More Than Just Dander
First, a sort of meta-comment in the form of a shout-out to HCRenewal ' s intrepid editor, Dr. Roy Poses, for his just-published analysis of what we might call " blogging: rise and fall. " He sees decline reflected in publications long  devoted to health and health policy, yet now flaking off.Methinks, however, despite the usefulness of his overview of recent decades, Dr. P need not fret excessively. Water spilling out of the barrel ' s lip will slow down once folks come along and punch a whole bunch of little mid-section tweet-holes in it. Information still flows. (Sort of.)  In any case, surely there ' s overla...
Source: Health Care Renewal - January 25, 2019 Category: Health Management Source Type: blogs

Experts declare physician burnout ‘a public health crisis’ - and health IT a significant pathogen
I ' m certain when the information technology hyperenthusiasts and non-clinical management information systems " experts " and pundits get the technology all figured out, this burnout crisis will end.It will be about the same time as Zefram Cochrane invents the warp drive in Bozeman, Montana just prior to first contact by the Vulcans. That is in 2063 or so.Experts declare physician burnout ‘a public health crisis’January 22, 2019https://www.healio.com/psychiatry/practice-management/news/online/%7B7f2124e2-d72e-4e3e-be53-6fbe41986186%7D/experts-declare-physician-burnout-a-public-health-crisisExperts from leading U.S. he...
Source: Health Care Renewal - January 23, 2019 Category: Health Management Tags: burnout healthcare IT burden Healthcare IT experiment Source Type: blogs

Return of the Anechoic Effect - Rest in Peace, Health Wonk Review
Introduction: Blogging About Taboo Topics in Health CareWe started Health Care Renewal in 2004 to discuss the causes of health care dysfunction that rarely were mentioned in polite conversation at the time.  When we started Health Care Renewal, such issues as suppression andmanipulation of research, and health care professionals 'conflicts of interests rarely appeared in the media or in medical and health care scholarly literature.  While these issues are now more often publicly discussed, many other topics, such as deceptivemarketing of health care products and services; distortion of health care regulation...
Source: Health Care Renewal - January 18, 2019 Category: Health Management Tags: anechoic effect blogs free speech health care reform Source Type: blogs

The Mysteries Surrounding Rhodes Pharmaceuticals, the Sackler Family's Second Opioid Company
 Mysteries still abound in the not so wonderful world of health care dysfunction, so, quick, the game ' s afoot...Today ' s mysteries involve beneficial ownership.  Beneficial ownership questions are important to anti-corruption campaigners.  Beneficial ownership simply refers to " anyone who enjoys the benefits of ownership of a security or property, without being on the record as being the owner. " (per Wikipedia). Concealing who really owns a company enables concealing sources of funds (as in money laundering), market power (when the owner also owns competitors), and sources of political influence, and en...
Source: Health Care Renewal - January 8, 2019 Category: Health Management Tags: anechoic effect concentration of power conflicts of interest dark money deception Donald Trump health care corruption marketing narcotics Purdue Pharma Source Type: blogs

For the Years of Investigation to Come: a Guide to Resources for Challenging Health Care Corruption
The Enduring Problem of Health Care CorruptionNow arrives the years of investigation.  Here in the US, a new majority in the US House of Representatives promises multi-pronged investigations of, among other topics, the corruption that now seems pervasive at the highest reaches of the US government, corruption that has badly affected efforts to truly reform US health care (lookhere).  Meanwhile, similar investigations are likely to get underway in various US states.  We can only hope that this flurry of activity will end up with some positive steps to reduce US health care corruption,an enduring problem about...
Source: Health Care Renewal - January 2, 2019 Category: Health Management Tags: health care corruption Transparency International Source Type: blogs

Dander Up, Down, and All Around
Today ' s topics: VA health care politics; a clear-eyed and sane report from a bastion of managerialism, with related observations on innovators trying to create real bottom-up value.It ' s the last day of the year, so let ' s get this done. Owing to various largely unforeseen challenges, happily now largely behind us, this " Dander " series was interrupted for some time. Apologies to anyone who noticed. In any case, to refresh: as Chief Blogger and FIRM president Dr. Poses has indicated often enough in these pages, health care developments raising our dander are still everywhere, all the time, and on the increas...
Source: Health Care Renewal - December 31, 2018 Category: Health Management Source Type: blogs

The Demise of the Trump Foundation, an Extreme Example of Elite " Do-Gooding " to Prop Up the " Broken System " that Benefits Them
DiscussionThis example may be extreme, but it may not be unique. Vox just published an opinion piece entitled, " The Trump Foundation shows justhow preposterously light our oversight of charity is. " It noted,As the political theorist Rob Reich explains in his new book Just Giving,we really don ’t expect much from foundations as a matter of public policy.They don ’t have to have a website or some other way for interested charities to contact them about funding. They don’t have to make their giving strategy publicly available or accessible in any way. They do have to fill out 990-F tax forms, which are public and...
Source: Health Care Renewal - December 22, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: Donald Trump Gates Foundation health care foundations health care reform Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Source Type: blogs

Johnson and Johnson's Latest Ethical Misadventures: Settled Kickback Allegations, Reportedly Concealed Knowledge of Adverse Effects of a " Sacred Cow " Product
Giant pharmaceutical/ biotechnology/ device company Johnson& Johnson has its famous" credo " which starts withWe believe our first responsibility is to the doctors, nurses and patients, to mothers and fathers and all others who use our products and services.  In meeting their needs everything we do must be of high quality..Nonetheless, the company has a long history of ethical misadventures (lookhere, and see appendix below).  Now late in 2018,  we note two more Johnson& Johnson misadventures. In chronological order,$360 Million Settlement of Allegations of Kickbacks to Medicare/ Medicaid Patients to...
Source: Health Care Renewal - December 15, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: adulterated drugs adverse effects deception impunity Johnson and Johnson kickbacks legal settlements Source Type: blogs

