Stanley Family Foundation gives $650 million for Psychiatric Research
From the New York Times, In Spark for a Stagnant Search, Carl Zimmer and Benedict Carey write:Late on Monday, the Broad Institute, a biomedical research center, announced a $650 million donation for psychiatric research from the Stanley Family Foundation — one of the largest private gifts ever for scientific research.It comes at a time when basic research into mental illness is sputtering, and many drug makers have all but abandoned the search for new treatments.Despite decades of costly research, experts have learned virtually nothing about the causes of psychiatric disorders and have developed no truly novel ...
Source: Shrink Rap - July 23, 2014 Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Authors: Dinah Source Type: blogs
Sleeping, or not
I have problems sleeping these days. On a good night, I get to sleep for a solid 12 hours. I'm not kidding. I hope to do this once a week at least. Not this weekend. If I can, I save my big sleeping nights for the weekend because I don't have to get up in the morning.Friday night I slept from about 10-330. Then I dozed off and on until 6 when I gave up and got up. Last night, I slept from about 930 to 4. Then I couldn't sleep so I played games on my phone (because my phone was nagging me to get caught up on words with friends) for about half and hour and then dozed for a while and finally got back to sleep for a bit. I am ...
Source: Caroline's Breast Cancer Blog - July 20, 2014 Category: Cancer Tags: crabbiness crankiness lack of sleep medical tests Source Type: blogs
Top stories in health and medicine, June 13, 2014
From MedPage Today:
Michigan Ties Behavior Change to Medicaid. Delayed by state lawmakers, Michigan did not expand Medicaid until the day after the federal online insurance exchange closed March 31 — a move advocates feared would undermine signups.
Feds Don’t Track Some Hospital Complications. An analysis released Thursday identified dozens of potentially avoidable hospital complications that are not being tracked by the government even though some occur frequently and are expensive to treat.
Stroke Rounds: More Protein Equals Lower Risk? Greater dietary intake of protein was associated with a lower risk of s...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - June 13, 2014 Category: Journals (General) Authors: MedPage Today Tags: News Neurology Pulmonology Source Type: blogs
Sleep apnea and the heart
Many of you who have heard me speak publicly, seen me in the office or read my blog know that I remain very concerned about the effects of sleep apnea on cardiovasacular health. I have written about this before:Could your sleep be hurting your heart?Women, Sleep and Heart Disease Sleep apnea treatment helps your gold gameDo you have sleep apnea?Two new important studies published in the June 12th edition of the New England Journal of Medicine continue to add to the growing body of evidence regarding the danger that sleep apnea poses to cardiovascular health and the importance of weightloss and continuous positive airway pr...
Source: Dr Portnay - June 13, 2014 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr Portnay Source Type: blogs
Must a surgeon mention death as a complication?
Earlier, I wrote about the tragic case of a young girl in California who was declared brain dead after what most media sources called a tonsillectomy. In fact, the patient had a much more extensive procedure for treatment of obstructive sleep apnea. In addition to having her tonsils removed, she underwent an uvulopalatopharyngoplasty (UPPP) and resection (removal) of her inferior nasal turbinate bones.
Continue reading ...
Your patients are rating you online: How to respond. Manage your online reputation: A social media guide. Find out how. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - June 3, 2014 Category: Journals (General) Authors: Skeptical Scalpel, MD Tags: Physician Malpractice Surgery Source Type: blogs
Exercise, over-indulgence and atrial fibrillation — seeing the obvious
If you like thinking and writing, few topics are better than the excess exercise and heart disease story. Indeed it is a matter for the curious.
Two studies published last week in the British journal Heart addressed the relationship of exercise and heart disease. (See references below.) Although these studies garnered mainstream media attention they added little to what is already known. Namely, that moderate exercise is protective and excessive exercise is detrimental. This has been dubbed the J-curve of exercise. You could also call it…obvious.
I’ve been to this place so many times, I was going to leave it al...
Source: Dr John M - May 18, 2014 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr John Source Type: blogs
Fwd: Secondary causes of pseudotumor cerebri syndrome
From: Djacobs272@aol.comTo: dhj1.neurology@blogger.comSent: 5/13/2014 2:29:28 P.M. Eastern Daylight TimeSubj: Secondary causes of pseudotumore cerebri syndrome (from Neurology, 2013; 81:1159-1165 cerebrovenous abnormalities:cerebral venous thrombosis (CVT)bilateral jugular thrombosis or surgical ligationmiddle ear or mastoid infectionincreased right heart pressuresuperior vena cava syndromeAV fistulashypercoagulable statesMedications and exposures:Antibiotics: tetracycline, minocycline, doxycycline, nalidixic acid, sulfa drugsVitamin A and retinoidshypervitaminosis A, isotretinoin, all trans retinoic acid...
