January 21st, 2010 by PhilBaumannRN in Better Health Network, Opinion
Tags: Features, Nursing, Social Media, Technology, Twitter, Wish List
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- Image via CrunchBase
After returning to Twitter after a week-long break, I’ve had the chance to look at the service with a freshened perspective. Twitter needs to stay simple – that’s what drives its success. Nevertheless, I believe Twitter needs to mature and provide exploits of its service. While the basics of Twitter aught to remain, Twitter, Inc. can build a wider ecosystem around those basics which could make it a true contender as an important part of the Web.
Services like Posterous and Friendfeed offer features such as replying via email. Although third-parties could develop similar features via Twitter’s API, it’s time that Twitter mature a bit. If Twitter plays its cards right, it could offer itself as much more than just as the modern equivalent of a telecommunications utility (which it is).
- Email content, replies, DMs. We should have an option to respond to replies & DMs via email. There are services out there such as Topify but they don’t provide the most secure methods. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Phil Baumann*
January 21st, 2010 by KevinMD in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Administrative Burden, Disrespect, Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, Low Pay, Primary Care, Primary Care Shortage
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It’s no secret that without a stronger primary care foundation, the current reform efforts are unlikely to be successful. If anything, it will only delay the inevitable.
I wrote last month that one discussed solution, adding more residency slots, won’t help: it would simply perpetuate the disproportionate specialist:primary care ratio.
A recent op-ed in The New York Times expands on that theme. The authors suggest that not only does primary care need to be promoted, specialist slots should be limited. Simply building more medical schools, or adding more residency slots, without such restrictions will only add to the number of specialists.
Already, many primary care residency slots go unfilled – what’s the point of adding more?
You have to solve the root cause that shifts more students away from primary care: disproportionately low pay, disrespect that starts early in medical training, and poor working conditions where bureaucracy interferes with the doctor-patient relationship.
Until each of those issues are addressed, simply more spending money to produce more doctors simply isn’t going to work.
*This blog post was originally published at KevinMD.com*
January 19th, 2010 by Jonathan Foulds, Ph.D. in Better Health Network, Health Tips, Opinion
Tags: Comparative Risk Claim, FDA, Philip Morris, Smokeless Tobacco, smoking, smoking cessation
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The Wall Street Journal reported Jan. 6 that Philip Morris and U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co., both parts of the Altria Group Inc., wrote to the FDA suggesting that tobacco products be ranked on their harmfulness to health. This would most likely result in smokeless tobacco products being ranked as markedly less harmful than cigarettes. Philip Morris apparently claimed the plan would have “a significant public-health benefit.” (assuming smokers took the rankings at face value and switched from more to less harmful products).
Now at face value, this sounds reasonably sensible. But when we consider that Philip Morris USA makes the vast majority of its profits from cigarette sales, and the plan would apparently reduce those sales as smokers switched to smokeless products, it is reasonable to wonder what they are playing at. Read more »
This post, Why Would Philip Morris Support Smokeless Tobacco Products? To Maintain Dependency On Nicotine?, was originally published on
Healthine.com by Jonathan Foulds, Ph.D..
January 19th, 2010 by RamonaBatesMD in Better Health Network, Health Tips, Opinion
Tags: addiction, Advice, Heidi Montag, Joan Rivers, Plastic Surgery, Psychiatry, Psychology
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A few years ago I wrote about the “Suitability” of a patient for plastic surgery. I was reminded of this topic by two cases in the recent lay media:
The first involves Heidi Montag, 23, who in November had multiple surgical procedures and is being compared to Joan Rivers.
According to People, Montag even kept her family in the dark about her intended transformation to become her “best me.” Telling only her husband Spencer Pratt, Montag had a nose job revision, chin reduction, mini brow lift, Botox in her forehead and frown area, fat injections in her cheeks, nasolabial folds and lips, neck liposuction, ear pinning, liposuction on her waist, hips, inner and outer thighs, buttock augmentation and breast augmentation revision. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Suture for a Living*
January 19th, 2010 by Davis Liu, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion
Tags: Affordability, CDHP, HDHP, Healthcare reform, HSA, Internal Medicine, Primary Care, Quality, Technology
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Even with healthcare reform, Americans will increasingly be burdened with high deductibles, more financial responsibility, and less satisfaction with their health insurance for the foreseeable future. Why? Because the healthcare system is unable to transform its services in a manner that other industries have done to improve quality and service while decreasing costs. The two biggest culprits are the mentality of healthcare providers and the fee for service reimbursement system.
Doctors and patients haven’t altered the way they communicate over the past hundred years. Except for the invention of the telephone, an office visit is unchanged. A doctor and patient converse as the physician scribbles notes in a paper chart. Despite the innovations of cell phones, laptop computers, and other time saving devices, patients still get care through face to face contact even though banking, travel, and business collaboration can be done via the internet, webcams, and sharing of documentation. As Dr. Pauline Chen noted in a recent article, doctors are not willing to use technology to collaborate and to deliver medical care better, more quickly and efficiently. Mostly it is due to culture resistant to change. Partly it is due to lack of reimbursement. Both are unlikely to be addressed or fixed anytime soon. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Saving Money and Surviving the Healthcare Crisis*
