October 20th, 2010 by Shantanu Nundy, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Annual Exam, Annual Physical, BeyondApples.org, Disease Prevention, Dr. Shantanu Nundy, Family Medicine, General Medicine, Health and Wellness, Healthcare Maintenance, Healthcare reform, Internal Medicine, Preventative Health, Preventive Care, Preventive Health, Preventive Health Services, Preventive Healthcare, Preventive Medicine, Primary Care, Routine Care, Routine Checkup
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It’s a scene that plays out thousands of times every day in doctors’ offices across the country — the moment the doctor shifts from addressing the concerns that brought the patient into clinic to when he or she attempts to make sure everything else is going okay.
Often this happens at the end of a sick visit, after working up an upper respiratory infection or back pain. Sometimes it happens after following up a chronic medical problem such as high blood pressure or arthritis, and occasionally it happens under ideal circumstances, during an annual physical or routine wellness visit. It doesn’t necessarily happen at the end of the visit. Often it sneaks it’s way into various points in the encounter — as when the doctor places his or her stethoscope over a patient’s chest while evaluating for knee pain.
What I’m referring to is so indistinct that it doesn’t even have an universal name, but rather goes by many titles — “preventive health,” “preventative health,” “preventive medicine,” “preventive care,” “healthcare maintenance,” “routine healthcare,” “routine checkup,” “annual physical,” and “health and wellness” — to name a few.
But whatever you call it nearly everyone agrees how important it is. The healthcare reform debate was ripe with calls for more “health”-care not just “sick”-care, and one of the most welcome measures in the new healthcare legislation across both sides of the aisle are provisions to support it. Outside of Capitol Hill, from cereal boxes to magazine racks and celebrity doctors, messages about staying healthy are everywhere, as is the general belief that “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at BeyondApples.Org*
October 20th, 2010 by DrRich in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: American Healthcare, Amish Bus Driver Rule, Contractual Enterprise, Covert Rationing Blog, Doctors' Ethics, Dr. Rich, Ethical Enterprise, General Medicine, Healthcare reform, Healthcare Reform: Putting Patients First, Medical Profession, MSNBC, New U.S. Healthcare System, Patient-Doctor Relationship, Personal Convictions of Medical Professionals, Progressive Medical Ethics, Rachel Maddow
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Rachel Maddow, in a discussion related to the provision of abortion services, once proposed that we (society) should invoke the Amish Bus Driver Rule (ABDR) whenever medical professionals invoke their personal convictions in refusing to provide legal medical services.
The ABDR goes like this: If you’re Amish, and therefore have religious convictions against internal combustion engines, then you have disqualified yourself for employment as a bus driver. (Presumably Ms. Maddow would not apply the ABDR to everyone, since it would disqualify, for instance, Al Gore from utilizing horseless carriages and other fossil-fueled contrivances.)
The ABDR would do far more than merely render it okay for doctors to perform abortions and other ethically controversial (but legal) medical services. The ABDR would obligate physicians to provide such services, whatever their personal moral or religious convictions.
The reason DrRich brings this up is not because he considers Rachel Maddow to be the giver of rules for the left, or for the government, or even for MSNBC. Rather, he brings it up because the ABDR is entirely compatible with Progressive medical ethics, and therefore it has a pretty good chance, sooner or later, of becoming the official policy of our new healthcare system. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at The Covert Rationing Blog*
October 20th, 2010 by Davis Liu, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion
Tags: 25 Skills Doctors Should Know, American Medical Students, Best Doctors, Best-Of-The-Best, Choosing Primary Care, Dr. Abraham Verghese, Dr. Davis Liu, Encouraging Medical Students, Family Medicine, Fixing Primary Care, General Medicine, Healthcare Technology, Infectious Disease, Internal Medicine, Medical Art, Medical Residency, Medical Residents, Primary Care Doctors, Primary Care Incentives, Primary Care Training Programs, Saving Money and Surviving the Healthcare Crisis, The Art of Medicine, The Practice of Medicine, Top Gun of American Medicine, U.S. Healthcare System
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The first-year medical students I precept were too young to see Tom Cruise’s alter ego Lieutenant Pete “Maverick” Mitchell grace the big screen in the 1986 blockbuster film “Top Gun.” Yet, the story has a relevant analogy to medicine.
According to the film, during the Vietnam war American pilots were relying too much on technology to bring enemy fighters down. They weren’t as skilled in taking out the opposition. They fired their technologically advanced missiles to try and get the job done. They didn’t think. It didn’t work. They forgot the art of dogfighting.
The military discovered that technology alone wasn’t going to get the job done. The best fighter pilots needed the skills, insight, and wisdom on when to use technology and when not to. As a result, the Navy Fighter Weapons School, known simply as Top Gun, was created to retrain the military pilots on this vital lost skill. The goal of the program was specifically to make the best of the best even better.
Like the military, the country is discovering that the healthcare system enabled with dazzling technology isn’t getting the job done either. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Saving Money and Surviving the Healthcare Crisis*
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.*
October 18th, 2010 by DrRob in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Business of Healthcare, Customer Service In Healthcare, Dr. Rob Lamberts, Family Practice, General Medicine, Healthcare Policy, Medicine As A Business, Musings of a Distractible Mind, Patients As Healthcare Customers, Primary Care
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Gosh, a whole lot of huffing over a little word! “Customer.” Okay, now grab a paper bag and breathe slowly and steadily into it. I know it’s hard to hear that word. I am sorry to have caused such trouble.
Some folks misunderstood my last post, thinking that I thought patients should only be considered customers, or that they should be referred to as customers. I never said that, nor did I imply it. I simply said that patients are customers. They are. Medical care is not free, and it is being paid for by the patient (directly or indirectly). Medicine is a business that has been so mismanaged that we are now in a crisis over its financial side. The trouble is the cost of care. Cost implies money is used, and trading money for services or goods is what business is about.
We’ve been spending our dollars on healthcare like a person irresponsibly running up a credit card bill they can’t pay back. The pain doesn’t happen now, it happens down the road when the collectors knock. We can’t order whatever tests we want or prescribe gazillion dollar drugs without remembering somebody will have to pay the bill. Ignoring the business of medicine has gotten us into deep doo-doo. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Musings of a Distractible Mind*
