From the monthly archives:

March 2007

Why is everybody so angry at doctors?

March 31, 2007

Edwin Leap tries to make sense of it:
No one bats an eye at television shows about rappers or athletes and their elaborate homes, or extensive car collections.
But doctors! Oh my! One reader commented on my column on free care with a very annoyed letter to the editor, ranting about doctors and their [...]

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Health care is not a right

March 31, 2007

Eric Novack in an op-ed:
Just as it is morally repugnant for employers or the government to require workers to work extra hours without pay, it is unethical for a society that cherishes freedom to create a system where a right to health care obligates doctors to provide care at any time, and for a price [...]

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"Working where the sun don’t shine"

March 30, 2007

An ode to the colorectal surgeon.

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Ecstasy commercial

March 30, 2007

A parody of the Zoloft TV ad. More weekend hilarity, via Mad TV.

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"In my white coat"

March 30, 2007

Courtesy of the Howard University College of Medicine.

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P4P measures causing harm

March 30, 2007

Roy Poses outlines two instances where suggested P4P measures can lead to more harm than good.

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Does the ACP covertly want a single payer system?

March 30, 2007

retired doc feels that the ACP’s “medical home” solution only would work within a single payer construct.

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Broken rib: $12,000

March 30, 2007

The tab started before he got to the hospital:
On the other hand, what Palmer didn’t know is that as soon as the paramedics radioed ahead to say they were bringing in an accident victim, San Francisco General, as per the hospital’s procedures, issued a trauma alert to its staff.
Basically, that means a page was sent [...]

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Old-school doctors

March 30, 2007

Maurice Bernstein laments the loss of the physical exam:
The old doctors had less tests and more time and more attention to the patient. Whether they could do a better job in diagnosis and treatment of the disease than more modern medicine is doubtful. But one thing is clear, they had the time to do a [...]

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Zelnorm, RIP

March 30, 2007

Zelnorm has been pulled, as there is a small association with heart attacks when taking this IBS drug:
Swiss pharmaceutical maker Novartis AG will stop selling a drug to relieve constipation after it was linked to a higher chance of heart attack, stroke and worsening chest pain that can become a heart attack, federal health officials [...]

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Abortion in Mexico

March 30, 2007

Apparently access to this procedure is pretty good:
Practically, those who can scrape together $700 can get an abortion from a doctor. Some of them will even bill health insurance for the procedure, by coding it as a complication of pregnancy, according to the article.

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How to observe drug reps

March 30, 2007

John Mack goes to his doctor’s office yesterday and reports on his findings.

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Single payer: The assault continues

March 30, 2007

Panda Bear just has no quit in him. The third in a series post on single payer - there’s no way the American public, groomed to expect the best medical care, instantly - will stand for it:
So, it may come to pass that our country adopts a single payer system in our impossible quest [...]

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True costs of jackpot justice

March 30, 2007

An editorial in the San Francisco Examiner tells it like it is:
Next time your doctor orders lots of blood tests and MRIs, you will be experiencing a slice of the estimated $124 billion annually in unnecessary costs imposed on American health care providers through malpractice and other liability lawsuits. Doctors call it “defensive medicine” when [...]

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Capped fees for doctors

March 30, 2007

Remove the financial incentive, and you get what’s happening in Canada - perceived doctor shortages:
Now, we have a situation where the great doctor can only bill a maximum of $450,000 per year (minus overhead and taxes). When, prior to the cap, he was happy to work for “services rendered” and billed accordingly.
However, now his $1.3 [...]

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