Before quitting medicine, consider the children

Patient
May 13, 2010

There’s little doubt that many doctors are frustrated, with some compelled to leave medicine altogether.

And with the myriad of obstacles intruding on the doctor-patient relationship, combined with the factors contributing to burnout, that’s certainly an understandable stance.

So, why do so many continue the uphill climb to practice the best medicine they can?

Emergency physician Edwin Leap gives his explanation, in a poignant column from Emergency Medicine News:

We may rail against …

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Before quitting medicine, consider the children

Patient explanation using an analogy can trigger comprehension

Patient
May 11, 2010

I have a patient in his 60s who is riddled with metastatic lung cancer. He isn’t on hospice (oncology refuses to let him out of their clutches just yet; actually, the problem is that around here Hospice won’t accept patients still on palliative chemo or radiation) but is aware of what they have to offer. He and his wife have assured me that they will let me know when they …

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Patient explanation using an analogy can trigger comprehension

Adult day centers help older patients and their families

Patient
May 1, 2010

by Deborah Stricoff

Are you caring for an elderly loved one or someone with dementia? As a caregiver, you may need respite and you can get it with the help of an adult day center knowing that your loved one is safe and cared for. Many people are not aware of adult day programs and the benefits they provide, and it’s important to get the word out.

Adult …

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Adult day centers help older patients and their families

Questions for doctors are powerful patient tools

Patient
April 27, 2010

by Toni Bigby

Our Federal Government is investing in a consumer education campaign called, “Questions are the Answer.” The idea is to encourage people to watch out for themselves a little better and be their own advocate by asking their doctors questions like, “Why do I need this surgery?” and “Are there any side effects from this drug?”

Why are we as health care consumers, who collectively spend trillions of dollars each …

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Questions for doctors are powerful patient tools

Top doctors may not always be the best physicians

Patient
April 21, 2010

I’m sure you’ve read through top doctor rankings and online physician ratings. It is only human to seek perceived leaders. But as sometimes seen in politics, those who have reached the pinnacles are often motivated by ambition, charisma, and gamesmanship instead of altruism, sincerity, and merit.

Beware the top doctors issues found in magazines and newspapers.

Some of these doctors are excellent, but many are simply “notable.” They may be well-connected, in …

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Top doctors may not always be the best physicians

Sick friends could use your help

Patient
April 20, 2010

Illness might be the most isolating and alienating experience a person can know. Lots of well people simply have no clue how to relate to someone with a chronic and catastrophic illness. That sort of thing is scary even just to witness. They hope (or assume) you’ll get better, and then they won’t have to deal with whatever you’re going through – but when that takes too long, they drift …

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Sick friends could use your help

Patient stories on the web may not be real

Patient
April 13, 2010

“On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog” was the caption of the famous cartoon by Peter Steiner in the July 5, 1993 issue of The New Yorker. The same is true of patient stories on health Web sites: nobody knows who really wrote them.

In the case of Lifestyle Lift, the company agreed to pay a $300,000 settlement last year to New York State because their patient stories were employee-generated.

Patient …

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Patient stories on the web may not be real

Price transparency will improve patient care

Patient
April 13, 2010

Debora T. had a blood pressure of 180/110 during her routine visit in my internal medicine clinic. She was already on every blood pressure medication I could think of, save one — amlodipine. I prescribed the medicine and asked her to follow up in a week. I feared her blood pressure was going to cause a stroke if it went up any higher.

At our next visit, her blood pressure was …

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Price transparency will improve patient care

Health information online won’t make doctors obsolete

Patient
April 13, 2010

More patients are on the web researching health information, and for the most part, this is a good thing.

But are doctors in danger of being “phased out” by Google and other search engines?

In an interesting perspective piece by Pamela Hartzband and Jerome Groopman in the New England Journal of Medicine, the answer appears to be no.

