Report reveals complexities of GME reform
Graduate Medical Education (GME) is in need of changes that address the rapidly changing health care system and to better prepare physicians-in-training for the future. A new report asked physicians, residents and other stakeholders from around the nation to identify GME-related issues or concerns.
A recentreport from the Association of Academic Health Centers brings together the input of physicians and residents, several medical societies, accreditation bodies, regional experts and other organizations with GME interests to discuss the current state of GME and what changes could be made to meet future health care needs.Wh...
Source: AMA Wire - September 7, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Clicks and keyboards stealing face-time with patients
Almost one-half of the physician workday is now spent on electronic health record (EHR) data entry and other administrative desk work while only 27 percent is spent on direct clinical face-time with patients, a time-motion study published Monday in theAnnals of Internal Medicine found. This finding is further proof that administrative burdens are directly affecting the patient-physician relationship. Though efforts are underway to make EHRs more practical for clinical use, there are ways to relieve this burden through team-based care.
Thetime-motion study, conducted by experts at the AMA and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Health Car...
Source: AMA Wire - September 6, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Clicks and keyboards stealing face time with patients
Almost one-half of the physician workday is now spent on electronic health record (EHR) data entry and other administrative desk work while only 27 percent is spent on direct clinical face time with patients, a time-motion study published Monday in theAnnals of Internal Medicine found. This finding is further proof that administrative burdens are directly affecting the patient-physician relationship. Though efforts are underway to make EHRs more practical for clinical use, there are ways to relieve this burden through team-based care.
Thetime-motion study, conducted by experts at the AMA and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Health Car...
Source: AMA Wire - September 6, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
LGBT residents provide insights to match applicants
Matching for residency programs can be stressful for LGBT applicants. Is it okay to be out? How much should I reveal about my LGBT advocacy work? What should I do if an interviewer tries to determine my sexual orientation indirectly? Five LGBT residents, including one couple, recently took part in a webinar to share their experiences and answer these and other questions LGBT students commonly have before and during the match.
The webinar,Navigating the Residency Match as an LGBT Applicant, co-hosted by the AMA and the American Association of Medical Colleges in August, addressed the rules governing questions that can be a...
Source: AMA Wire - September 6, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Timothy Smith Source Type: news
How to respond to bad online reviews
In the age of online reviews, medical professionals have been accused of violating the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) for how they responded to negative online reviews from patients. To avoid that pitfall and other missteps, here are some do ' s and don ’ts for responding to online critics.The pitfalls
AProPublica investigation earlier this year, co-published with theThe Washington Post,combed through more than 1.7 million patient Yelp public reviews and found dozens of instances where medical professionals ’ responses to complaints led to disputes over patient privacy.
In one case, a pat...
Source: AMA Wire - September 3, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Online DPP tackles challenges of location and participation
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ’s (CDC) National Diabetes Prevention Program (National DPP) has been proven effective at helping participants make substantial and sustainable lifestyle changes. But up until now, adoption of the program has been greatly limited by challenges in enrolling patients into local programs and scaling the program beyond its brick-and-mortar settings. But a new approach—providing the program digitally and remotely—is tackling both simultaneously“Any kind of a health care professional telling someone, ’Look, you’ve got prediabetes, you need to make some lifestyle changes,...
Source: AMA Wire - September 3, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Working upstream to achieve the quadruple aim
“None of us went into this work to achieve mediocrity, to achieve a sub-standard level of care,” said Rishi Manchanda, MD. “We’re in it for excellence. For professional satisfaction. For joy at work. For impact.” Although Dr. Manchanda was speaking to medical and health professions student s at a recent AMAAccelerating Change in Medical Education Consortium meeting, his talk held lessons for physicians at every stage of their careers.
In fact, he said, the key to achieving satisfaction is achieving a higher standard of care. And he had advice for how to do that.“The better stream of care we can achieve has to ...
Source: AMA Wire - September 2, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Doctors who serve: Becoming a Navy flight surgeon
Physicians have a long history in the military from treating disease in the Civil War to treating battle wounds in field hospitals in Afghanistan. One resident is training now to become a Naval flight surgeon, and when he completes residency, he will attach to a jet and helicopter squadron and deploy with those soldiers as their front line physician. Wherever they go, he will go.
