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One example where the EMR can really make a difference in outcomes

Conditions and Diseases

March 31, 2014

Given all the complaining I and my colleagues do about the problems with the EMR, I figured I’d take the opportunity to tell you about something good that came from having my practice online.

A patient came to see me last week for a check up and requested a prescription for birth control pills. She’d used them in the past without problems. I wrote the script and sent her on her …

It’s OK to laugh after a procedure

Susan D. Klugman, MD

Conditions and Diseases

March 31, 2014

She asked me, “Is it OK to laugh?”

My patient Linda, who was only 12 weeks pregnant, had just had a chorionic villus sampling, or CVS. During this procedure, a small piece of placenta (chorionic villi) is removed via a long, thin needle inserted into the woman’s uterus, and then the sample is sent to a laboratory for genetic analysis. My patient fell into the category of advanced maternal age, and …

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It’s OK to laugh after a procedure

The dreadful cost of denying how you really feel

Anoop Kumar, MD

Physician

March 31, 2014

I was recently sent a link to this article entitled “Smile! You’ve Got Cancer” written by Barbara Ehrenreich. I encourage everyone to read it. The article lives up to its striking title and more. And I couldn’t help but respond with my perspective. So that you know where I’m coming from, my most personal encounter with cancer is that my grandmother died from cancer. I also treat people with acute …

Weight loss resistance is real

David L. Katz, MD

Conditions and Diseases

March 31, 2014

Weight is not a behavior, and weight is not a choice. Nobody wakes up and decides what to weigh today. In an age when healthy and unhealthy behaviors are increasingly subject to incentives and disincentives, respectively, this is all too easily forgotten.

Of course, weight is largely the byproduct of behaviors and choices, namely what and how much we eat, and what and how much we do: calories in and calories …

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Weight loss resistance is real

My best teachers are my patients

Greg Smith, MD

Physician

March 31, 2014

One good thing about doing anything for three decades or longer is that you get to see cycles and repeated events, things that fail and things that work. I hope that over the last thirty years of learning about psychiatry and mental health (and yes, I am still learning and hope to acquire that one last little piece of knowledge on my deathbed) that I have paid attention to the …

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My best teachers are my patients

Hospital medicine doctors are key to improving patient satisfaction

Suneel Dhand, MD

Physician

March 31, 2014

Improving patient satisfaction and enhancing the hospital experience is all the buzz today in health care. Every hospital executive across the country is talking about it, and coming to terms with how their organization’s reimbursements will be directly tied to their performance in this area.

A decade ago, none of us had ever heard of HCAHPS (Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems) scores, the core metric by which health …

Did the NEJM publish a bad study about checklists?

Josh Herigon, MPH

Medical Education

March 30, 2014

Recently, a study in the New England Journal of Medicine called into question the effectiveness of surgical checklists for preventing harm. Atul Gawande, one of the original researchers demonstrating the effectiveness of such checklists and author of a book on the subject, quickly wrote a rebuttal on the Incidental Economist. He writes, “I wish the Ontario study were better,” and I join him in that assessment, but want to take it a step further.

Gawande first criticizes …

Understanding the uproar over Zohydro ER

James Patrick Murphy, MD

Medications

March 30, 2014

In March 2014, Zohydro ER (hydrocodone extended-release) was introduced to the market. Never in my medical lifetime do I recall a medication stirring such angst. Worries of mass overdoses, backdoor FDA conspiracies, and blatant disregard for the public well-being abound. Is there method to this madness?

Zohydro ER is a pain pill that, when taken by mouth, is released slowly over twelve hours. The active ingredient, hydrocodone, is an opioid (i.e. narcotic) that’s been around for decades …

Checklists alone do not produce a culture of vigilance

Dr. Saurabh Jha

Physician

March 30, 2014

A respiratory physician who I worked for had an uncanny ability of predicting the diagnoses the admitting junior doctor would fail to consider in patients presenting acutely with difficulty in breathing. He was using a checklist, which he developed after years of observing his housestaff.

