Better Water Solutions

Water and it's part in learning

 

 

Schools are becoming increasingly aware of the importance of frequent intake of water to enhance learning and many schools now have formal school hydration policies

 

Mental performance can fall by 10% when your pupils are thirsty and it will also add to tiredness, headaches and irritability. Having water readily available to children links well with learning programmes as well as promoting healthy lifestyles in your school. Frequent small intakes of water are better for learning than limiting drinks to breaks and lunchtimes, with children needing to drink a total 8 glasses of water during the day.

 

St Michael’s Primary School near Lincoln encourages all pupils to bring their own water container into school, with unlimited access to water during the school day. Here are their main findings and suggestions to help make this a successful initiative in your own school.

 

    * To launch the scheme a water bottle was bought for every child in the school – consider having the school logo on water bottles. Parents now provide the water containers.

    * A letter was sent to all parents explaining the health and learning benefits of having water freely available during the school day.

    * Occasionally during the day pupils are asked to put their bottles down, especially when delivering key information to the class.

    * There is a tap in every classroom for filling up the water containers. LSAs do this for the youngest children with set times for filling up bottles for the older pupils.

    * Spills are surprisingly not an issue and all pupils (even the infants) manage the situation well. Pupils are encouraged to bring sports bottles, which helps minimise leakage.

    * Pupils rarely fiddle with their bottles and they have not proven to be a distraction to either the pupils or the teachers.

 

An alternative to allowing pupils to bring their own water bottles is to provide water coolers with disposable cups. Disposable plastic cups can add to the litter issue, especially in a large secondary school where schemes using bottles may be much more practical. Dauntsey’s Aided Primary School in Wiltshire has overcome this by purchasing cheap and cheerful plastic cups and marking each one with the names of the children. These are kept on a shelf outside each classroom and pupils help themselves during the school day. Using water coolers and cups does require more maintenance, whereas keeping bottles clean is the responsibility of parents. And finally, contrary to popular belief, drinking more water won’t result in more toilet trips during lessons. The urinary health of pupils will actually improve. If your school has a hydration policy let us know the impact it is having!

 

Good websites with resources and advice for water in schools include:

 

    * Water is Cool in School

    * Health Ed Trust

    * Learning Wales

The importance of water on brain activity

Brain Hydration

 

By Gregory Kellett, a cognitive neuroscience researcher at SFSU and UCSF, and science writer for Lumos Labs.

 

Your brain is made up of 60% water and many of us may not be drinking enough of the clear wet stuff to keep our thinking “juicy”.

 

Not drinking enough water has detrimental effects on our brains. When your body lacks water, brain cells and other neurons shrink and biochemical processes involved in cellular communication slow. A drop of as little as 1 to 2% of fluid levels can result in slower processing speeds, impaired short-term memory, tweaked visual tracking and deficits in attention.

 

With proper hydration however, neurons work best and are capable of reacting faster.

 

What constitutes proper hydration is controversial. Some say that it is important to imbibe 8 tall glasses of water daily, while others claim that one should only drink when thirsty.

 

In fact, there is no one golden rule to staying well hydrated. The amount of water each of us needs varies from person to person as it depends on each individual’s physiology and lifestyle activities like diet and exercise.

 

Experiment and see what feels good. In today’s world of infinite distractions however, it is best not to leave hydration to your sense of thirst alone. It is also important to note that your ability to notice thirst typically diminishes with age.

 

Also of note:

 

    * Sweating from exercise or high temperatures can result in more than 3 liters an hour of fluid loss.

    * The maximum amount of water the body is capable of absorbing is 1 litre an hour or 330 millilitres every 20 min (the ideal amount to drink under high sweat conditions).

    * Although good for energy, foods high in protein and sugar increase the body’s need for water.

 

Warning!

 

Drinking TOO much water is very dangerous! Over hydration causes a sodium imbalance that can be fatal. It is common for marathon runners to be hospitalized because of overzealous hydration during the race.

 

Approach fluid consumption with moderation.

 

References:

 

Armstrong, L. E., & Epstein, Y. (1999). Fluid-electrolyte balance during labor and exercise: concepts and misconceptions. International Journal of Sport Nutrition, 9(1), 1-12.