After doing a one-month internship in flight surgery last year with the Navy where he spent time on an aircraft carrier and steered a helicopter over the water, Josh Lesko, MD, a flight surgery resident in the Navy, decided it was right up his al...
Source: AMA Wire - September 1, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
A simple tool to ensure treatment plan effectiveness
The patient-physician relationship is a partnership that requires a two-sided dialogue in order to decide on the most effective treatment options. The Choosing Wisely ® campaign from the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) aims to promote conversations between patients and physicians to choose evidence-supported, low-risk, necessary care that is not duplicative of other tests or procedures already completed.
Physicians want their patients to be well informed because it only makes their partnership in shared decision-making stronger. The goal of Choosing Wisely is not only to foster a conversation between physician...
Source: AMA Wire - August 31, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Precision medicine: What to know about cell-free DNA screening
With more women seeking tests for common chromosome conditions in pregnancy, many are now opting for newly developed non-invasive cell-free DNA (cfDNA) screening. But like all screening tests, it has limitations and isn ’t appropriate for all patients. Find out how cfDNA works and which of your patients may benefit from the screening.
Anew continuing medical education (CME) module, developed by AMA in partnership with Scripps Translational Science Institute and The Jackson Laboratory, is helping physicians understand what the test detects, which patients benefit most from it, what to consider when ordering the test and ...
Source: AMA Wire - August 31, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Get the revised Code of Medical Ethics
The AMA ’sCode of Medical Ethics is regularly cited as the medical profession ' s authoritative voice in legal opinions and in scholarly journals. It was adopted at the first AMA meeting in 1847, and while much has changed in medicine since, this founding document —the first uniform code of ethics of its kind—is still the basis of an explicit social contract between physicians and their patients. At the AMA Annual Meeting this year, delegates voted to update the AMACode.
The revised edition is the culmination of an eight-year project to modernize the AMACode ' s ethical guidance for relevance, clarity and consiste...
Source: AMA Wire - August 30, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Timothy Smith Source Type: news
Peer-review confidentiality critical, but under threat
Without confidentiality, the peer-review process cannot be an effective tool for improving quality of care. A case before the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania could establish rules that narrow the scope of peer-review protected materials, harming the process.
At stake inReginelli v. Boggs, is whether the Pennsylvania Peer Review Protection Act (PRPA) privilege against legal discovery should apply when an independent contractor of a hospital reviewed the performance of a physician on the hospital ’s medical staff.How the situation unfolded
Eleanor Reginelli presented to the emergency department at Monongahela Valley Hospit...
Source: AMA Wire - August 30, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
7 takeaways from ethics of image-sharing pathology tweet chat
As pathologists embrace image-sharing on social media for educational and informational purposes, patient privacy can be a concern. How can pathologists navigate the tumultuous waters of the digital world while still reaping the benefits? A recent tweet chat gathered the answers and resources.
TheAMA Journal of Ethics (@JournalofEthics) joined the AMA (@AmerMedicalAssn) to co-host a tweet chat with two expert pathologists.
Genevieve (Eve) Crane, MD, (@EveMarieCrane) is a research/clinical fellow in the Dept. of Pathology and the Children ' s Research Institute at UT Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas pursuing stem cel...
Source: AMA Wire - August 29, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Interactive tool reveals where physicians are needed
The distribution of the health care workforce has major implications for residents, physicians, advocates, policymakers and, of course, patients. An updated mapping tool can help you better grasp that distribution and how it relates to population health and professional opportunities.
The AMAHealth Workforce Mapper Version 2.0 is a customizable, interactive tool that illustrates the geographic distribution of the health care workforce. Users can filter physician and non-physician health care professionals by specialty and employment setting at the state, county and metropolitan levels.
The mapper also features geographic...
Source: AMA Wire - August 29, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
Restoring joy in practice through team-based care
While health systems across the country are implementing team-based care, few are doing it in exactly the same way. But many are doing it for the same reasons.“There’s never any straightforward or easy patient anymore,” said James Jerzak, MD, of Bellin Health, in Green Bay, Wisc. “In Wisconsin, the copays and the deductibles are huge. So every office visit is jammed with a lot of questions, and it can be really overwhelming to the individual clini cian.”
Dr. Jerzak, a family medicine physician, made his remarks in a recent presentation, “Restoring Joy in Practice through Team-Based Care,” at the University o...
Source: AMA Wire - August 29, 2016 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Troy Parks Source Type: news
