Oldie but Goodie Pediatric Clinical Concepts
A number of older clinical concepts may be unfamiliar to younger clinicians, but these clinical concepts are useful in pediatric medicine. Some of these concepts showed up in the medical literature for the first time nearly a century ago. Physicians should feel free to question the potential value and validity of older clinical concepts that aren't at the forefront of medical education, but my experience of more than 30 years practicing pediatrics and emergency medicine has repeatedly affirmed to me that these are valuable in emergency medicine.Parenteral DiarrheaThe concept of parenteral diarrhea has been around for...
Source: M2E Too! Mellick's Multimedia EduBlog - March 1, 2017 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Oldie but Goodie Pediatric Clinical Concepts
A number of older clinical concepts may be unfamiliar to younger clinicians, but these clinical concepts are useful in pediatric medicine. Some of these concepts showed up in the medical literature for the first time nearly a century ago. Physicians should feel free to question the potential value and validity of older clinical concepts that aren't at the forefront of medical education, but my experience of more than 30 years practicing pediatrics and emergency medicine has repeatedly affirmed to me that these are valuable in emergency medicine.Parenteral DiarrheaThe concept of parenteral diarrhea has been around for...
Source: M2E Too! Mellick's Multimedia EduBlog - March 1, 2017 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Anti-Vaping Researcher Gives Negligent Advice to the Public
An anti-vaping researcher, citing findings solely from anin-vitro cell culture study without clear clinical significance, has claimed that vaping can cause fatal respiratory infections. Based on his extrapolation from anin-vitro study to human disease, this researcher has advised all vapers to be vaccinated for serious bacterial lung infections. However, at the same time, he failed to advisesmokers to be vaccinated against these same serious infections.According to anarticle in theTimes of London, a professor of pediatric respiratory and environmental medicine at Queen Mary University of London " has found that the chemica...
Source: The Rest of the Story: Tobacco News Analysis and Commentary - September 12, 2016 Category: Addiction Source Type: blogs
UnitedHealth's Optum Division Settles Case Alleging it Enrolled Non-Terminally Ill Patients in Hospice, Thus Risking Their Deaths Due to Treatable Illnesses
Discussion < /b > < br / > < br / > The problem of fraudulant enrollment of non-terminal patients in hospice continues, despite our < a href= " http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/search/label/hospices " > efforts over five years < /a > to make the problem more public. & nbsp; The latest case involved a very big, very wealthy for-profit health care corporation which has had its share of < a href= " http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/search/label/UnitedHealth " > troubles in the past < /a > . & nbsp; Yet the latest case is as < a href= " http://hcrenewal.blogspot.com/search/label/anechoic%20effect " > anechoic < /a > as earlier ones...
Source: Health Care Renewal - July 19, 2016 Category: Health Management Tags: fraud hospices legal settlements UnitedHealth Source Type: blogs
UnitedHealth's Optum Division Settles Case Alleging it Enrolled Non-Terminally Ill Patients in Hospice, Thus Risking Their Deaths Due to Treatable Illnesses
Discussion The problem of fraudulant enrollment of non-terminal patients in hospice continues, despite our efforts over five years to make the problem more public. The latest case involved a very big, very wealthy for-profit health care corporation which has had its share of troubles in the past. Yet the latest case is as anechoic as earlier ones, including smaller cases this year.These enrollments may be motivated by the desire for more money, but they put patients at risk. Nonetheless, such abuses by hospices get little press coverage, seemingly are ignored by health care regulators and law enforcemen...
Source: Health Care Renewal - July 19, 2016 Category: Health Management Tags: fraud hospices legal settlements UnitedHealth Source Type: blogs
Intro to Class Blending
I thought I'd devote the next few blogs to a concept that has gotten much less attention than it deserves: blended classes. Class blending lurks behind much of the irreproducibility in "Big Science" research, including clinical trials. It also is responsible for impeding progress in various disciplines of science, particularly the natural sciences, where classification is of utmost importance. We'll see that the scientific literature is rife with research of dubious quality, based on poorly designed classifications and blended classes. For today, let's start with a definition and one example. We'll discuss many more spe...
Source: Specified Life - March 26, 2016 Category: Information Technology Tags: classification complexity data science irreproducible results ontologies ontology Source Type: blogs
Getting patients and physicians to ask the right questions
Overtesting — it’s an epidemic threatening consumers of U.S. health care. The notion that testing can be anything but beneficial belies the common assumption that more information is always better, as exemplified by billionaire Mark Cuban’s proclamation earlier this year that he obtains “baseline” quarterly blood tests and encourages others to do so. Knowledge is power, right? Not always. Aside from adding economic strain to our already beleaguered health care system, overtesting can harm patients from the adverse effects of the test itself or as a result of the interventions that ensue.