 

Kleiner, S. M. (1999). Water: an essential but overlooked nutrient. Journal of the American Dietetic Association, 99(2), 200-6.

 

Lang, F., Busch, G. L., Ritter, M., Völkl, H., Waldegger, S., Gulbins, E., et al. (1998). Functional significance of cell volume regulatory mechanisms. Physiological Reviews, 78(1), 247-306.

 

Lieberman, H. R. (2007). Hydration and cognition: a critical review and recommendations for future research. Journal of the American College of Nutrition, 26(5 Suppl), 555S-561S.

 

Maughan, R. J., Shirreffs, S. M., & Watson, P. (2007). Exercise, heat, hydration and the brain. Journal of the American College of Nutrition, 26(5 Suppl), 604S-612S.

 

Murray, R. (1998). Rehydration strategies–balancing substrate, fluid, and electrolyte provision. International Journal of Sports Medicine, 19 Suppl 2, S133-5.

 

Suhr, J. A., Hall, J., Patterson, S. M., & Niinistö, R. T. (2004). The relation of hydration status to cognitive performance in healthy older adults. International Journal of Psychophysiology: Official Journal of the International Organization of Psychophysiology, 53(2), 121-5.

Legionaires disease Newbury

Family to make formal complaint after wrong diagnosis kept her from hospital

 

 

A WOMAN died from Legionnaires’ disease after her symptoms were mistaken for swine flu, the Newbury Weekly News can reveal.

Carol Rowe, of Thatcham, died on Sunday, August 2, aged 46.

Now her husband Kevin, a Detective Inspector with Thames Valley Police, has vowed to make a formal complaint about her treatment.

Mr Rowe claimed that the South Central Ambulance Service initially refused to take his wife to hospital because her symptoms resembled those of swine flu.

He said that only following a third call hours later did they take her to the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading, where she died.

He said: “I’m pretty angry about it. I'm going to be asking them questions about why they thought it was not necessary to attend.

“My wife died in terrible

circumstances but it does seem to me that swine flu has got in the way of making a better

diagnosis. That’s a heck of a price to pay if they could have done something about it.”

He added: “If someone else has it and they don’t ask the right questions are we going to have the same thing again?”

He said that he, his son Jack and daughter Rebecca were “going through hell”.

Following Mrs Rowe’s death, the Health Protection Agency (HPA) launched an investigation into how she contracted the deadly, infectious disease.

HPA spokeswoman Teresa Cash said that its responsibility was to protect the health of the public and if it found Legionella bacteria at sufficiently harmful levels in one place then it would be its duty to inform the public.

She said that as part of the investigation, they would take a two-week history of the patient, tracking her every movement to find out where the disease was contracted.

She said: “In this case she worked in London so we are also working with the assistance of environmental health officers in the council area in which she works.

“Thus far we have not had anything positive come back from any of the places we have tested.”

She also confirmed that samples from the family home had come back negative and they would continue sampling until they had exhausted all their sources.

NHS Berkshire West spokeswoman Corrine Yates said: “NHS Berkshire West has notified the Health Protection Agency of a case and subsequent death from Legionella.

“At this stage this appears to be an isolated incident and there is no cause for public concern about any possible spread.”

In 2002, Barrow-in-Furness suffered the UK’s worst outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease.

Six women and one man died as a result of the illness and another 172 people also contracted the disease. The cause was found to be a contaminated cooling tower at the town’s arts centre.

A statement from the ambulance service said that it could not comment on individual patients but pointed out that the service dealt with an average 300 calls daily and added: “Patients are encouraged to call back immediately if the situation worsens.”

South Central Ambulance Service said that they could not comment on a patient’s clinical condition.

However, a statement later released said: “When we receive an emergency call, the call taker takes all the relevant details relating to the incident and enters them onto the Computer Aided Dispatch system.

“An emergency care practitioner may also speak with the patient or caller and offer additional clinical advice and assess the best care pathway for the needs of the patient.

“A patient’s care pathway is based on the assessment by our clinically trained staff.”

