February 2011 - The Health Care Blog

The Triumph of Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt

By JOE FLOWER According to a new poll, half of all Americans say they are “confused” about healthcare reform. And boy howdy, are they right! Take a look at this new Kaiser Family Fund poll: http://www.kff.org/kaiserpolls/upload/8156-C.pdf Scan down to...

Published Fri, Feb 25 2011 12:58 PM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Front Page

Guess Who Has Been Over-Treated For More Than Twenty Five Years?

By MAGGIE MAHAR When I was in my twenties, I was diagnosed with glaucoma. At the time, I didn’t worry about it. I was twenty-something, busy teaching, having babies, writing a book—and, with glasses, my eyesight was 20/20. It was only when I moved to...

Published Sun, Feb 27 2011 7:48 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Maggie Mahar, The Insider's Guide to Health Care, Over-treatment

Deciding What Works

Steven Goldberg Is probably best known for the controversial "Billions of Drops in Millions of Buckets: Why Philanthropy Doesn't Advance Social Progress." In this post he looks at the ways in which success and failure are measured in his...

Published Tue, Feb 08 2011 8:38 AM by The Health Care Blog

Radiologist: Commoditize Thyself

By DAVID E. WILLIAMS There is little in the health care world as amusing as watching radiologists work themselves into a froth over some real or perceived threat to their profession. Usually the villain is non-radiologists daring to encroach on... Read...

Published Wed, Feb 02 2011 7:00 AM by The Health Care Blog

NJ ACO: A Sheep in PHYCORE Clothing

By SCOTT SHREEVE, MD I am on an email list of Bill DeMarco’s, a reputable industry insider who has written and consulted extensively in the physician group and medical management space. He recently sent me a note about several physician... Read More....

Published Wed, Feb 02 2011 3:54 PM by The Health Care Blog

Why Aren’t The Uninsured Protesting In The Streets Like The Egyptians?

By MICHAEL MILLENSON Maybe the uninsured could learn something from Egyptians and the Arab street. At a time when landmark health reform granting most of the uninsured access to medical care for the first time in their lives is being... Read More...

Published Thu, Feb 03 2011 1:20 AM by The Health Care Blog

A Patient is Not a Shunt

By EVAN FALCHUK Some people may tell you that health care IT will solve many of the quality and cost problems in health care. I don’t believe them. I know a 70-year old man named Carlos (not his real name)... Read More...

Published Sat, Feb 05 2011 11:29 AM by The Health Care Blog

The Greater Fool

By PAUL LEVY In the last four decades, we have witnessed a series of investment "bubbles" that have all collapsed. It seems that there is no end to the number of people with cash who will be intoxicated by a... Read More...

Published Mon, Feb 07 2011 7:13 AM by The Health Care Blog

Cruel Shoes

By JOHN HENNING SCHUMANN, MD A thirtysomething friend of mine, let's call her Sally, started running last year in an effort to get in better shape. As often happens in these scenarios, Sally developed some foot pain. So she went... Read More...

Published Wed, Feb 09 2011 12:26 PM by The Health Care Blog

Exploitations of Immortality

By FRANK PASQUALE, JD Rebecca Skloot’s remarkable book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks has quite a following among health lawyers. As an excerpt from the book explains, Henrietta Lacks was a poor Southern tobacco farmer who worked the same... Read...

Published Thu, Feb 10 2011 9:15 AM by The Health Care Blog

NIH and New Drugs — New Study Says 1 in 5

By MERRILL GOOZNER For most of the past decade, Democrats and Republicans in Congress have competed over who could pour more money into the National Institutes of Health, the largest funder of biomedical research in the world. But the party is over. The...

Published Mon, Feb 14 2011 4:51 PM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: pharmaceuticals, Merrill Goozner, NIH, NEJM, Drug development

The HMO in Your Future

By JOHN GOODMAN I have not been able to determine how you pronounce the acronym for Accountable Care Organization (ACO). Is it ā´ ko? Or ā´ so? Or ăh so´, as in Charlie Chan movies? What about ĕ´ ko, as in a canyon? Or simply ick, with a silent o? Anyway...

Published Mon, Feb 28 2011 10:29 AM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: John Goodman, ACOs, Front Page, HMO, Accountable Care Organizations

Replace The RUC

By BRIAN KLEPPER, PHD A few weeks ago, my writing partner David C. Kibbe and I ran an article on Kaiser Health News called “Quit the RUC!“ that has caused some turmoil within the physician community, particularly in DC. First, it noted that the RUC, the...

Published Thu, Feb 17 2011 6:13 PM by The Health Care Blog

Filed under: Brian Klepper, AMA, CMS, Tech, Front Page, RUC

NIH and Drug Innovation