September 1st, 2010 by SteveSimmonsMD in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion, Primary Care Wednesdays, True Stories
Tags: DocTalker Family Medicine, Dr. Steve Simmons, Healthcare reform, primary care wednesday, Shortage of Primary Care Doctors
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As a primary care physician, I am becoming painfully aware of how hard it is to be good –- I mean really good — at what we do today. I would prefer to believe that it has always been so, yet I do not believe that our predecessors in the medical profession found it nearly as difficult to excel in their time as we do now.
With all of the technological and medical advances, you might ask how I could believe this to be true. Too, you might consider it pessimistic or even crazy to suggest that physicians 20, 30, or 100 years ago found it easier to practice medicine well in their time.
You could counter with numerous or obvious examples such as antibiotics, pharmaceuticals, robotic surgical procedures, or even our wondrous ability to peer inside the human body without cutting it open. You also would be correct to point out that the technological advancements of the 20th century opened the way for the medical profession to become a real science thus giving me and my colleagues the chance and knowledge to make a real difference in our patients’ lives today. Read more »
September 1st, 2010 by Toni Brayer, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Research
Tags: Archives of Internal Medicine, Communication Disconnect, Communication Gap, Compromising Patient Care, Doctor-Patient Communication, General Medicine, Healthcare Improvement, Influencing Patient Care, Lack of Communication, Primary Care, Quality Improvement, Waterbury Hospital, Yale University School of Medicine
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In a surprising report from the Archives of Internal Medicine, we learn that most hospitalized patients (82 percent) could not accurately name the physician responsible for their care and almost half of the patients did not even know their diagnosis or why they were admitted.
If that isn’t enough, when the researchers queried the physicians, 67 percent thought the patients knew their name and 77 percent of doctors thought the patients “understood their diagnoses at least somewhat well.” I would call that a pretty significant communication gap.
Ninety percent of the patients said they received a new medication and didn’t know the side effects. Although 98 percent of physicians thought they discussed their patients’ fears and anxieties with them, only 54 percent of patients thought they did. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Internist*
August 31st, 2010 by Bryan Vartabedian, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Doctors and Social Media, Doctors On Twitter, Healthcare Social Media Camp, Medicine and Social Media, Physicians On Twitter, Tweetchat For Doctors, Tweetchat For Physicians, Twitter, Twitter Doctors
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Lately there’s been talk of a tweetchat for doctors. The issue has surfaced on Twitter over the past couple of weeks. The idea is out there –- the genie’s out of the bottle. There will be a tweetchat for physicians. But I’m not sure we need it. We may want to think about why we need a Twitter discussion group and what we’d like to get out of it.
I look at tweetchats like I look at medical meetings: I go to see old friends in one place. Most of what’s discussed was public long before the meeting. The most interesting stuff happens in the hallway. With that said I still go to medical meetings. But it’s usually to cultivate relationships. And tweetchats do accomplish that.
I like to participate in tweetchats to see who shows up. I like to look at how people behave, how they meet the challenge of open-ended questions in the limits of 140 characters. It’s really interesting to watch those who think they have the answers. I like to see who actually takes the process so seriously that they can’t crack a joke and have a little fun (this tells me the most). Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at 33 Charts*
August 31st, 2010 by Happy Hospitalist in Better Health Network, Opinion, True Stories
Tags: Co-Worker Respect, Communication Gap, Compromising Patient Care, Disrespectful Nurses, Doctor-Nurse Relationship, General Medicine, Healthcare Workers, Impolite, Inappropriate Professional Behavior, Lack of Communication, Nurse-To-Doctor Communication, Rude, VA Nurses, Veterans Administration, Veterans Hospital, Yelling At Doctors
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What do you do when doctors and nurses don’t get along? A reader asks for my advice:
Hi Happy,
I have this problem and wanted some advice from someone with more experience dealing with this.
I have been bashed by nurses because they expect me to know all the bureaucratic issues, when you don’t have more than a month in the hospital. I have noticed that nurses get mad, when you give them an instruction they don’t understand, or they aren’t used to, not because you are wrong, but instead, their lack of ignorance, or their narrow process of thought. One example of this is when they laugh at me cause i prescribed a generic medication of a common drug that they weren’t familiar with the generic name.
Days ago, a first-year family doctor was yelled at badly by some nurse because she filled in the prescription chart where she shouldn’t — she didn’t know because no one told her. I have seen that attitude several times from different nurses — they yell in a very unproper manner. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at The Happy Hospitalist*
August 30th, 2010 by Nicholas Genes, M.D., Ph.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Research
Tags: Doctors Who Blog, ED, ED Length Of Stay, Electronic Medical Records, Emergency Department, Emergency Medicine, Emergency Room, EMR, ER, Facebook, Health IT, HIT Industry, Medical Blogosphere, Michael Furakawa PhD, Physician Bloggers, Wall Street Journal, WSJ
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Here’s a confession: Despite my steadfast advocacy of medical blogging as a means to promote understanding and education, I continue worry a lot about professional liability. Not just whether the things I write could hurt my career, but, in terms of academic output, is blogging a waste of time? What view does my department’s leadership take on blogging?
Still, I’ve continued to support medical blogging as a useful academic endeavor, hoping that someday this support would be borne out. When sites like Sermo and Facebook came along, I despaired that more physician opinions were going to be hidden behind walled gardens, available only to select colleagues or friends.
Then, last week, some revelations — I discovered a member of my department’s leadership was blogging, or at least, had commented on a blog. How about that! The other revelation? Facebook may be the last great hope for academic discussions to flourish on blogs.
This all arose from a pretty academic question about emergency department implementation of electronic medical records. Does the degree of implementation (full, partial, or none) impact patient wait times in the emergency department? Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Blogborygmi*
