June 7th, 2010 by GarySchwitzer in Better Health Network, Health Policy, News, Opinion, Research
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The worst-kept secret in journalism circles recently was that the New York Times was planning an article critical of the Dartmouth Atlas. Among the main points in the article:
• “The mistaken belief that the Dartmouth research proves that cheaper care is better care is widespread.”
• “The atlas’s hospital rankings do not take into account care that prolongs or improves lives.”
• “Even Dartmouth’s claims about which hospitals and regions are cheapest may be suspect.”
• “Failing to make basic data adjustments undermines the geographic variations the atlas purports to show.”
The Times has also published the correspondence it had with the Dartmouth team about methodology questions.
The Dartmouth team challenges each of these criticisms. The team says the Times made at least five factual errors and several misrepresentations. They write:
“What is truly unfortunate is that the Times missed an opportunity to help educate the American public about what our research actually shows — or about the breadth of agreement about what our findings mean for health care reform.” Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview Blog*
June 6th, 2010 by Happy Hospitalist in Better Health Network, Health Tips, Humor, Opinion, True Stories
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I was having fun watching my niece play with dozens of pool inner tubes when another relative shows up. Never one to surprise me, he shows me a fashion statement I’d never seen before. How do you get your kids to wear their seatbelts?
The key here is repetition. Just like a medical school education, repetition is what makes us experts. Doing the same thing over and over again makes us great at what we do. To get your kids to wear their seatbelt every time, you must make it a part of their daily existence. How do you do that? You buy them a “seatbelt” belts from Honda
. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at The Happy Hospitalist*
June 6th, 2010 by Harriet Hall, M.D. in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News, Opinion, Research
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Red meat consumption has been linked to diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and several types of cancer (breast, colorectal, stomach, bladder, prostate, and lymphoma).
There are plausible mechanisms: Meat is a source of carcinogens, iron that may increase oxidative damage, and saturated fat. But correlation and plausibility are not enough to establish causation.
Is red meat really dangerous? If so, how great is the risk? A couple of recent studies have tried to shed light on these questions, but they have raised more questions than they have answered. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Science-Based Medicine*
June 6th, 2010 by BarbaraFicarraRN in Better Health Network, Health Tips, News, Research
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A recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states that one in five U.S. high school students have taken a prescription drug that they didn’t get from their doctor.
According to the 2009 National Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) that was released today from the CDC, the survey asked more than 16,000 high school students if they’ve ever taken a prescription drug such as Oxycontin, Percoset, Vicodin, Adderall, Ritalin and Xanax. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Health in 30*
June 6th, 2010 by Medgadget in Better Health Network, News, Research
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Current methods of testing people for food allergies aren’t particularly precise, leaving many people to falsely think that they have a condition that they really don’t.
MIT chemical engineer Christopher Love is working on a new test based on cytokines that may prove to be substantially faster and more reliable. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*