In an effort to curb ...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - September 9, 2015 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Alan R. Schroeder, MD Tags: Physician Cancer Pediatrics Source Type: blogs
How to teach clinical medicine – lessons learned by studying sore throats for 35 years
35 years ago I started collecting data in a non-acute emergency room. Over approximately 3 months the residents enrolled slightly more than 300 patients into the initial sore throat study. Spending the next 3 months learning how to analyze the data, I began a long journey that continues today.
Learning medicine rarely includes having epiphanies. Learning medicine requires patients and reading. But we who teach medicine can help our learners speed that process if we help them focus on some key features.
My colleagues and I often cite Judy Bowen’s classic article – Bowen, Judith L. “Educational strat...
Source: DB's Medical Rants - June 4, 2015 Category: Internal Medicine Authors: rcentor Tags: Attending Rounds Medical Rants Source Type: blogs
Does Tamiflu work and what are the side effects?
The flu season has really gotten into gear now with 46 of our 50 states reporting widespread influenza activity as of January 3, 2015. Influenza is a virus that infects the respiratory tract, causing sore throat, runny nose, fever, and cough. Rarely people with the flu will have nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, but this is not “stomach flu” which is a term some of us use to describe any one of a number of viruses that give us intestinal symptoms. Influenza is the one where you hurt all over, you have a high fever and cold symptoms, then you start coughing and you can barely get out of bed for days. Sometimes it&#...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - February 20, 2015 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Janice Boughton, MD Tags: Meds Infectious disease Source Type: blogs
How Can You Be Sure?
“How can you be sure?”
That question stopped our discussion for a second.
During some down time, several nurses and I were talking about childhood coughs. Her 6 month old child had just started daycare 2 weeks ago and has been coughing ever since. The child was put on amoxicillin and then Zithromax by her pediatrician but … [GASP] … her cough wasn’t getting any better. The nurse thought her child had pneumonia.
“What should she be taking now?”
I was in a particularly snarky mood, so, with a smirk, I said “probably vancomycin … maybe add gentamycin just for the gram nega...
Source: WhiteCoat's Call Room - January 13, 2015 Category: Emergency Medicine Authors: WhiteCoat Tags: Random Thoughts Source Type: blogs
The Price of Compassion - Commercialized Hospices and the Mistreatment of Vulnerable Patients
Introduction - Commercialized Hospices We have occasionally written about the rise of the commercialized hospice industry, and concerns that commercialized hospices may not be providing the compassionate care they promise. As we have discussed before, the hospice movement began with small, non-profit, community based organizations meant to provide compassionate palliative care to the terminally ill. However, in the US, the hospice movement has been co-opted by commercial hospices, often run by large corporations, which may put profit ahead of compassion.Several long investigative articles have appeared this yea...
Source: Health Care Renewal - July 10, 2014 Category: Health Management Tags: Carlyle Group deception Fillmore Partners Gentiva Golden Living HCR ManorCare hospices marketing private equity Vitas Source Type: blogs
The Art of Resurrection
Resurrection, Raffaellino del Garbo (1510)In the world outside of Christianity, horror, and science fiction, the dead cannot be brought back to life. Or can they? A feature in the The Observer from earlier this year profiled Dr. Sam Parnia, critical care physician and author of Erasing Death: The Science That Is Rewriting the Boundaries Between Life and Death (called The Lazarus Effect in the UK). The article begins in a dramatic fashion:Sam Parnia – the man who could bring you back from the deadSam Parnia MD has a highly sought after medical speciality: resurrection. His patients can be dead for several hours before t...
Source: The Neurocritic - August 25, 2013 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Authors: The Neurocritic Source Type: blogs
New Cochrane Review of Smoking Cessation Drugs Hides the Truth from Readers
A new, comprehensive, 51-page review of multiple meta-analyses summarizing the effectiveness of nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) and other drugs for smoking cessation concludes that these drugs are highly effective in helping smokers quit.(See: Cahill K, Stevens S, Perera R, Lancaster T. Pharmacological interventions for smoking cessation: an overview and network meta-analysis. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2013, Issue 5. Art. No.:CD009329.DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD009329.pub2.)The review was extensive, covering hundreds of studies and tens of thousands of subjects: "The authors combined the findings of existin...
Source: The Rest of the Story: Tobacco News Analysis and Commentary - June 3, 2013 Category: Health Medicine and Bioethics Commentators Source Type: blogs