Data without expertise in interpretation is largely meaningless. Consider this patient the authors …

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Health information online won’t make doctors obsolete

Patient beliefs and their role in non-adherence

Patient
April 9, 2010

Patient non-adherence is a big problem. Non-adherence among chronic disease patients is associated with higher rates of hospital re-admissions, higher costs and poorer outcomes.

Research has identified over 200 possible factors thought to influence patient adherence. According to the experts, these factors can be categorized into two groups:

1. unintentional non-adherence
2. intentional non-adherence.

Unintentional non-adherence is related to a patient’s ability and resources to take their medication (e.g., problems with manual …

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Patient beliefs and their role in non-adherence

Advance planning helps families cope with loss

Patient
April 8, 2010

by Crystal Phend

Advance planning improves end-of-life care for elderly patients and helps families cope with the loss, researchers found.

In a randomized trial, hospitalized patients over age 80 who were formally assisted with documenting their end-of-life treatment wishes and with designating a surrogate were almost three times more likely to have those wishes followed (86% versus 30% in usual care, P<0.001).

Family members of patients in the advance planning intervention reported significantly …

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Advance planning helps families cope with loss

Patient questions during doctor visits are uncommon

Patient
March 27, 2010

Ask your doctor. I think most of us would agree that is good advice, at least up to the point that we find ourselves sitting half naked on an exam table in our doctor’s office. Then the doctor walks in and for some reason many of us just “clam up.”

Patient question-asking during the primary care office visit was and continues to be an “index” of patient health information …

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Patient questions during doctor visits are uncommon

Guilt used in a positive manner can help with parenting

Patient
March 27, 2010

In my pediatric practice, it is not uncommon for a mother, given the time, to move quickly away from telling me about her child’s behavior problem, to talk about herself, sharing vivid stories of emotional distress from her own life. I may suggest that this distress could make it difficult for her to deal with the challenging behavior of her child.

Rather than finding this statement helpful, she might collapse back …

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Guilt used in a positive manner can help with parenting

10 salt reducing tips that can lower your blood pressure

Patient
March 26, 2010

It’s hard for Cassandra Mathieu to describe her mother’s cooking without mentioning the salt shaker.

“I remember my mother used to cook with seasoning salt, garlic salt, every kind of salt you can imagine,” she said recently. “We grew up on salt.”

Cassandra grew up fixing food the same way, adding generous amounts of salt to dishes she prepared and to her food at the table. At age 42, she discovered her …

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10 salt reducing tips that can lower your blood pressure

Archeology skills work in medicine

Patient
March 23, 2010

I’m becoming an amateur archeologist. The hilltop where we live is strewn with arrowheads and bits of Native American pottery shards. I have slowly, surely, trained my eye to find them. There is little flint here; so most of the pieces I find were made of quartz. (Hard to work with, but remarkably beautiful and almost always a brilliant white.)

My kids and I walk the red-clay paths and look down …

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Archeology skills work in medicine

Patient input in their treatment should be valued by doctors

Patient
March 23, 2010

Thanks all who responded to my recent USA Today piece, Patient-satisfaction surveys have drawbacks.

But in a letter published in the paper yesterday, a reader from Oklahoma City was quite unhappy with my take.

Mark R. Heaton writes, somewhat angrily:

Dr. Kevin Pho’s recent opinion piece was not only arrogant but also grossly naive.

His basic premise was twofold:

• Doctors know best and should therefore ignore patient feedback regarding possible tests and treatments.

• …

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Patient input in their treatment should be valued by doctors

Taxing junk food may improve your health

Patient
March 17, 2010

Originally published in MedPage Today

by Kristina Fiore, MedPage Today Staff Writer

Taxing junk food may help reduce obesity and improve health, researchers have found.

Patients got significantly less of their energy (calories) from soda or pizza when there was a 10% increase in the price of either (P<0.001), Penny Gordon-Larsen, PhD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and colleagues …

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Taxing junk food may improve your health

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