Partisan rancor was one of the signatures of the recent healthcare reform debate. Can middle ground actually be sought? That’s a question that Eric Segall asks in a recent AOL News op-ed. As is the case in Washington, both sides are to blame. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at KevinMD.com*
It’s only Wednesday, and so far three patients have come to their office visits carrying Cynthia Gorney’s article from Sunday’s New York Times entitled “The Estrogen Dilemma.”
The article explores the stories of three women who found relief from perimenopausal symptoms by using hormone replacement, framing the discussion in the larger context of what is being called the “window hypothesis” — the idea that starting estrogen replacement in the perimenopause and continuing it into later life may be neuroprotective and even cardioprotective, in contrast to beginning its use 10 or more years after menopause, where it can trigger heart disease, stroke and dementia. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at The Blog that Ate Manhattan*
An article in the New York Times this week looks at a raft of new public health initiatives passed by Congress that are aimed at boosting disease prevention. Examples include requiring restaurants with at least 20 locations to include nutrition information on their menus and mandating employers with at least 50 employees to allow new mothers to express breast milk at work. In addition, Medicaid will now cover smoking cessation counseling for pregnant women and Medicare beneficiaries will be eligible for an annual physical. The initiatives are expected to eventually save money by decreasing the country’s chronic disease burden. (New York Times)
Researchers from Johns Hopkins University recently did a study applying physicians’ ethical codes to the conduct of the fictional doctors on “Grey’s Anatomy” and “House, M.D.” Perhaps to no one’s surprise, TV doctors are behaving very badly. As the abstract of the study states, both shows feature “egregious deviations from the norms of professionalism and contain exemplary depictions of professionalism to a much lesser degree.” (Philadelphia Inquirer, Journal of Medical Ethics)
*This blog post was originally published at ACP Internist*
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*
Is the tide finally turning on PSA screening for prostate cancer? There’s no definitive data that PSA screening saves lives from prostate cancer, and it indeed can lead to further, invasive, tests that can cause men significant discomfort. Medical societies are divided on the issue. Primary care groups like the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) recommend against it for older men, while the American Urological Association (AUA) continues to recommend screening.
In a strongly worded op-ed in the New York Times, Richard Ablin, also known as the founder of the PSA test, bemoans how our healthcare system has twisted its use. “The test’s popularity has led to a hugely expensive public health disaster,” he writes. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at KevinMD.com*
It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…
I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…
Book Review: Is Empathy Learned By Faking It Till It’s Real?
I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…
The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You
When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…
Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book
I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…
