Guerilla Billing – Missing the Gorilla in the Midst
By ANISH KOKA, MD
No one likes getting bills. But there is something that stinks particularly spectacularly about bills for healthcare that arrive despite carrying health insurance. Patients pay frequently expensive monthly premiums with the expectation that their insurance company will be there for them when illness befalls them.
But the problem being experienced by an
increasing number of patients is going to a covered (in-network) facility for
medical care, and being seen by an out-of-network physician. This happens because
not all physicians working in hospitals serve the same master, and thus may not
all have ag...
Source: The Health Care Blog - November 26, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Christina Liu Tags: Economics Hospitals Medicare Patients Physicians Primary Care The Business of Health Care Source Type: blogs
Charting The Economic History of US Health Reform
By MIKE MAGEE, MD
Adam Gaffney’s recent Boston Review article, “What the Health Care Debate Still Gets Wrong”, a landmark piece that deserves careful reading by all, reaches near perfection in diagnosing our health system malady.
Dr. Gaffney is president of Physicians for a National Health Program, and a co-chair of the Working Group on Single-Payer Program Design, which developed the “Physicians’ Proposal for Single-Payer Health Care Reform.”
A seasoned health policy expert, his article cross-references the opinions and work of a range of health commentators including Atul Gawande, Steven B...
Source: The Health Care Blog - November 25, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Christina Liu Tags: Health Policy Politics Adam Gafney Atul Gawande health economics health reform Medicare For All Mike Magee Single payer Source Type: blogs
Launch of Index At-Home Biological Age Test: Interview with Dr. Morgan Levine, Yale School of Medicine and Head of Bioinformatics at Elysium Health
Elysium Health, a life sciences company selling health products with a particular focus on interventions that target fundamental processes of aging, has developed the Index at-home biological age test. The company claims that the test allows users to determine their biological age at home, and provides science-backed healthy living recommendations that may be able to impact overall health.
Aging is the largest risk-factor for a huge array of diseases and health issues, and, indeed, mortality. Identifying, monitoring, and modifying the factors involved in the aging process could help clinicians to increase patient lifesp...
Source: Medgadget - November 18, 2019 Category: Medical Devices Authors: Conn Hastings Tags: Exclusive Source Type: blogs
Wanted: Division of Biophysics, Biomedical Technology, and Computational Biosciences Director
BBCB Search Committee Members:
Enrique De La Cruz, Yale University
Daniel Gallahan, National Cancer Institute
Jill Heemskerk, National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering
Ming Lei, National Institute of General Medical Sciences, Chair
Cathy Wu, University of Delaware
The search is now open for an outstanding candidate to serve as director of our Division of Biophysics, Biomedical Technology, and Computational Biosciences (BBCB). The division supports the development of biophysical and computational methods and tools for understanding basic biological questions; physical and theoretical methodol...
Source: NIGMS Feedback Loop Blog - National Institute of General Medical Sciences - November 18, 2019 Category: Biomedical Science Authors: Matt Mills Tags: Job Announcements Source Type: blogs
A Role for B Cells in the Chronic Inflammation Generated by Visceral Fat Tissue
Much of the long-term harm caused by excess visceral fat tissue is due to raised levels of chronic inflammation, the inappropriate over-activation of the immune system characteristic of both obesity and aging. Chronic inflammation accelerates the progression of near all of the common age-related conditions. There are numerous mechanisms via which fat tissue rouses an immune response: cellular debris that triggers immune cells into action; generation of excessive numbers of senescent cells; inappropriate signaling from fat cells that mimics the response to infection; infiltration of inflammatory macrophages into fat tissue;...
Source: Fight Aging! - November 18, 2019 Category: Research Authors: Reason Tags: Daily News Source Type: blogs
Concerning Findings About Cannabis Use
While recreational marijuana is legal in 11 states as of November 2019, more states gravitating toward legalizing the recreational use of the substance, and 33 states allowing medical marijuana, there’s apparently no stopping this trend. Cannabis, in the form of marijuana, hemp, and cannabidiol (CBD) is being used for pain relief, to alleviate stress, cope with anxiety, and a number of other mental health disorders and addictions.
Yet, there’s a dearth of clinical studies that have been conducted on the overall effects on a user’s health. Clearly, as Crain’s Detroit Business points out, more research on marijuan...
Source: World of Psychology - November 16, 2019 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: Suzanne Kane Tags: Medications Substance Abuse Cannabis Marijuana Source Type: blogs
New Portable MRI Could Change the Way We Approach Emergency Imaging
Jonathan Rothberg, an entrepreneur with a knack for developing creative solutions for imaging needs, is adding a portable MRI scanner about the size of a photo booth to his growinglistof accessible imaging inventions. The scanner was spun out of Rothberg ’s latest startup, Hyperfine. According to STAT News, the MRI is priced around $50,000, it ’s 20 times cheaper to build than traditional MRI, 10 times lighter, and consumes 35 percent less energy than a 1.5 Tesla MRI. It was designed for emergency situations, and can be easily wheeled around and patients don’t need to remove any metal accessories to use it. Ke...
