July 6th, 2010 by GarySchwitzer in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Quackery Exposed
Tags: Big Pharma, Buy Doctors Lunch, Commercial Support, Drug Companies, Drug Rep Lunches, Drug Reps, Gary Schwitzer, General Medicine, Health Journalism, HealthNewsReview.org, Industry-Supported Medical Education, Misinformed, Misleading, Naive, Pharma-Paid Lunches, Pharmaceutical Companies, Pharmaceutical Reps, Pharmacology, Slate.com
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“Appetite for Instruction: Why Big Pharma should buy your doctor lunch sometimes” is the headline of an article on Slate.com that has upset many readers. I’m not terribly upset about it because it just seems too naive and misinformed to get upset about. The final line of the piece tells you all you need to know about the tone of the column:
“Ousting commercial support is creating a huge chasm in medical education, leaving doctors not only hungry but also starved for knowledge.”
A number of online comments were posted in reaction to the piece. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview Blog*
July 6th, 2010 by Harriet Hall, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News, Research
Tags: CDC, Centers For Disease Control and Prevention, Chickenpox, Family Medicine, General Medicine, Herpes Zoster, Immunization, Immunology, Infectious Disease, Internal Medicine, NNT, Number Needed To Treat, PHN, Placebo, Postherpetic Neuralgia, Primary Care, Public Health, shingles, VA, Vaccination, Vaccine, Varicella Zoster Virus, Veterans Administration, Zostavax
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Shingles (herpes zoster) is no fun. It usually begins with a couple of days of pain, then a painful rash breaks out and lasts a couple of weeks. The rash consists of blisters that eventually break open, crust over, and consolidate into an ugly plaque. It is localized to one side of the body and to a stripe of skin corresponding to the dermatomal distribution of a sensory nerve.
Very rarely a shingles infection can lead to pneumonia, hearing problems, blindness, brain inflammation (encephalitis) or death. More commonly, patients develop postherpetic neuralgia (PHN) in the area where the rash was. The overall incidence of PHN is 20%; after the age of 60 this rises to 40%, and after age 70 it rises to 50%. It can be excruciatingly painful, resistant to treatment, and can last for years or even a lifetime. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Science-Based Medicine*
July 6th, 2010 by Joseph Scherger, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News, Research
Tags: Added Sugars, American Diet, Chronic Disease, Denver, Dietetics, Drink Water, Family Medicine, Fructose, General Medicine, Healthy Diet, High Blood Pressure, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Hypertension, Internal Medicine, Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, Low Sugar, National Nutrition Survey, Natural Fruit, Obesity Epidemic, Primary Care, Salt, Soft Drinks, Sugar, Sugar Free, University of Colorado
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Most of us know that salt raises blood pressure in many people. When I learned that in medical school almost 40 years ago, I have not touched a salt shaker since. I enjoy having a low normal blood pressure. A new study published in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (July 2010) suggests that sugar, especially the fructose that comes from corn syrup, may also raise blood pressure.
A study team from the University of Colorado in Denver looked at sugar intake among thousands of Americans in a major national nutrition survey between 2003 and 2006. Those who consumed more added sugars, such as the fructose in soft drinks, had significantly higher blood pressures than those who did not and ate more natural foods such as fresh fruit. Fructose from corn syrup is a major cause of the obesity epidemic and may also be contributing to high blood presure, the most common chronic disease in adults. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at eDocAmerica*
July 6th, 2010 by DavedeBronkart in Better Health Network, Health Tips, Opinion, True Stories
Tags: Amanda George, Cancer Journey, Cancer Patients, Cancer Survivors, Dave deBronkart, ePatient Dave, Health and the Internet, Oncology, Online Health Communities, Online Tools, Patient Empowerment, Patients in the Internet, Person-Centered Health, Psychology, Social Networks, Take Control Of Your Illness And Treatment, ThinkAboutYourLife.org
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I love this — a website that could’ve ONLY been created by cancer patients. From ThinkAboutYourLife.org:
Find empowerment: Anything you can do to feel like you are taking control of your illness and treatment will help you. Think About Your Life was developed by cancer survivors. We have used the tools on this website in our own experiences, and we hope to inspire you do the same.
This website provides easy-to-use tools for each stage of the cancer journey to help you:
- Process your thoughts and feelings: Elizabeth shared the “Good Day, Bad Day” tool with her family to tell them how they could help her throughout treatment.
- Take control and make decisions: Amanda used her “One Page Profile” with her doctor to discuss the impact of treatment on her life.
- Think about the “what now” and the “what next”: The “Hopes & Fears” tool helped Susan think about the next few months of her life after treatment.
I learned about the site from its creator, Amanda George, who commented on a recent post about person-centered health. Hot diggety. Don’t you just love how the Internet lets us connect with each other and share ideas?
*This blog post was originally published at The New Life of e-Patient Dave*
July 5th, 2010 by Shadowfax in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion, True Stories
Tags: ACEP, American College of Emergency Physicians, Angela Gardner, Anoxic Brain Injury, Appropriate Care, Combat Veteran, Diversion Of Narcotics, Doctor-Patient Trust, Drug Abuse, Drug Addiction, Drug Databases, Drug Overdose, Drug Seekers, Drug-Seeking Patients, ED, Emergency Department, Emergency Medicine, Emergency Room, ER, Medication Refills, Micropopulation, Narcotic Dependence, Op-Ed, Opiates, Pain Killers, Pain Police, Patient Safety, Patient-Physician Relationship, Permanent Vegetative State, Prescription Drug Abuse, Trust But Verify, U.S. Navy, USA Today
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I don’t know what’s going on with American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP) lately, but it’s disheartening. Their abdication of responsibility and engagement during the healthcare reform debate was depressing. Then there was a rigged poll designed to elicit a predetermined result. Now I see a bizarre op-ed piece in USA Today entitled “Opposing view on drug addiction: Don’t make us ‘pain police'” and authored by ACEP President Angela Gardener. An excerpt:
The patient-physician relationship is sacrosanct, demanding candor and trust. In the emergency department, trust is built in nanoseconds because patients and doctors do not have prior relationships. Knowing that any pain prescription will be entered into a large, public database might prevent patients from being truthful, or in the worst case, from seeking needed care. … As an emergency physician, I can assure you that the drug abusers who use the emergency room simply to get a prescription drug fix represent a micropopulation of the 120 million patients who seek emergency care every year in the USA. … Put bluntly, if legislators have money to spend, they should spend it where it will do the most good for our patients, and that is not on drug databases.
I really don’t know what to say, other than to wonder whether Dr. Gardner and I practice in the same United States in which abuse of prescription drugs is growing exponentially and in which “drug-seeking” patients are a part of each and every shift worked in the ER, where deaths due to overdoses of prescription medications are on the rise, and where diversion of narcotics is a serious and growing problem. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Movin' Meat*