As a surgical intern I was once praised for my presence of mind in cross matching blood for a patient with a rare blood group who …

4 keys to manage medical malpractice stress syndrome

Dianne Ansari-Winn, MD, MPH

Physician

March 30, 2014

Most physicians will be sued for malpractice during their career. A group at Harvard has estimated that by age 65, more than 75% of physicians in low-risk specialties such as family medicine and 99% of physicians in high-risk specialties such as surgery will have been sued. Over 95% of physicians do experience emotional distress during some or all of the process of litigation. Malpractice suits can take between …

Self-censoring of patient information may be a public health hazard

Steven Reidbord, MD

Physician

March 30, 2014

Medical student Joyce Ho recently wrote an article in which she admitted to discomfort raising the topic of religion with patients. As a “polarizing” issue that could make the doctor-patient relationship “more unprofessional,” Ms. Ho imagined that patients would fear playing into their doctors’ prejudices, particularly if the doctor were atheist, and that this fear would push some patients away from the inquiring doctor. Despite her instructor’s recommendation to ask …

MKSAP: 24-year-old woman with painful muscle spasms

mksap

Conditions and Diseases

March 30, 2014

Test your medicine knowledge with the MKSAP challenge, in partnership with the American College of Physicians.

A 24-year-old woman is evaluated for a 3-week history of painful muscle spasms and twisting movements in the neck and trunk. She says that her neck feels as if it is being pulled backward. She also reports general restlessness and an inability to keep still. Her medical history is notable for asthma, …

Unexpected lessons from an unexpected patient

Chiduzie Madubata, MD

Physician

March 29, 2014

“I’m so sorry, but it looks like the cancer has spread.”

As I heard these words come out of my mouth, I knew that in a split second, a new reality was created in the mind of the patient that I was talking to. I looked at his face and saw that he was trying to remain strong, but in his demeanor, it was apparent that dreams were crushed and that …

Dissatisfied doctors can’t provide good patient care

Afshine Ash Emrani, MD

Health Policy

March 29, 2014

The worst news in health care is not antibiotic resistance, drug-drug interactions, hospital acquired infections, lack of communication between systems of medical records, and certainly not the alarming rate of obesity in our youth.

The worst news is the increasing number of dissatisfied physicians.

The physician, also known in the system as a “provider,” has been the direct target of assault by the government. The logic has been that if the physician …

What a World Series MVP taught me about practicing medicine

W. Lee Warren, MD

Physician

March 29, 2014

Summer, 1998
Three Rivers Stadium
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

It was a typical Saturday morning on call. We’d finished rounds and I’d taken the sign-out from the resident who’d worked the night before. I headed to the library, planning to do some board prep before the inevitable beeper call to the ER or ICU. I was a PGY-4 neurosurgery resident, with many previous weekends on duty to my credit. No reason to think this one would be …

Be more involved in how patients fill their prescriptions

Arshya Vahabzadeh, MD

Medications

March 29, 2014

As physicians, we often write prescriptions for our patients. Where, when, and how patients fill their prescriptions are usually outside of our realm of expertise. But should we be more involved?

On occasion, the cost of a medication and possible alternatives will be the subject of my conversation with a patient. I was surprised, however, when one of my patients complained about the price of an antidepressant that I had prescribed. …

Look for a doctor who understands healing

Barbara Kivowitz, MSW and Roanne Weisman

Patient

March 29, 2014

An excerpt from In Sickness as in Health: Helping Couples Cope with the Complexities of Illness.

You are not a statistic

Ironically, the surgeon who repaired her heart also left her heartbroken. While he and the neurologists may have considered it their obligation to present what they envisioned as …

Do patients have a right to know their doctor’s uncertainty?

Brian J. Secemsky, MD

Medical Education

March 29, 2014

Picture this.

You walk into your doctor’s office for an urgent visit for new distressing symptoms. He (or she) takes your blood pressure, temperature, heart rate. All within normal limits. He asks you several questions pertaining to your symptoms, does a thorough exam and perhaps orders a quick in-office lab or two. You ask him what he thinks is going on.

The quandary

If it’s a slam dunk diagnosis, the branch point in …

Choosing a perfect residency: What goes into a rank list

Michael Richardson

Medical Education

March 28, 2014

What do you do when your ideal residency program does not exist? This is a truth that all perspective applicants must come to terms with, but I was still hoping that I would be the exception. I had created my list of everything my top family medicine program must have, including strong research mentorship, dedicated faculty, and a welcoming resident environment, and I had an idea going into the interview season what …

Statistical significance doesn’t always warrant a miracle headline

Jennifer Gunter, MD

Conditions and Diseases

March 28, 2014

Interpreting studies is a dicey thing. Often I find what might be statistically significant translated into headlines that might not really get at the nuance of the study or the results.

Take these three for example: