by Dan Walter
We found out that her real name was Cindy Chapman, and that she died alone and afraid.
Cindy was a paralegal, an activist and a fighter of lost causes who lived in Worcester, Massachusetts. She was part of an online community called RATEMDs, where she had many soul mates. Her posts on health care were funny and cynical and wise. Her screen name was Jane Q. Patient.
My wife, Pam, was especially fond of trading comments and barbs with her. Like others on the forum, Jane Q. was prone to drop off the screen for days or weeks at at time. But she always resurfaced with stories of her battles with the system, her fights for the poor as a paralegal, or her volunteer efforts with the Obama campaign. A few months ago, as the fight for health care reform was reaching a fever pitch, Jane started posting about her own medical complaints. She told of emergency room visits and fights over insurance, and pain, pain, pain. Her postings became erratic, with uncharacteristic typos, misspellings, and fragmented thoughts.
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Originally published in HCPLive.com
by Colleen O’Leary, RN, MSN, AOCNS
Last time I talked about how I had never really experienced the concept of nurses eating their young in action.
However, I have seen the opposite begin to evolve. I see this as a bigger issue in nursing these days. The “putting out to pasture” of seasoned, experienced nurses is happening more often and for a variety of reasons.
First, and foremost, is simply the fact that the pool of nurses inevitably follows the general aging of the nation. As baby boomers who once filled the halls of healthcare institutions caring for others begins to age, they will certainly have a more difficult time meeting the demands of current healthcare. More and more institutions are requiring nurses to work longer and longer shifts, changing from an 8-hour day to a 12-hour day. This, along with the fact that patients in the inpatient settings have much higher acuity and a variety of complex issues, makes the demands on nurses even greater.
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Originally published in MedPage Today
by Emily P. Walker, MedPage Today Washington Correspondent
Drug and device makers are urging the FDA to establish clear guidelines that will allow the industry to discuss and promote products in the unsettled world of online social media.
The FDA is hearing testimony from drug and device companies, online marketing experts, and consumer groups about what steps the agency should take to move medical advertising and promotion into online communities.
“The Internet is an important tool for consumers looking for answers about medications,” Michele Sharp, a spokeswoman for Eli Lilly, said at the FDA gathering today.
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In medical schools, primary care continues to be among the least respected fields a student can choose.
No where is that more starkly illustrated than in Pauline Chen’s recent New York Times piece, where she tells a story of a bright medical student who had the audacity to choose primary care as a career:
Kerry wanted to become a primary care physician.
Some of my classmates were incredulous. In their minds, primary care was a backup, something to do if one failed to get into subspecialty training. “Kerry is too smart for primary care,” a friend said to me one evening. “She’ll spend her days seeing the same boring chronic problems, doing all that boring paperwork and just coordinating care with other doctors when she could be out there herself actually doing something.”
This lack of peer respect is one reason why only 2 percent of medical students choose primary care internal medicine as a career.
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