therapy, or prone to relapse following such therapy. This includes tumors located in the central nervous system, head, neck, skull base, chest and abdomen. So far there have been several cases where people have recovered from cancers by the therapy.

6 . A man with Parkinson’s（帕金森）disease has experienced a substantial improvement in his ability to walk after being fitted with a device that electrically stimulates his spinal cord（脊髓）. The findings, although based on one person, suggest this could be used to treat movement disorders.

Treatments for Parkinson’s disease include drugs that target parts of the brain which regulates movement, as well as deep-brain stimulation, which changes the electrical signals that cause symptoms. However, many people don’t respond to these treatments, particularly if their condition is advanced, says Courtine.

He and his colleagues wanted to find out whether directly stimulating the spinal cord in a person with severe Parkinson’s disease could help. The team designed the device that specifically targets neurons（神经元）in the spine that are activated when legs walk, which showed promise in non-human primates with Parkinson’s-like symptoms. To test it in a person, the researchers recruited a 62-year-old man called Marc, who has experienced Parkinson’s symptoms for around 30 years. These included pace freezing-sudden and temporary inability to move.

The researchers first had to map the neurons in Marc’s spine. This helped to guide the application of stimulators so they would only target his legs’ neurons. They then placed sensors on Marc’s legs and shoes to monitor the electrical activity of the neurons that activate the muscles in these limbs and his feet. When these sensors detected this electrical activity, they activated the stimulators.

After three months’ training using the stimulators, Marc more or less stopped experiencing pace freezing. Marc says that passing through narrow paths or turning had previously caused pace freezing, which led to him falling five or six times a day. Marc has now been using the stimulator for two years and says he hardly falls any more, allowing him to walk several kilometres at a time.

The stimulation is personalised to Marc. Nevertheless, the team thinks a similar technique could help many people. But there are at least five more years of development before the treatment will reach people outside a trial, says Courtine.

10 . Online Annual Refresher

This interactive yearly refresher course provides first aiders with an opportunity to practice and update their skills as qualified first aiders, at any time while their first aid certificates (证书) are valid (有效的).

Course description

Employers are legally required to ensure their first aiders are competent and maintain their skills throughout the three years in which their certificates are valid.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) strongly recommends that first aiders attend a refresher course once every year during this three-year period.

Course content

Session (阶段) 1:

Choking — 30 minutes to complete.

After this session, you will be able to help an individual who is choking.

Session 2:

Chest Pains — 30 minutes to complete.

After this session, you will be able to help an individual who is experiencing chest pains.

Session 3:

Severe Bleeds — 45 minutes to complete.

After this session, you will be able to help an individual who is bleeding severely.

Session 4:

Recovery Position — 45 minutes to complete.

After this session, you will be able to help an individual who is unresponsive and breathing normally.

Session 5:

Basic Life Support & AED (Automated External Defibrillator) — 30 minutes to complete.

After this session, you will be able to help an individual who is unresponsive and not breathing normally.

Booking details

Please click this button below if you are the person who wishes to buy and sign up for the course. You will be directed to our Learner Management System where you will be asked to login or register for an account. You will then be given the option to buy access to the course.