July 13th, 2010 by RyanDuBosar in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Research
Tags: Balloon Treatment, Cardiology, CMS, Death Rates, Decreased Mortality, Emergency Medicine, Emergency Services, Heart Attacks, Hospital Data, Hospital Improvement, Hospital Report Card, Lowering Readmissions, Medicare Patients, National Average, Public Reporting, To The Hospital Faster, U.S. Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services
No Comments »
Heart attack mortality fell by nearly a half a percent last year at 4,500 hospitals that treat Medicare patients. And, facilities with the lowest and highest death rates saw similar declines, according to a new hospital report card by the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).
Heart attack mortality fell from a national average of 16.6 percent last year to 16.2 percent, with a range among all facilities from 14.5 percent to 17.9 percent. CMS released the data as part of its hospital report card effort to spur better quality and outcomes through public reporting of recommended treatments. The agency added heart attack and heart failure mortality to the report card three years ago.
At issue now is what’s driving the figures: public reporting of hospital data driving improvement, or faster door-to-balloon-treatment times. Areas that do need to improve include lowering readmissions and getting people to the hospital faster when they have a heart attack. (USA Today)
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Hospitalist*
July 12th, 2010 by AndrewSchorr in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Research
Tags: Andrew Schorr, Avandia, Biotech Drugs, Cancer Patients, CLL, CTI, Diabetes Drug, Dr. Richard Pazdur, Drug Effectiveness, Drug Safety, Empowered Patients, FDA, Food and Drug Administration, GlaxoSmithKline, Government Research, GSK, New-Drug Approval, Patient Power, Personalized Medicine, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, Pharmacology, Pixantrone, Playing Fair For Patients, Transparency In Medicine
No Comments »
They have a tough job, those government doctors, scientists, and bureaucrats who are charged with assessing the safety and effectiveness of proposed new medical products. As you know, they rely largely on studies presented by the applicants.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has the power to not approve a new drug or product or even pull it off the market. Right now it is considering limiting or pulling GlaxoSmithKline’s (GSK) diabetes drug, Avandia, because of newly discovered data that it may have caused heart attack in some patients –- data mysteriously not shown in GSK’s own studies. If the drug is pulled it will cost GSK billions of dollars in lost revenue but, from the FDA’s point-of-view, it will be protecting the public. And, after all, there are safer diabetes drugs on the market as alternatives. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Andrew's Blog*
July 12th, 2010 by KevinMD in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Research
Tags: Ad-Driven Drug Requests, Banning Drug Ads, Brand Name Prescription Drugs, Consumer Drug Marketing, Direct-To-Consumer Drug Advertising, Dr. Ray Fabius, Drug Ads, Family Medicine, General Medicine, Influence On Patients, Internal Medicine, National Public Radio, NPR, Pharmaceutical Companies, Pharmaceutical Industry, Pharmacology, Primary Care, Thomson Reuters
No Comments »
How effective is direct-to-consumer drug advertising? Some think that drug ads should be banned altogether, saying that it encourages patients to ask their doctors for expensive, brand name prescription drugs. It turns out their fears may be overblown.
NPR’s Shots blogs about a recent study looking at the effectiveness of these ads. The numbers, for the pharmaceutical companies anyways, are not encouraging. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at KevinMD.com*
July 10th, 2010 by David Kroll, Ph.D. in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News, Research, True Stories
Tags: Accelerated Heart Rate, Anesthesiology, Angel's Trumpet, Anticholinergic Poisonings, Asthma Attacks, Atropa Belladonna, Belladonna Alkaloids, Bronchoconstriction, Brugmansia Genus, Erowid, Fatal Cardiac Rhythmic Disturbances, Feingold, Hallucinations, Hospitalizations, Mydriasis, Physostigmine, Pilocarpine, Poison Control, Poisoning In Kids, Tea, Tree Datura, Tropane Alkaloids, Witches Brew
No Comments »
Toxicity reports are re-emerging in southern California this week after a dozen hospitalizations of kids using teas made from a fragrant flowering plant called Angel’s Trumpet.
A tea made from the plant is used to produce hallucinations, but they can progress to extremely unpleasant experiences. Moreover, Angel’s Trumpet can be deadly, accelerating the heart rate and causing fatal cardiac rhythmic disturbances and bronchoconstriction that can trigger asthma attacks in sensitive individuals. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Terra Sigillata*
July 8th, 2010 by Mark Crislip, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Quackery Exposed, Research
Tags: Alternative Medicine Nonsense, Brigham and Women's Hospital, CAM, Chiropractic Medicine, CME, Complimentary and Alternative Medicine, Continued Medical Education, Cranial Sacral Therapy, Evidence-Based, Harvard Medical School, NEJM, New England Journal of Medicine, Oscher Clinical Center for Complementary and Integrative Medical Therapies, Phrenology, Pseudoscience, Science Based Medicine, Structural Acupuncture, Yoga
1 Comment »
Some universities have more cachet than others. On the West Coast it’s Stanford that has the reputation as the best. Then there’s Oxford, Yale, and MIT. I would wager that in most people’s minds the creme de la creme is Harvard, where you find the best of the best. If Harvard is involved, a project gains an extra gobbet of credibility. Brigham and Women’s Hospital also has similar reputation in U.S. as one the hospitals associated with only Harvard and the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) — premier university, premier hospital, premier journal.
So if Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital are offering continuing medical education (CME) for acupuncture, there must be something to it, right? A course called “Structural Acupuncture for Physicians” must have some validity. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Science-Based Medicine*
