December 2009 - The Health Care Blog

Pink Glove Dance

By Matthew Holt (Stolen direct from and Hat-tip to MrHIStalk) this is fabulous. It’s a fund raiser for Breat Cancer awareness done by more than 200 doctors, nurses, lab technicians, administrators and kitchen and janitorial staff from the Providence St...

Published Thu, Dec 03 2009 7:40 PM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Matthew Holt

Pelosi’s Hidden Tort Bomb -- an Alternative View

by Charles Silver & David A. Hyman We once thought Democrats would accept tort reform to win Republicans’ support for national health care legislation. Now, however, Democrats have dispensed with bipartisanship. Perhaps they think they can ram health...

Published Tue, Dec 08 2009 1:03 PM by The Health Care Blog

Senate Compromise on Health Care Reform: Political Genius?

By JOE FLOWER Democrat Roland Burris, the sudden senator who replaced Barack Obama in that august body, has now joined those who are pledging to filibuster any bill that does not have a "public option" – joining of course those,... Read More...

Published Thu, Dec 10 2009 9:29 AM by The Health Care Blog

Health 2.0 in Europe: Couldn't? Wouldn't? Does!

By Denise Silber They said it couldn’t happen in Europe, that social media and online tools wouldn’t catch on, because the healthcare context was soooo different from the US. They said that Europeans don’t worry about access and cost, that... Read More...

Published Sun, Dec 13 2009 2:33 PM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Health 2.0

MedEncentive's Five Year Report

By Matthew Holt As many involved in the worlds of Health 2.0 and Information Therapy know, some of the most interesting experiments in the world of patient-physician engagement have been happening in the somewhat unlikely environs of small town Oklahoma...

Published Tue, Dec 15 2009 12:29 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Health 2.0, Policy/Politics, Policy, Information Therapy, evidenced-based medicine

Interview with Paul Taylor, renegade hospital CEO

By Matthew Holt Paul Taylor is CEO of Ozarks Community Hospital, a teeny 2 hospital system catering to the poor and senior populations in rural Missouri and Arkansas. He thinks that he's figured out a way to deliver health care... Read More...

Published Fri, Dec 18 2009 7:06 AM by The Health Care Blog

Interview with Alan Greene MD, author <i>Raising Baby Green</i>

One of the most remarkable talks I heard this year wasn't about health care. It was about food. Of course, food is very, very closely related to health and health is at least tangentially related to health care. So I... Read More...

Published Mon, Dec 21 2009 1:01 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Matthew Holt, Policy, Consumers, Children's Health, Podcasts, Books

Voters Want Abortion-Neutral Health Care Reform

By MARK MELLMAN A few months ago, I warned that some folks were attempting to misuse healthcare reform to restrict access to abortion. They have come a long way since then, endangering the vital struggle for healthcare — indeed, torpedoing... Read More...

Published Tue, Dec 22 2009 9:45 AM by The Health Care Blog

Why buy insurers stocks, When the Obama health bill would bankrupt them?

By DONALD JOHNSON On Monday, liberals sneered when insurers' stocks rose, indicating that speculators thought ObamaCare (HR 3590) would be good for the big regional companies. But today several of the stocks are sinking, probably in response to University...

Published Wed, Dec 23 2009 12:54 PM by The Health Care Blog

Genetic Testing, Fact or Fiction: You Be the Judge

By MICHAEL MILLENSON Which of these two events is fact and which is fiction? Organizations representing employers and health plans call for a moratorium on implementation of the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, asserting that the new rules could...

Published Tue, Dec 08 2009 12:45 AM by The Health Care Blog

Why Wait Four Years?

By PAUL LEVY I was struck during President Obama's health care speech before Congress several months ago that the reforms he advocates would not go into effect for four years, until 2014. This timetable, too, is written into both the... Read More...

Published Wed, Dec 02 2009 6:53 AM by The Health Care Blog

Health Journos Protest FDA Interview Rules

By MERRILL GOOZNER The Association of Health Care Journalists, the Society of Professional Journalists and 9 other scribbler groups have asked the Food and Drug Administration to lift its requirement that agency officials first get permission from the...

Published Fri, Dec 04 2009 12:19 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Annals of Journalism

Making (sh)it up as they go along

By Matthew Holt So today’s news is the the gang of ten have come up with something. (If you haven’t been following along, the gang of ten are the five “liberal” Democrats and the five DINOs asked by Harry Reid... Read More...

Published Wed, Dec 09 2009 8:10 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Policy/Politics, Matthew Holt, Policy, Jeff Goldsmith

Your Money or Your Wife

By JD Kleinke Talk about perfect timing. Just as the last “death panel” falsettos fade into the droning no-government- takeover chorus, along come those “faceless government bureaucrats” from the U.S. Preventative Services Task Force to stop the music...

Published Fri, Dec 11 2009 7:19 AM by The Health Care Blog

There Be Dragons: The Fiscal Risk Of Premium Subsidies In Health Reform

By JEFF GOLDSMITH Last week, the Congressional Budget Office weighed in on the biggest economic imponderable in the health care debate: how private health insurance premiums will behave under health reform. Building on its December 2008 CBO health insurance...

Published Mon, Dec 14 2009 7:08 AM by The Health Care Blog