Mission-Hostile Hospital Management: Quieter, but Still Pernicious After All These Years
Hospitals exist to take care of sick people, with the goal of making them better.  Hospitals employ and work with health care professionals, again who are sworn to put taking care of patients ahead of all other concerns.However, since we foundedHealth Care Renewal, we have noted striking examples of hospital leaders threatening their hospitals ' fundamental mission and/or health care professionals ' core values, which we dubbedmission-hostile management.  We also saw mission-hostile management affecting the broader health care industry, particularly pharmaceutical and device companies.  Most recently, the mo...
Source: Health Care Renewal - December 10, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: hospitals imperial CEO managerialism mission-hostile management perverse incentives Source Type: blogs

The Perils of CEO Worship - What Happens When the Leader Becomes Demented?
Introduction: the Cult of the CEOAlthough the US and most developed countries are nominally democratic, many of us seem to be again yearning for a man on a white horse, and in the current era, the horse ridden is corporate.On Health Care Renewal, we having been talking about this pheonomenon for a long time. We have written about it in terms ofthe messianic (or visionary, or charistmatic) CEO,CEO disease, and theimperial CEO.These concerns are diffusing into the broader media.  For example, from the introduction to a revent Vox article entitled "The Problem with CEO Worship"Society has always had heroes, be those of w...
Source: Health Care Renewal - December 2, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: accountability anechoic effect CEO disease Donald Trump imperial CEO leadership Source Type: blogs

From Russia with Money - Harvard Medical School Accepts $200 Million from Russian Emigre with Ties to Russian Oligarchs and Putin, and Who Is Under Investigation for US Election Meddling
We present a big case of what looks like an entirely new, and very troubling variation on an institutional conflict of interest.A " Transformative " Gift to Harvard Medical SchoolOn November 8, 2018, Felice Freyer, writingin the Boston Globe, documented a huge new gift to Harvard Medical School.Harvard Medical School has received a $200 million donation— the largest in its history — to support research into fundamental questions about human illness and health.The pledge,from the Blavatnik Family Foundation, will enable the school to hire researchers, add to its advanced technology, and a build an ' incubator ' in the L...
Source: Health Care Renewal - November 18, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: conflicts of interest crime Donald Trump Harvard Harvard Medical School institutional conflicts of interest oligarchy revolving doors Russia Source Type: blogs

Pharmaceutical and Other Health Care Corporations Funnel Dark Money to Republicans to Defeat " Leftward " Democratic Candidates - Partisanship Trumps Social Responsibility
Discussion and SummaryThis is now the fifth time we have discussed the role ofdark money in health care.- In 2012 wediscussed a case of "dark money" being used to conceal sources of support for particular health policy and political positions.- Earlier this year,  wediscussed the case of huge pharmacy chain CVS,which proclaims its " social responsibility, " and its policy of only making charitable contributions to improve " health and healthcare nationwide. "  Yet CVS was donating to America First Policies, a supposed non-profit group devoted to promoting the partisan agenda of President Trump, including " repeal...
Source: Health Care Renewal - November 7, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: corporatism dark money deception Eli Lilly Genentech Roche stealth health policy advocacy stealth lobbying US Chamber of Commerce Source Type: blogs

Nonsense-Based Health Care - in the Service of Political Ideology and Sectarian Beliefs
ConclusionSince 2016, we have seen increasing attempts to distort or ignore medical science, clinical and epidemiological research findings to support the political ideology of the ruling party and the religious beliefs of their extreme fundamentalist supporters.  As we have discussed, most recentlyhere, the Trump regime has seen fit to put ill-informed people in positions of power in health care and public health agencies.  Some of these people have put their political and/or religious agendas ahead of the public ' s health.  Our examples above show a continuing inclination by the administration, its sympat...
Source: Health Care Renewal - November 2, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: DHHS disinformation Donald Trump ill-informed management mission-hostile management propaganda Source Type: blogs

Issues at the 18th International Anti-Corruption Conference
Many issues brought up at the18th International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC) in Copenhagen, Denmark, were relevant to the problems of conflicts of interest, crime and corruption in health care which we often discuss onHealth Care Renewal, and hence bear repeating here.The discussion certainly got at the complexity of fighting corruption, seemingly one of many necessities that has come into light in the new political era.  Unfortunately, while the complexity is fascinating, it suggests this fight will hardly be simple.  Since warnings about corruption go back thousands of year, we already knew it would not be...
Source: Health Care Renewal - October 28, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: deception disinformation health care corruption propaganda US Department of Justice whistle-blowers Source Type: blogs

Update: How to Challenge Health Care Corruption Under a Corrupt Regime
Summary: the Corruption of Health Care Leadership as a Major Cause of Health Care DysfunctionAs we wrote in August, 2017, Transparency International (TI) defines corruption asAbuse of entrusted power for private gainIn 2006,TI published a report on health care corruption, which asserted that corruption is widespread throughout the world, serious, and causes severe harm to patients and society.the scale of corruption is vast in both rich and poor countries.Also,Corruption might mean the difference between life and death for those in need of urgent care. It is invariably the poor in society who are affected most by corruptio...
Source: Health Care Renewal - October 17, 2018 Category: Health Management Tags: anechoic effect conflicts of interest Donald Trump health care corruption regulatory capture Source Type: blogs