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What is observation care? Clearing up common misperceptions

Policy

February 4, 2013

To treat observation care as simply a loophole that allows hospitals to avoid the Medicare penalties from readmissions — as Brad Wright, an assistant professor of health management and policy at the University of Iowa did earlier this month — is to take a short-sighted approach to a complex health issue.

Observation care in fact aims to address several of healthcare’s thorniest challenges head on. In the process, …

Behind the fetish of vitamin B12 shots

Roy Benaroch, MD

Conditions

February 3, 2013

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Medicines and other treatments need to be tested. We want reliable proof that something works and is safe before we recommend it. We don’t like the false dichotomy of “alternative medicine”. If there is good evidence that it works, it’s medicine. If it doesn’t work, it’s quackery.

It doesn’t matter who’s doing the quacking. A quack is a quack, even if …

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Behind the fetish of vitamin B12 shots

We can learn a lot by comparing guns to cars

Jennifer Gunter, MD

Physician

February 1, 2013

A common rebuttal to any discussion about of gun control is motor vehicle accident deaths. We don’t blame the car, we blame the driver. Regardless of the object’s intent (the car is for transportation and the gun is shoot people, targets, game, and skeet), neither a car nor a gun can kill or maim without human touch.

And I agree. Comparing guns and cars is fair, after all they kill about …

From Mom: Here’s what it takes to be a great doctor

Anonymous

Education

January 31, 2013

My mom wrote me the following letter during my first semester in medical school. She has been a patient, and a mother/wife/sister/daughter of patients. She has been around countless doctors. Here is her take on what makes a great one.

Dear Son,

I am so very proud that you are becoming a physician and that you chose this profession, not for the prestige or the financial advantages, but because you want to …

Do doctors take advantage of desperate couples with infertility loans?

Peter Ubel, MD

Physician

January 30, 2013

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Somewhere near where you live, a couple will discover this week that they are infertile and that if they want biological children of their own, they are going to need in vitro fertilization (or IVF). According to treatment protocol, the woman will need to take powerful medicines to ramp up her production of fertilizable eggs. One monthly cycle of this treatment will run …

Countertransference is a reality that must be grappled with

Ilana Yurkiewicz

Education

January 29, 2013

“Sometimes, how you feel at the end of an interview can be clinically revealing,” my preceptor says. “How does this patient make you feel?”

***

“Mr. M?” I ask gently, knocking on the hospital room door. “May I come in?”

“Hello? Hello?”

I enter at what I think is an invitation to me, but see that 79-year-old Mr. M is speaking into the phone instead.

“I’m sorry, I can come back…” I start to say. …

The closing of a mental health facility in Newtown

Deep Ramachandran, MD

Physician

January 26, 2013

I wrote in a previous post about what life was like growing up in Newtown, Connecticut. It truly is a picturesque New England town. But what might be surprising is that within that town sat a gem. A hundred acres of wooded rolling hills within which sat an inner campus of professionally landscaped and meticulously manicured grounds crowned with stately and handsome brick buildings in a colonial architectural style. These …

Why I’m not sure that psychiatric medications work

Steve Balt, MD

Meds

January 25, 2013

I have a confession to make. I don’t think what I do each day makes any sense.

Perhaps I should explain myself. Six months ago, I started my own private psychiatry practice. I made this decision after working for several years in various community clinics, county mental health systems, and three academic institutions. I figured that an independent practice would permit me …

Using the iPad Mini in the hospital: One doctor’s experience

Vineet Arora, MD

Tech

January 22, 2013

On my birthday several weeks ago, I was lucky to get an iPad Mini from my husband. I already have an iPad and have shared my experience. In fact, we gave all of our residents iPads (one of them contacted Steve Jobs and got a response), and documented an improvement in efficiency on the wards. So why the Mini? What is …

When is making the decision to be DNR appropriate?

James C. Salwitz, MD

Physician

January 22, 2013

Here is a little appreciated fact: Patients cannot order medical care; they can only accept or refuse it. Only a doctor can order medical treatment. In an extreme medical situation, the doctor can offer CPR, but it is the patient’s job to accept or reject. Any patient can refuse CPR. This refusal is known as Do Not Resuscitate or DNR, and for obvious reasons needs to be made ahead of …

Don’t make me leave primary care

Lydia Dugdale, MD

Physician

January 21, 2013

You need a doctor, and I love what I do. But this work just isn’t sustainable.