Source: neurologyminutiae - May 14, 2014 Category: Neurologists Source Type: blogs
Upstream Problems
He had been through this before. The patient, a 57-year-old man, had come through the doors of this emergency department many times. He had a favorite seat in triage. He knew what questions the nurse would ask him once he was in a room, and that the doctor would repeat those same questions. Then tests and labs, then moved upstairs for a couple of days before going home, hopefully feeling better. He knew all of this. Today, though, everything he thought he knew was wrong.
He had once considered himself lucky. He even survived a gunshot to the chest as a young man. But that notion had faded long ago. His health had been gett...
Source: Spontaneous Circulation - May 12, 2014 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Upstream Problems
He had been through this before. The patient, a 57-year-old man, had come through the doors of this emergency department many times. He had a favorite seat in triage. He knew what questions the nurse would ask him once he was in a room, and that the doctor would repeat those same questions. Then tests and labs, then moved upstairs for a couple of days before going home, hopefully feeling better. He knew all of this. Today, though, everything he thought he knew was wrong.
He had once considered himself lucky. He even survived a gunshot to the chest as a young man. But that notion had faded long ago. His health had been get...
Source: Spontaneous Circulation - May 12, 2014 Category: Emergency Medicine Tags: Blog Posts Source Type: blogs
Sleep Apnea in Heart Failure
One of the most common symptoms experienced by people who have heart failure is poor sleep. And, while there are several causes of sleep disorders in heart failure, the most common is sleep apnea - prolonged pauses in breathing during sleep. Sleep apnea causes several problems, including lots of disturbing symptoms related to sleep deprivation, hypertension, and cardiac arrhythmias....Read Full Post (Source: About.com Heart Disease)
Source: About.com Heart Disease - May 9, 2014 Category: Cardiology Source Type: blogs
Atrial fibrillation and philosophy…
Patterns. As a doctor, you learn to see patterns. Biologists call the patterns of organisms phenotype–as opposed to genotype, the genetic makeup.
For twenty years, I have observed phenotypes (patterns) of people afflicted with AF, and have come to believe, and data are beginning to confirm, that the disease doesn’t just happen. It’s not a fluke. AF happens to people because of something about them.
I’m not talking about the obvious AF associations, such as obesity, high blood pressure, sleep apnea, and structural heart problems (heart failure and valve disease, etc). These are all diseases that disr...
Source: Dr John M - May 4, 2014 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr John Source Type: blogs
Diabetes or Weight — Which Comes First?
By David Spero
"Everybody knows" that being fat leads to Type 2 diabetes, even though it's not true. That idea has been pretty well debunked.
Reporting on a study in The Journal of the American Medical Association, Diane Fennell wrote "General measures of obesity, such as body-mass index, total body fat, or [fat under the skin] were not associated with an increased risk of developing Type 2."
What seems more likely is that Type 2 diabetes makes people fat. The connection is insulin resistance. Nurse practitioner Laurie Klipfel writes, "Even thin people who are insulin resistant are at risk for the things associated with ...
Source: Diabetes Self-Management - March 5, 2014 Category: Diabetes Authors: David Spero Source Type: blogs
Management of obstructive sleep apnea
(Source: Notes from Dr. RW)
Source: Notes from Dr. RW - February 25, 2014 Category: Internists and Doctors of Medicine Tags: guidelines pulmonary Source Type: blogs
AF ablation and the hard truths about AF
Atrial fibrillation is a mysterious disease. We know a lot but surely not enough. We look at AF but are we really seeing it?
I believe there are hard truths to this disease. Hard in a way that neither patients nor doctors like. More on that later. First to some news on a major AF ablation trial.
AF ablation news:
One of the fundamental questions in electrophysiology today centers on the outcomes of AF ablation. Though most experts agree that AF ablation, when compared with medical therapy, reduces AF symptoms and improves quality of life (important metrics for sure), we don’t know whether ablation reduces the chance ...
Source: Dr John M - February 18, 2014 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr John Source Type: blogs
Healthcare Update Satellite — 02-13-2014
More medical news from around the web on my other blog at DrWhiteCoat.com.
No more “putting it on my account.” Due to cuts in payments from Medicare and Medicaid and expenses for treating uninsured patients, Hutchinson Hospital in Kansas will require payment for emergency department services, radiology, and outpatient surgery services before services are rendered.
Emergency department patients will still get screened, but apparently won’t receive non-emergency treatment if a partial payment isn’t made.
Florida Hospital Memorial Medical Center has implemented the same type of system – along wit...
Source: WhiteCoat's Call Room - February 13, 2014 Category: Emergency Medicine Doctors Authors: WhiteCoat Tags: Healthcare Update Source Type: blogs