 

B&Q -Permutit

B&Q, along with Tesco seem bent on ruling the world, they just seem to want to get in on anything they can!! I don't suppose it will be long before you can wheel out your very own flat pack coffin, well they do seem to want a piece of every part of our lives.

Enough rambling!  

Want a spare part for your B&Q (Permutit) water softener, want to know how it works, want to know how to service it, or do just want a product manual? No problem, just pop into your local B&Q store to see the full range of blank looks from the staff when you ask for these simple after sales support questions, I doubt very much if you'll find a single person who will be able to help you!

Your Permit water softener from B&Q can come with a Fleck control system or an Autotrol control system on it (neither being Permutit) that's just a sales name.

You can down load Fleck or Autotrol manuals here free of charge.

We can help you to identify your softener for spare parts if you can send us a picture to info@betterwatersolutions.co.uk or you can also give us a call on 01233 645688 and we will do our best to help you

                                                                                                 

B&Q sell water softeners - B&Q do not give any back up support or sell spare parts, they do not offer any technical help or telephone support, so once you have purchased your softener from them you are on your own!

Be aware that if you do telephone us we may not always be available, so be prepared to leave a message, or contact us at info@betterwatersolutions.co.uk 

If you have the capabilities, take a digital picture of the controller (clock) so that we can readily identify the model that you have, we will then contact you.

Legionaires Disease

Legionnaires disease William Harvey

 

A patient has died and two other people were seriously ill with Legionnaires' disease. A spokes person for the East Kent NHS Trust said an elderly patient had developed the disease while at the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford.

 

Health officials are already undertaking an inquiry after a former guest at a Pontin's holiday camp developed Legionnaires Disease and is currently fighting for her life in a hospital in Birmingham.

 

One case was admitted to the William Harvey Hospital from the community already ill with Legionella infection.

 

The person had not been a recent in-patient, but had visited the hospital for an outpatient appointment during the previous two weeks.

 

 

Legionnaires Disease is a killer so when it gets into our hospitals it is a very serious problem indeed.

 

So how does it get there, where does it come from and how do people catch the disease?

 

It’s much simpler than most people imagine, firstly legionaries disease is in the soil and in a our water courses and even in our water supplies that come into our houses, offices, schools and of course hospitals, but it is normally in very little amounts and does little if no harm at all.

 

The problems start when water is stored at ideal temperatures for the bacteria to proliferate, and these temperatures are between 40 degrees Celsius and 60 degrees Celsius (and ideal breading ground. Below this temperature there is no evidence that the bacteria is in enough concentration to cause any harm, above the temperature range it is simply killed off.

 

Even in the range (40 – 60c) it is not normally a problem, and it cannot be caught by drinking it, in either case if you have a cold drink anyway it is likely to be below 40c and if you have a hot drink it would have been killed off.

 

So where is the problem?  Luke warm water (ideal breeding temperatures), bad plumbing design, and in the case of hospitals and commercial premises, bad management. The problems are known and it is simple to control.

 

In the case of water borne disease, it may be hard to imagine how it can survive in our water supplies after going through intensive cleaning, disinfecting, and the high doses of the deadly poison Chlorine that is dosed into our water supplies! But survive it does, along with many other lesser known contaminants and chemicals that we happily drink every day.

Peter Allen 11th August 2009.

 

So, presuming that there is a proliferation of LD in a water supply and it cannot be caught by drinking it, nor can it be caught by contact with other people, how is it caught? The answer to that is very simple, by breathing it in. When water droplets are small enough (aerosol size) they are easily breathed in and enter the lungs, where they develop into a very serious, and life threatening pneumonia type disease, Legionella Pneumophila, this would most commonly be from air conditioning, hot tubs, spas, and showers, or anywhere where the right conditions are in place and water droplets are small enough to be breathed in.

 

Hospitals generally have specialised water purification systems installed, similar to the type of Reverse Osmosis systems fitted into many thousands of homes throughout the country, that successfully, filter out Bacteria and give a very high quality of water, with a very high level of other water borne contaminants also.

 

People, who are most likely to catch the disease, are likely to be middle aged and the elderly.