October 19th, 2010 by GarySchwitzer in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Quackery Exposed, Research
Tags: Big Pharma, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, Consumer Reports, Critical Reporting, Doctors Paid By Drug Companies, Dollars For Doctors, Gary Schwitzer, Healthcare Conflicts of Interest, HealthNewsReview.org, Medical Reporting, News Organizations, NPR, PBS, Pharmaceutical Companies Who Pay Physicians, Pharmaceutical Industry, ProPublica, Responsible Reporting, Sound Health Journalism, Troubled Doctors As Experts
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An historic piece of journalism was published today. Six news organizations partnered on the “Dollars for Docs” project — ProPublica, NPR, PBS’s Nightly Business Report, the Chicago Tribune, Boston Globe and Consumer Reports. They examined $258 million in payments by seven drug companies in 2009 and 2010 to about 18,000 healthcare practitioners nationwide for speaking, consulting, and other tasks.
This webpage can be your gateway to the project, with links to a database searchable by doctor’s name or by state, and links to the journalism partners’ efforts:
Boston Globe
“Prescription for Prestige”
The Harvard brand, unrivaled in education, is also prized by the pharmaceutical industry as a powerful tool in promoting drugs. Its allure is evident in a new analysis of all publicly reported industry payments to physicians.
Consumer Reports
“Consumers Wary of Doctors Who Take Drug-Company Dollars”
Most Americans are skeptical of financial relationships between doctors and companies, according to a new, national from the Consumer Reports National Research Center.
Chicago Tribune
“Doctors Draw Payments From Drug Companies”
Follow drug company money in Illinois, and it leads to the psychiatry department at Rush University Medical Center, a prominent headache clinic on the North Side of Chicago, a busy suburban urology practice and a psychiatric hospital accused of overmedicating kids.
PBS
“Nightly Business Report”
A doctor talks about quitting drug company money when their marketing tactics crossed the line.
NPR
“Drug Companies Hire Troubled Docs As Experts”
*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview Blog*
October 19th, 2010 by BarbaraFicarraRN in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News, Research
Tags: Accurate Health Information, American Cancer Society, Bad Health News Stories, Barbara Ficarra, Clinical Trials, Empowered Patient, Health In 30, Health Journalism, Health News Articles, Health News Headlines, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Patient Education, Patient Engagement
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Guest post submitted by MD Anderson Cancer Center
Most of us can’t keep up with all the new ways to avoid cancer. Thanks to the Internet, we now have an unlimited supply of cancer knowledge at our fingertips. But, how can we filter out the good, the bad and the questionable?
Below are steps to help you tease out the facts when reading that next big news story on preventing cancer.
Says who?
Don’t just take the writer’s word for it. Dig a little deeper to find out the source behind the hype. The American Cancer Society says you should ask yourself these questions when reading an article:
- Was this a press release from a company announcing a new breakthrough in cancer prevention?
- Was it a report from a clinical study that was given at a scientific conference?
- Was it a report from a study that was published in a respected medical journal?
- Where was the study done? What do you know about the research centers that conducted and sponsored the study?
Knowing the answers to these questions can help you decide on where you need to go to seek more details about the study findings. Visit the source of the information to learn more about how this new substance or method was tested. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Health in 30*
October 19th, 2010 by Medgadget in Better Health Network, News, Research
Tags: Bartron Medical Imaging, Breast Cancer, Cancer Diagnosis Tool, Earth Imaging Software, Goddard Space Flight Center, Hierarchial Segmentation Software, Homogeneous Areas, HSEG, James Tilton, Mammogram Enhancement, MED-SEG, Medgadget, NASA, Radiology, Satellite Data
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James C. Tilton, a scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, for some years now has been working on new image enhancement software to help automatically analyze satellite data of the Earth. Hierarchical Segmentation Software (HSEG), as the tool is called, identifies relatively homogeneous areas of an image and highlights them.
Our eyes and brains are pretty good at image analysis, but large dense maps can be quite a challenge. Although originally designed for aerial cartography, the first commercial use of the software came in the form of a mammogram enhancement and analysis system.
The lakes of northern Wisconsin (top) are very much like dense breast tissue (side) to a NASA scientist it turns out, and porting over the code and optimizing it led to the MED-SEG™ system from Bartron Medical Imaging (New Haven, Connecticut). Having received FDA approval, plans are now being made to conduct clinical trials evaluating how MED-SEG can benefit radiologists in cancer diagnosis. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*
October 19th, 2010 by RyanDuBosar in Better Health Network, News, Research
Tags: ACP Internist, American College Of Physicians, Anesthesiologists, CNN/Money, Healthcare Administrators, How Meaningful Is Medical Practice, Medical Careers, Medical Education, PayScale.com, Physician Assistants, Physician Careers, Practicing Medicine, Ryan DuBosar, Social Workers
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Doctors are the top six best-paid careers (based on median and top pay), with anesthesiologists being the best-paid, primary care being the sixth-best and nurse anesthetists the seventh best-paid, according to a survey by CNN/Money magazine and PayScale.com. But not one of the physician careers landed on the top lists for job growth or quality of life. The title of best job went to software architect and the second-best job went to physician assistant.
Take heart, though. When asked about having the most meaningful work (based on the percentage who think their job makes the world a better place), the top spot went again to anesthesiologists, and second through ninth went to some kind of medical provider or healthcare administrator. Social workers rounded out the tenth spot. (CNN/Money)
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Internist*
October 19th, 2010 by KerriSparling in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Medblogger Shout Outs, News, Opinion, True Stories
Tags: 33 Charts, Blog World Expo 2010, Dr. Bryan Vartabedian, Dr. Kevin Pho, Health Bloggers, Healthcare Social Media, Kerri Morrone Sparling, KevinMD, Kim McAllister, Medical Bloggers, Medical Blogosphere, Online Medical Communities, Six Until Me, Social Health, Social Networking Technologies, Social Networks
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I was in Las Vegas, but it wasn’t all just spending quality time with blogging buddies. There was work to do — we were there for the Social Health track of BlogWorld & New Media Expo 2010 to help inform others about the discussions taking place in the medical blogosphere, and the power of these communities.
The panel that I was participating on was Social Networks & The Medical Blogosphere: Compatible or Competitive, with fellow panelists Kevin Pho and Bryan Vartabedian (see photo) moderated by the fabulous Kim McAllister. The big question was: “Are these social networking technologies helping or hurting the blogosphere?”
We, as a panel, gave this a lot of thought as we prepared for our discussion, and we ultimately settled on the answer of “Well…both.” Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Six Until Me.*
