February 2010
14 posts
“I did not sign away my right to get the best possible health care for myself...”
– Canadian premier Danny Williams on the controversy over his decision to have heart surgery in the US (via randyhaddock)
4.43 @ 50 →
Green, via his Twitter account, claims to have run a 40-yard-dash in 4.43 seconds, and then claimed to be the fastest baby boomer alive. I’m not going to argue with him.
I am admittedly an unabashed Darrell Green fan. This just makes me even more of a fan of the speedster. A 4.43 s 40 yard dash at 50 years old. Damn! Go Darrell.
Metal Foam: strange, amazing, useful. →
In a new paper, researchers have reported recent findings that, in addition to the extraordinary high-energy absorption capability and light weight of their novel composite foams, the “modulus of elasticity” of the foam is very similar to that of bone. Modulus of elasticity measures a material’s ability to deform when pressure is applied and then return to its original shape when...
VHI →
I started as the main shoulder and elbow orthopedic surgeon at the VA in Dayton back in September. Things are going great. the patients are really cool. many of them have phenomenal stories about the places they’ve been all over the world. If it weren’t for patient privacy, I would have enough to fill my blog everyday for years…maybe I’ll get their permission and write...
Better Outcomes for Hospitals that Specialize in... →
Among more specialized hospitals, there were fewer serious post-surgical complications such as blood clots, infections and heart problems, as well as fewer deaths.
The findings, which were published online Feb. 11 by the British Medical Journal, were based on data for nearly 1.3 million patients who received hip or knee replacement surgeries between 2001 and 2005 at 3,818 hospitals in the United...
Should doctors be forced to treat patients... →
jayparkinsonmd:
New regulations to reduce wait times for medical care in California are due to take effect next year. Under the proposal, primary care doctors employed by HMOs are required to see patients within 10 days of the appointment request, and specialists must see patients within 15 days. Telephone calls must be returned within 30 minutes and patients needing urgent care have to be seen...
Diabetes Meds and Increased Fracture Risk: no free... →
After taking a thiazolidinedione (TZD) for one year, women are 50 percent more likely to have a bone fracture than patients not taking TZDs, according to study results. And those at the greatest risk for fractures from TZD use are women older than 65. I am a big believer that orthopedic surgeons need to take a leadership role in dealing with metabolic bone disease, of which osteoporosis is the...
Social Textbooks and the iPad →
orthoonc:
It is probably not an exaggeration to predict that the medical student of the next decade will not lift a physical textbook. In fact, even ownership of a discrete entity, formerly referred to as a “textbook’, may be a historical footnote. Instead, students may simply rent the chapters they need for a particular course, paying a recurring subscription fee to the publisher for the period...
Alternatives →
• Health Care. The plan ensures universal access to affordable health insurance by restructuring the tax code, allowing all Americans to secure an affordable health plan that best suits their needs, and shifting the control and ownership of health coverage away from the government and employers to individuals. It provides a refundable tax credit—$2,300 for individuals and $5,700 for families—to...
Back Packs and Kids' Backs →
Conclusion: Backpack loads are responsible for a significant amount of back pain in children, which in part, may be due to changes in lumbar disc height or curvature. This is the first upright MRI study to document reduced disc height and greater lumbar asymmetry for common backpack loads in children.
1 tag
Mises: wage earners and employers. What conflict? →
And then there is one very important fact to keep in mind. When, as we did in the preceding observations, one distinguishes between the concerns of the capitalists and those of the people employed in the plants owned by the capitalists, one must not forget that this is a simplification that does not correctly describe the real state of present-day American affairs. For the typical American wage...
Checklists Reduce Hospital Based Infections →
“Prior to our work, we thought these were largely inevitable infections and that they were simply a cost of being in the hospital,” says Pronovost, the report’s leader and the developer of the checklist. “Now we know they are universally preventable. We’ve reset the benchmark.”
Many quality improvement innovations, Pronovost says, are a flash in the pan — successful while they are being...
I'm Part of the Problem by Jeffrey A. Tucker →
I’ll tell the story in moment but first consider that none of the politically active reform proposals being debated deal with the absence of market pricing for medical care, that system-wide problem that there is a disconnect between the supplier and the consumer, and this problem is absolutely pervasive. You rarely know the prices of what you are getting, and even when you do, the prices...
Rent Control →
* “In many cases, rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city except for bombing.”
* “Rent control has in certain western countries constituted, maybe, the worst example of poor planning by governments lacking courage and vision.”
* “That great sacred cow — Rent Control — is a textbook case of Economic stupidity.”
It is no surprise that free market...