Source: radRounds - November 15, 2019 Category: Radiology Authors: Julie Morse Source Type: blogs
In addition to it being time for patients to refuse use of EHR's in their care, is it time for clinicians to refuse forced use of same? - " Association Between Perceived Electronic Health Record Usability and Professional Burnout Among US Physicians "
(Source: Health Care Renewal)
Source: Health Care Renewal - November 15, 2019 Category: Health Management Tags: bad health IT burnout Clinical Informatics Fellowship at Yale Edward Melnick Source Type: blogs
Can Mindfulness Meditation Really Reduce Pain and Suffering?
You're reading Can Mindfulness Meditation Really Reduce Pain and Suffering?, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you're enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.
There are many scientifically-validated claims about meditation's myriad benefits, but can it actually reduce chronic pain?
One study demonstrated a significant decrease in chronic pain-related suffering from 10 weeks of mindfulness meditation.
Another study found that meditation improves pain tolerance by 57%.
How is this possible? To make sense of these results, it helps to know the diff...
Source: PickTheBrain | Motivation and Self Improvement - November 12, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: christinejoneslms Tags: featured health and fitness psychology self improvement meditation pain Source Type: blogs
Five Ways To Boost Resilience In Children
By Emma Young
While some of us crumble in the face of adversity, and struggle to recover, others quickly bounce back from even serious trauma. Psychological resilience is undeniably important in all kinds of areas of life, so understanding what underpins it, and how to train it – particularly in children — is of intense interest to psychologists.
1. Watch your language
According to Carol Dweck of growth mindset fame, to drive success in our children we should “praise the effort that led to the outcome or learning progress; tie the praise to it,” as opposed to praising effort more broadly, or achievement al...
Source: BPS RESEARCH DIGEST - November 5, 2019 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: BPS Research Digest Tags: Developmental Feature Source Type: blogs
Ultrasound and autism
A former UCSF medical student, Carolyn Rees, now a doc in rural Idaho, wrote me a very informative letter — and raised several interesting questions — that are definitely worth a little discussion here.
Dr. Rees asked: Is there any evidence that ultrasound examination can affect brain development?
In fact, that evidence is mixed. Over the past 15-25 years, a number of smaller studies conducted principally in North America recorded cognitive and language impairments in children that were attributable to ultrasound examination — while results in several other subsequent large studies conducted principally i...
Source: On the Brain by Dr. Michael Merzenich, Ph.D. - November 1, 2019 Category: Neuroscience Authors: Dr. Merzenich Tags: Aging and the Brain Brain Fitness BrainHQ Cognitive Impairment in Children Cognitive impairments Language Development Reading and Dyslexia Source Type: blogs
How are hospitals supposed to reduce readmissions? Part III
By KIP SULLIVAN, JD
The
Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) and other proponents of the
Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program (HRRP) justified their support for the
HRRP with the claim that research had already demonstrated how hospitals could
reduce readmissions for all Medicare fee-for-service patients, not just
for groups of carefully selected patients. In this three-part series, I am
reviewing the evidence for that claim.
We saw in Part I and Part II that the research MedPAC cited in its 2007 report to Congress (the report Congress relied on in authorizing the HRRP) contained no studies supporting tha...
Source: The Health Care Blog - October 14, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Christina Liu Tags: Health Policy Medicare health reform Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program HRRP Kip Sullivan MedPAC Source Type: blogs
Chronic Lyme arthritis: A mystery solved?
In 1975, researchers from Yale investigated an epidemic of 51 patients with arthritis who lived near the woodsy town of Lyme, Connecticut. The most common symptom was recurrent attacks of knee swelling. A few had pain in other joints, such as the wrist or ankle. Many had fever, fatigue, and headache. Some remembered a round skin rash before the onset of knee swelling.
We now know that Lyme disease is an infection acquired from tick bites, caused by a spiral bacterium named Borrelia burgdorferi. After a tick bite, Borrelia bacteria wriggle through the skin away from the bite site. This leads to a circular red rash, known as...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - October 3, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: John Ross, MD, FIDSA Tags: Arthritis Bones and joints Infectious diseases Source Type: blogs
Podcast: Misinformation Crusader – Writing About Mental Illness
On today’s show, Gabe talks with Dr. Jessi Gold, a self-described misinformation crusader. In addition to being a practicing psychiatrist, Dr. Gold’s career has focused on writing about mental health and mental illness for a lay audience.
Join us as Gabe and Dr. Jessi talk about common sources of psychiatric misinformation, the perils of the supplement industry, how mental health and mental illness are often portrayed incorrectly in the popular media, and why she decided to pursue a very specific type of writing career.
SUBSCRIBE & REVIEW
Guest information for ‘Dr. Jessi’ Podcast Episode
Jessica (“...
Source: World of Psychology - October 3, 2019 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: The Psych Central Podcast Tags: General Health-related Interview Mental Health and Wellness Podcast Psychiatry Psychology The Psych Central Show Women's Issues Source Type: blogs
