April 2nd, 2008 by Dr. Val Jones in Announcements, Medblogger Shout Outs
Tags: Grand Rounds, Hospitals
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For those of you who enjoyed the April Fool’s Grand Rounds (I was participant #2 in an amusing “progressive blog” string of hosts), please join me at the Dr. Anonymous show tomorrow night (9pm EST, April 3) to find out how we pulled it off. In addition to going “behind the scenes” of the April Fool’s edition of Grand Rounds, Paul Levy (CEO of Beth Israel/Deaconess in Boston and author of “Running A Hospital“) will be Dr. Anonymous’ special guest. Paul recently won Medgadget’s coveted “Best Medical Blog of 2007” award.
You can listen to the conversation, join the chat room, call in to the show, or watch Dr. A’s live video feed. This will be a multi-media extravaganza with some of the medical blogosphere’s brightest stars… so don’t miss it! Go to this link a few minutes prior to the show start time.This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
April 1st, 2008 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs
Tags: Grand Rounds, News
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Welcome to Grand Rounds Volume 4, Number 28, part 2. This is the most esteemed medblog carnival on the Internet, founded by Nicholas Genes, MD, PhD on September 28, 2004. Grand Rounds is meant to embody the spirit of good science and humanism in medicine, as it is a weekly collection of the very best blog posts from critically acclaimed, international health care professionals.
This noble undertaking has been carefully advanced by high-minded hosts, who happily put aside their life’s work, their families, yes, even the needs of their beloved pets, in order to provide readers with a cogent analysis of the week’s most important medical facts and opinions. I didn’t think I’d see the day when this great public service would fall into the hands of the lackadaisical. But alas, that day has come – and wouldn’t you know that it would be an Emergency Medicine physician who let us all down?
GruntDoc, a pillar of the medical blogosphere establishment, cannot be bothered to fulfill his hosting role this week, and has asked yours truly to finish his work for him. How typical of an EM physician! Get things started and then hand them off to another doctor to complete. (Witness his shameful apathy for yourself at Grand Rounds, Part 1).
Well, it’s one thing to be summarily passed the Grand Rounds baton, and it’s another altogether to be left with the dregs of the submissions. I am agog and aghast at the low-brow nature of this week’s offerings. Here is but a small sample:
The common leech as a celebrity blood-detoxification system (by Dr. Ramona Bates at Suture for a Living).
The surgical value of flatus (by Bongi at Other Things Amanzi).
In search of the perfect gluteal contour (by My Med Jokes).
In search of your lost tampon (by Dr. Jan Gurley of Gurley Doc).
I find this whole exercise utterly deflating – and unworthy of the high calling of Grand Rounds. But because I myself am long-suffering and reliable, I will not shirk my responsibilities, but rather ask a peer with lower standards (whose sensibilities will surely not be offended by flatus) to continue this week’s carnival. Please go to David Williams’ blog for the rest of this collection of health content of questionable value.
-Posted April 1, 2008-This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
March 29th, 2008 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs
Tags: Hospitals, Medicare, Quality
2 Comments »
Interesting thoughts from The Happy Hospitalist:
How do you define quality care?…
If preventing 90% of in-hospital DVT’s with a medicine that cost $30 a day was quality, so be it.
What if you could prevent 99% of in hospital DVT’s with a medicine that cost $300 a day. Would the 90% be quality or the 99% be quality? What if it cost $3,000 a day to prevent 99.99% of in- hospital DVT’s?
Which effort would be considered quality? Who defines the cut off, and at what price?
Here’s what he has to say about Pay for Performance measures, and why they won’t add up to significant savings:
Unfortunately, the measures being undertaken for quality initiatives are, from my stand point, minuscule in terms of the overall potential cost savings to the system.
And the reason is simply, at least in my part of the medical physician spectrum, a very large chunk of health care expenditures comes in the form of evaluation, and not management…
In the medical profession, there exists a sense of universal freedom to order tests, xrays, labs, and procedures with a sense of unlimited funding. Somebody will pay for it. My patient sitting in front of me is the center of my attention and their needs supersede all other needs from a social/financial point of view of the nation…
Where are the government incentives for quality medicine in the evaluation of disease?
Where is your bonus payment for not ordering the heart cath?
For not ordering the CT Angiogram?
Where is your physician bonus payment for not ruling out a low probability DVT?
Or not ordering an EGD?
For choosing watchful waiting.
Where are your quality bonus payments for evaluation of illness?
They simply don’t exist. Because doing so would overtly ration the public and create a firestorm.
Is the storm coming nonetheless?This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
March 24th, 2008 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs
Tags: Plastic Surgery, Skin Cancer
3 Comments »
I was really impressed with some beautiful work done by a French plastic surgeon on behalf of this patient with Von Recklinghausen’s disease (Elephant man’s syndrome). Thanks to Dr. Bates for pointing it out. A full face transplant was performed with incredible improvement in the man’s appearance and quality of life. I discussed the ethics behind face transplantations in a previous post.
I also applaud the plastic surgeon who carefully filled the nose defect of my fellow blogger TBTAM who had a large basal cell carcinoma removed from the side of her face. See the post-op photo and recent healing shot here. I myself have had some facial surgery, after being mauled by a dog as a child.
I am so grateful to the surgeons who do this kind of work. I know they get a bad rap with all the Dr. 90210 publicity and breast/botox focus. But there are also many unsung heroes. This post is for you! Many thanks from those whom you’ve helped over the years.This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
March 16th, 2008 by Dr. Val Jones in Humor, Medblogger Shout Outs
Tags: Humor, Parenting, Pediatrics, Relationships
1 Comment »
My friend Mindy Roberts is a mommy blogger extraordinaire. In fact she was one of the very first in this genre – and is author of themommyblog.com.
I’ve shamelessly stolen excerpts from her book “Mommy Confidential: Adventures form the Wonderbelly of Motherhood” for my blog readers. And now, she has created an entire website for kiddie quotes. If your kids or grandkids have said something funny, please share it with the world at PearSoup. Or if you’d just like to return to your own wonder years… take a look at what kids are saying these days. Here are some quotes that I liked a lot:
“Mommy, are you sure you remember how to make a baby?”
— Terrel, 4
“If I plant this eggplant will it grow eggs for us?”
— Spencer, 4
“Whew, that sure was undignified!”
— Ryan, 3
(After running away from the vacuum cleaner)
This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
