The words we use may comfort or shock, allay or provoke, sooth or batter. Words often imply layers of meaning that are not explicitly articulated, yet rest beneath the surface:
“I worry that time is short for you” (You are dying) (I care about you)
“I wish we could have done more” (Nothing would have changed her death) (I am on your side)
“I hope with you that you’ll get better, but I think we should prepare in case things don’t go as we hope” (You are not getting better) (I support your hope)
A Massachusetts anesthesiologist accused of fabricating data in studies of pain drugs will plead guilty to federal criminal charges under an agreement with prosecutors.
Scott Reuben, MD, a well-known pain researcher at Baystate Medical Center in Springfield, Mass., was charged with one count of healthcare fraud.
The common thought among health reformers is that we spend too much on care, and the additional care patients receive doesn’t necessarily help them.
What inevitably follows is a discussion on how to streamline care, yet maintain quality. To that end, most hospitals and emergency rooms are using algorithm-based care based on the best available evidence. Where doctors actually had to hand write admission orders, they are now checked off – like a menu at a restaurant.
Another study has found that hypertension may contribute to increased risk of dementia, this time with evidence of actual brain abnormalities.
Data from an offshoot of the Women’s Health Initiative found that participants’ baseline blood pressure was strongly correlated with volume of lesions in their brains’ white matter, according to Lewis Kuller, MD, DrPH, of the University of Pittsburgh, and colleagues.
Along with earlier studies linking blood pressure to clinical dementia, the evidence “supports tight control of blood pressure levels, especially beginning at younger and middle age as a possible and perhaps only way to prevent dementia,” Kuller and colleagues concluded online in the Journal of Clinical Hypertension.
A patient learns about a treatment for his condition. So he goes to his physician to suggest the treatment as an option. Is there anything wrong with that?
It depends on how his “suggestion” is presented.
In today’s age of patient advocacy and direct-to-patient marketing of pharmaceuticals, a new phenomenon is flourishing in doctors’ offices: patients asking for specific diagnostic tests or therapies.
More than 85% of American military medical evacuations from the Middle East were not the direct result of enemy action, but the result of non-battle injuries and disease, researchers said.
Of some 34,000 military personnel in Iraq and Afghanistan who shipped out for medical reasons from 2004 to 2007, only 14% had been wounded or injured in combat, according to Steven P. Cohen, MD, of Johns Hopkins, and colleagues.
There is a veritable epidemic of doctor-writers out there. What is going on?
Are doctors suddenly in the kiss-and-tell mode? What about confidentiality? Professionalism? HIPAA?
As one of the aforementioned doctor-writers, I look upon this trend with both awe and trepidation. I suspect that that this flourishing literary phenomenon relates to the public’s fascination and fear about all things medical. It also relates to the falling away of previous, pedestal-like images of doctors and doctoring. Lastly, it may have occurred to the medical profession—and this has taken a few centuries, it seems—that doctors have profound emotional reactions to the work we do, and that exploring these reactions may offer benefit to both patient and doctor.
Early in my training as a glider pilot my instructor showed me an excellent but simple analogy for ensuring my safe performance as a pilot. I have always remembered this lesson, which he called the ‘accident slope’, and have tried to apply it to my method of practicing medicine, as well as the other ‘dangerous’ activities for which I have an affinity.
“Accidents and mistakes are seldom the result of one single error” he said, “ but more commonly the combination of a multitude of mishaps – each of which on its own may seem minor, but when superimposed, spin with increasing speed towards tragedy.”
Physicians tend to prefer intellectual hobbies — chess, reading, writing. Dr. Alfred Bove is no exception. His hobby often requires application of his expertise in physiology. You know him as the president of the American College of Cardiology. But you may not know that his heart belongs to the sea.
Bove’s interest in scuba diving has thrived for more than 50 years, generating an immense knowledge that other reporters and I have tapped when writing stories such as this one about diving with disease. I recently dove more deeply into Bove’s “other” profession — a dive medicine physician reputed among the scuba community.
Currently, the most important test prospective medical students take is the Medical College Admission Test, or MCAT.
Despite what schools say, an MCAT score holds tremendous weight, more so than a brilliant essay or a stellar recommendation letter.
In an interesting New York Times piece, Pauline Chen wonders whether that score itself leads to a great physician. She discusses an article showing that students’ cognitive traits may be equally important.
