April 7th, 2010 by Berci in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Research
No Comments »
It was just time to end the era of gene patents. About 20 percent of human genes have patents, which is unacceptable. Here’s an excerpt from the New York Times story:
A federal judge on Monday struck down patents on two genes linked to breast and ovarian cancer. The decision, if upheld, could throw into doubt the patents covering thousands of human genes and reshape the law of intellectual property.
One of the individual plaintiffs in the suit, Genae Girard, who has breast cancer and has been tested for ovarian cancer, applauded the decision as “a big turning point for all women in the country that may have breast cancer that runs in their family.”
Chris Hansen, an A.C.L.U. staff lawyer, said: “The human genome, like the structure of blood, air or water, was discovered, not created. There is an endless amount of information on genes that begs for further discovery, and gene patents put up unacceptable barriers to the free exchange of ideas.”
I’m curious how Myriad will respond to it.
*This blog post was originally published at ScienceRoll*
April 5th, 2010 by Medgadget in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Research
No Comments »
Researchers from the Medical Device Safety Institute at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston and the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of Washington in Seattle have published an article in the latest New England Journal of Medicine suggesting technological and regulatory actions that they hope will increase the security and privacy of implantable medical devices.
As has been reported earlier, implantable pacemakers, defibrillators, and similar devices are subject to wireless hacking that may influence their functionality. Although a lip-smacking target for devious hackers, an actual incident where a person’s implant has been interfered with is yet to be reported.
NEJM: Improving the Security and Privacy of Implantable Medical Devices…
Flashback: Implant Hacking Possible, Not Probable…Yet
*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*
April 4th, 2010 by GruntDoc in Better Health Network, News, Opinion, True Stories
No Comments »
There’s a nice WSJ article on how forward treatment of combat casualties has become possible. Kudos to these deployed doctors, and to the military that invests the time, money and effort to make things like this happen:
Dr. York, an interventional radiologist who usually performs surgery at the U.S. Naval Medical Center in Portsmouth, Va., is especially skilled at treating internal injuries. His type of surgery—using X-rays and imaging equipment to guide catheters through veins to perform micro-operations—is comparatively rare in emergency rooms. But in the cramped Kandahar hospital, it is critical to saving lives.
via Wounded Soldiers Have Increased Odds of Survival – WSJ.com.
Probably the world’s only front-line (literally) interventional radiologist.
HT: He who shall not be named.
*This blog post was originally published at GruntDoc*
April 2nd, 2010 by Happy Hospitalist in Better Health Network, Humor, Opinion
No Comments »
As a hospitalist physician of seven years and taking care of dialysis patients, I’ve come to the conclusion that a dialysis survival gene exists. I talked with a nephrologist the other day about dialysis survival. Here’s what he said:
“If you take all dialysis comers, every year 25% of them will die.”
There is a broad range of dialysis survival. A 94-year-old with severe COPD, CHF, and dementia will not have the same survival statistics as a healthy 27-year-old with acute interstitial nephritis. The protoplasm from which you begin with often times determines the dialysis survival.
There are many factors that determine dialysis survival statistics. Some of them include, age, race, weight, and even the length of the dialysis treatments. But no where have I seen reported the association of dialysis survival with Happy’s presumed dialysis surivival gene. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at The Happy Hospitalist*
March 31st, 2010 by RyanDuBosar in Better Health Network, Health Policy, Opinion, Primary Care Wednesdays, True Stories
No Comments »
Congress controls the nation’s purse strings. It can tell the Executive Branch how to spend money. It can regulate all commerce, and by the way, to Congress everything is “commerce.”
Congressional legislation can incent economic behavior–pay for this, but not for that–but it can’t change personal decisions. A case in point is Dr. Robert Cantor, ACP Member, of Boca Raton, Fla., who says he authorizes the tests that his patients demand. His opinion? “I do the damn test.”
He says there’s little incentive not to order tests and little in healthcare reform to make him and others change their habits. More likely is the idea that, once new medical technology is invented, it will find a use.
Another article compiles a wide spectrum of ideas on how to reduce healthcare spending. Tort reform was one, sure, but many doctors focused on changing patient behavior first.
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Internist*
