Infectious disease

2,187 articles · Since 2008

Articles, page 103

Why doctors and nurses should be required to have flu shots

February 5, 2013Feb 5, 201335

I was recently speaking to the clinical leaders of a mid-sized hospital, and a senior administrator posed the question, “should we require our doctors and nurses to get flu shots?” The answer, I said, is yes, and it isn’t just to prevent the flu. It’s to get into the habit of making our folks do the right thing when it comes to patient safety.

Preventing the flu is very important. In …

Conditions and diseases

What you can learn from the flu epidemic: Get vaccinated earlier

Kevin Pho, MD

February 2, 2013Feb 2, 20134

CNN. During the past few months, I have gently suggested to my patients that they receive the flu vaccine. Many said yes, but some declined. Today, as I look up Google's national flu trend map, I see nearly the entire…

The following column was published on January 11, 2013 in CNN.

During the past few months, I have gently suggested to my patients that they receive the flu vaccine. Many said yes, but some declined.

Today, as I look up Google’s national flu trend map, I see nearly the entire country painted in an alarming red, signifying “intense” flu activity. According to the Centers …

Physician voices

7 reasons to boycott the Super Bowl from a medical standpoint

Dr. Charles

January 30, 2013Jan 30, 201319

You’ve probably watched the Super Bowl as I have many times, faithfully, elevating the occasion to some kind of macabre family tradition. It is a spectacle of athletic agility, drama, and struggle; the pinnacle of American sporting contests. Despite the heavy onslaught of commercialism, faux halftime culture, and evident violence on the field, we suspend our awareness that this event may not …

Real physician voices, twice a week

Free, and one click to unsubscribe.

Drugs and prescribing

Vaccines: Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it

Davis Liu, MD

January 29, 2013Jan 29, 20134

Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. Most of us have not had personal experience with illnesses like measles, mumps, German measles, or polio. Thank goodness for that. It is because a generation ago individuals, families, and doctors choose a different path. They witnessed loved ones stricken with these diseases. When the opportunity arose to protect themselves from these …

Physician voices

Big Joe: Living proof of our fallibility

Sid Schwab, MD

January 24, 2013Jan 24, 20134

When I think of Big Joe, I see his overalls, and how he filled them. And how a couple of months after I operated on him, there was room for both of us in there. Big Joe: farmer, salt of…

When I think of Big Joe, I see his overalls, and how he filled them. And how a couple of months after I operated on him, there was room for both of us in there. Big Joe: farmer, salt of the earth, tough, stoic. On the day I met him, if it’d been Halloween, I might have tried to stick a candle in him. That’s how orange he was. My …

Conditions and diseases

We cannot be complacent about drug resistant bacteria

Christopher Johnson, MD

January 22, 2013Jan 22, 20132

This little cartoon, courtesy of xkcd, highlights a problem we have had for some time, but which is getting worse–highly antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Soon after the first antibiotics appeared, especially penicillin, doctors noticed the phenomenon of developing bacterial resistance to them.…

Physician voices

Medical malpractice: Equating standard of care to best practice

Shadowfax, MD

January 8, 2013Jan 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 …

Drugs and prescribing

It’s time to rethink the role of antivirals in flu treatment

Kenneth Lin, MD

December 31, 2012Dec 31, 20122

Flu season has begun in the U.S., and in addition to familiarizing themselves with the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practice's vaccination guidelines for the 2012-13 season (offer influenza vaccine to everyone 6 months of age or older), physicians should consider…

Flu season has begun in the U.S., and in addition to familiarizing themselves with the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practice’s vaccination guidelines for the 2012-13 season (offer influenza vaccine to everyone 6 months of age or older), physicians should consider how they plan to diagnose patients with suspected influenza. Despite the availability of multiple antiviral medications for influenza, whom to treat remains a …

Physician voices

Antibiotics for your viral cold: Why it’s hard to do the right thing

Toni Brayer, MD

December 19, 2012Dec 19, 201214

Winter is officially here and we are in the cold and flu season. This is the time that patients get sick with viral illnesses and primary care doctors get even more frustrated as they try to do the right thing…

First of all we want to relieve suffering. But we also want to do that …

Conditions and diseases

HIV screening and the USPSTF: Better late than never

Paul Sax, MD

December 10, 2012Dec 10, 2012

A flurry of coverage recently appeared about the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force’s recommendation for one-time HIV screening for all Americans, ages 15-64. Some might wonder why this is news — um, hasn’t this been recommended now for years? —…

A flurry of coverage recently appeared about the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force’s recommendation for one-time HIV screening for all Americans, ages 15-64.

Some might wonder why this is news — um, hasn’t this been recommended now for years? — and I think I’ve figured it out.

Let me start by relaying that every ID/HIV specialists can tell some version of the following sad story, which is still repeated on a regular basis …

Drugs and prescribing

The conversation that takes place before the flu shot

Suzanne Koven, MD

December 5, 2012Dec 5, 20124

In our practice, doctors have the option to administer influenza vaccines right in the exam room. The truth is, giving the flu shot only takes a couple of seconds. The syringes are pre-filled, so all you have to do is…

It’s the conversation that precedes the flu shot that takes time.

