From MedPage Today:

1. Time to Retire Lithotripsy for Kidney Stones? More than 30 years ago, extracorporeal shock wave lithotripsy (ESWL) had a highly anticipated, much-ballyhooed introduction as a nonsurgical therapy for kidney stones. Obviating the need to cut the skin or insert a device into the body, ESWL would use acoustic shock waves to pulverize stones into dust that would be washed out of the kidneys.
2. Senate Committee Mulls Medicare Hospital Observation Stays. Hospital observation stays for Medicare patients can be problematic, but finding solutions is also tricky.
3. Sildenafil May Help Heal Scleroderma Ulcers. Sildenafil (Viagra) provided some benefits for digital ulcer healing in patients with systemic sclerosis (SSc), although the primary endpoint of a placebo-controlled trial was not met.
4. Docs ‘Missing the Mark’ on Shared Medical Decisions. Patients trying to decide between two surgical options for the treatment of ulcerative colitis found information supplied by doctors to be “believable” but not very “useful.”