In 2009, I finished medical training and joined a clinical academic practice. For those not in the know, doctors can — very generally speaking — work in one of two domains: in private practice, or on faculty at a medical school where they see patients, teach, and/or do research. Some docs manage to keep a …

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Don’t make me leave primary care

Dealing with psychological stress of being a doctor

Shadowfax, MD

Physician

January 21, 2013

Chatting with some med students, a good question was raised: how do we, as doctors, deal with the emotional baggage we encounter in our profession? It’s high stress, we see disturbing things, and sometimes we make mistakes that can result in harm to patients. The pressure and responsibility can be very hard to handle.

These stresses, if unmanaged or poorly managed, can …

The link between early ear infections and inflammatory bowel disease

Roy Benaroch, MD

Conditions

January 19, 2013

Add to the growing list of reasons antibiotics might not be good for you and your children: a recent study showing a statistical link between early ear infections and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

Researchers in the UK analyzed data from about a million children, looking specifically at the 750 who developed IBD (Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, mostly.) They then compared the kids with IBD to children without that …

Allowing EMTs to perform an ECG should not be controversial

William C. Dillon, MD

Conditions

January 17, 2013

I live in Louisville, KY, which is the epicenter for heart disease in the United States. My state ranks 49th out of 50 states for heart attack mortality. This is a complex issue with many contributing factors, including access to care, patient education, health insurance, cooperation between EMS and hospitals, among others. The thing is: heart disease is our number one …

I was sued and lived to tell the tale

Natasha Deonarain, MD, MBA

Physician

January 17, 2013

A few years ago, I was sued. Yes indeed, I can now shout it from the rooftops. I know what it feels like to sit in the fire and burn into ashes of self-doubt, regret and emptiness; staring into the soulless, Cyclopean eye of a deposition camera, recounting my sins, defending my pride. I know what it’s like to live with fear, up close and personal. And I know what …

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I was sued and lived to tell the tale

I will talk to my patients about smoking: Again and again

Bruce Campbell, MD

Conditions

January 16, 2013

Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced.
– James Baldwin

She sits in the examination chair reeking of cigarette smoke. “I had a new sore under my tongue last week,” she tells me. “It was bad.”

A year ago, she finally developed a large throat cancer from her years of smoking and drinking. The cancer had spread to the neck lymph nodes and …

The problem of bouncy houses and the injuries they cause

Claire McCarthy, MD

Conditions

January 16, 2013

For around four years in a row, starting around 1996, my husband and I rented one of those inflatable bouncy houses for my son’s birthday party every August. We invited a whole bunch of his friends and cousins to bounce in it for a few hours (and let them play in the sprinkler and fed them cake). Nobody got hurt.

Which, in retrospect, …

Be the bad guy with good intentions

Shara Yurkiewicz

Education

January 14, 2013

“You’re not sorry.”

Within two days two different patients said this to me, each with hatred in his voice. Each time I was alone, each time I had known the patient for only a few minutes, and each time the rage was directed at me and only me.

For seven months, I had avoided being the bad guy. When a patient got upset, he accused my superiors, and I hid behind their …

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Be the bad guy with good intentions

Bed alarms don’t work and won’t reduce patient falls

Ken Covinsky, MD

Conditions

January 14, 2013

Many older patients fall in the hospital and these falls often lead to injury. Hospitals are under a lot of pressure to reduce falls. Generally, these falls happen when patients transfer such as when an older person tries to get out of bed or get up from a chair. While hospitalized, many patients are weak, dizzy, or confused, and they can be at risk of falling when ambulating …

Medical malpractice: Equating standard of care to best practice

Shadowfax, MD

Physician

January 8, 2013

I review a lot of cases in my professional life. Some of them are just ones that our QA group comes across in our practice. Some are cases related to our liability policy. Some are cases I’m sent for review, or educational cases I present. We see a lot of cases which could have been done better, or in which the …

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