Take yesterday. A very intelligent middle-aged …

Conditions and diseases

Debunking 8 persistent health myths

Leana Wen, MD

December 3, 2012Dec 3, 20127

I recently a session at the Asian American Women Leadership Conference to high school and college students about taking care of our bodies. One the topics is common health myths. Despite our best efforts at debunking them, here are 8…

1. You can catch a cold from being too cold. Growing up, how many of us have heard this from well-meaning parents and grandparents? It’s easy to see how …

Read more…

Debunking 8 persistent health myths

Physician voices

A physician takes his flu vaccine under protest

Doug McGuff, MD

November 27, 2012Nov 27, 201228

To hospital administration, I am writing this letter to inform you that when I take my mandated influenza vaccine I will be doing so under protest and with the understanding that failure to do so could result in loss of…

To hospital administration,

I am writing this letter to inform you that when I take my mandated influenza vaccine I will be doing so under protest and with the understanding that failure to do so could result in loss of my ability to earn income for myself and my family. Unfortunately, I do not qualify for any of the exemptions allowed by our facility. Since I am not religious, I have …

Patient voices

What would your personal health checklist look like?

Alexandra Yperifanos & Barbara Bronson Gray, RN

November 24, 2012Nov 24, 20125

Think of a time when you’ve felt very sick, maybe a case of pneumonia, a bad bout of the flu, or a more serious illness. You probably didn’t feel much like “engaging” with people. That’s the term health advocates use…

Think of a time when you’ve felt very sick, maybe a case of pneumonia, a bad bout of the flu, or a more serious illness.

You probably didn’t feel much like “engaging” with people. That’s the term health advocates use to describe what patients need to do to be effective in managing their health care.

It’s very hard to act like the CEO of your own body when you’re unbelievably tired, or …

Physician voices

Society must come to a conclusion on how important human suffering is

Pinak S. Joshi

November 23, 2012Nov 23, 20122

The art and practice of medicine is built around lessening the suffering of our fellow man. The method of doing this however, has changed dramatically throughout human history. Western medicine had its beginnings in the restoring balance to the body that was not in sync with the environment. As scientific reasoning found its way into medical practice after the dark ages, the benefits of medicine quickly became a cornerstone of …

Conditions and diseases

How is fungal meningitis diagnosed and treated?

Manoj Jain, MD, MPH

November 21, 2012Nov 21, 2012

As the number of deaths from fungal meningitis mounts, many people want to know how fungal meningitis is diagnosed and treated. As an infectious disease doctor, it is routine for me to care for patients who come in the hospital…

As the number of deaths from fungal meningitis mounts, many people want to know how fungal meningitis is diagnosed and treated.

As an infectious disease doctor, it is routine for me to care for patients who come in the hospital with a fever. At first glance it is impossible to tell whether the patient has meningitis, pneumonia or a urine infection.

If a patient has headache, confusion or stiff neck along with …

Health policy

Penalizing hospitals for never event infections is ineffective

Skeptical Scalpel, MD

November 20, 2012Nov 20, 20123

I told you so. Three months ago, I blogged about the Medicare (CMS) “never events” list, diagnoses that Medicare will no longer reimburse hospitals for. In Medicare’s eyes, these diagnoses are totally preventable, should never happen and will not be…

I told you so.

Three months ago, I blogged about the Medicare (CMS) “never events” list, diagnoses that Medicare will no longer reimburse hospitals for. In Medicare’s eyes, these diagnoses are totally preventable, should never happen and will not be reimbursed. I pointed out that several were in fact not 100% preventable despite any institution’s best efforts, and the rates of many of these occurrences would not fall to zero.

Now …

Conditions and diseases

Where are the tonsils and why would we take them out?

Christopher Johnson, MD

November 19, 2012Nov 19, 2012

There are some important new recommendations both about strep throats in general and about tonsillectomy – taking out the tonsils — as a treatment for recurrent strep throats. Some of us can recall a time when getting your tonsils out…

There are some important new recommendations both about strep throats in general and about tonsillectomy – taking out the tonsils — as a treatment for recurrent strep throats.

Some of us can recall a time when getting your tonsils out was one of the rites of passage of childhood. Usually a related procedure is added — an adenoidectomy, removing the adenoids as well. It’s called a T&A …

Medical education

Rural medicine in India: What American health care can learn

Roheet Kakaday

October 27, 2012Oct 27, 20122

Many premeds take time during their undergraduate careers to volunteer abroad. Popular destinations include Mexico, various Central and Southern American countries, and Africa. These are great opportunities to discover more about underserved care and, more importantly, what you are made of. I just thought I would share my reflections on volunteering abroad during college. Hopefully, you can glean something from them.

In the backcountry of India, in the state of Maharashtra, …

Conditions and diseases

Ways to improve influenza immunization rates

William Schaffner, MD

October 26, 2012Oct 26, 20124

With the 2012-13 influenza season underway, I want to remind my colleagues that while influenza vaccination has been around for 60 years, the times are changing, and physicians need to change too. We now have newer vaccine options targeting specific…

Alas, many providers have not taken advantage of these options that 1) potentially offer better protection for patients aged 65+ and 2) …

Infectious disease

Articles, page 103

Real physician voices, twice a week

The Podcast

Latest episodes

Most popular

The Podcast

Latest episodes

Most popular