The End of Polio

A medical student today will go through their entire career without ever seeing a case of polio. The polio virus was feared throughout the early 20th century, leaving millions paralyzed or dead. During Summer and Autumn, polio epidemics spread human to human with this highly contagious disease. In the 1940's and 50's, negative pressure ventilators called the "iron lung" were used to support

It's Post Secret Day

Every Sunday the new Post Secrets are online. They only last a week. Don't miss out at this sad, amusing, wonderful look at mankind.

MRSA- it's tiny microbes

With all of the continued interest in MRSA (methacillin resistant staph aureus), it is a good time to remember just how bacteria work. According to author Bill Bryson..."if you are in good health and averagely diligent about hygiene, you will have a herd of about one trillion bacteria grazing on your fleshy plains-about a hundred thousand of them on every square centimeter of skin. You are for

Rate Your Doctor

I think the internet will have a huge impact on patient satisfaction of how they are treated by doctors. The idea of internet sites that rate doctors and hospitals has been around for about 5 years. In the past the sites have been difficult to view, some cost money and they were not user friendly. But like anything new...it may now have reached a tipping point.I logged onto Ratemd.com and was

Patient Safety- Run the OR Like a Jet Plane

We all know about the poor patient who goes in for a right kidney operation and ends up having the "good" left one removed instead. Or the patient with the allergy who is given the wrong anesthesia and has a reaction. Or the patient who is given the wrong blood type. These things happen despite the fact that doctors and nurses are doing their very best to heal under really tough circumstances.I

Transparent Pricing for Patients

There is a big push toward having patients be smarter consumers of health care as a way to control costs. Employers are pushing for medical savings accounts (where the patient has a pot of money they spend on health care or just save) and more and more insurance products have high deductibles and more cost sharing by the patient. The simple way of explaining it is that if someone else is paying

Surgical Model

In my medical training, oh so many years ago, we learned from cadavers. While this was a good way to learn basic anatomy, the physiology of how the body worked was a slower process. Thanks to Unbounded Medicine for this look at the way students can learn now. This reproduction of a patient was crafted with animal organs that really give the student a much better idea of how the body functions.

MRSA - It's preventable

Everywhere I turned today, I was engaged in discussions about methicillin resistant staph aureus (MRSA) and tonight I read a new article in JAMA that says it is twice as prevalent as we thought.MRSA is a common skin bacteria-Staphylococcus aureus-that has become a "bug on steroids" and is resistant to penicillin, methicillin and other drugs that used to kill it flat. It has developed over time

Healing Environments

While the housing market has bombed, new hospital buildings are the rage in California due to a law that says they need to be seismically (earthquake) safe. As hospitals are planning the hospital of the future, many are using architectural design to reduce stress and promote safety and healing.What type of building promotes safety and healing? We know what doesn't work. I've practiced in

Plastics and Chemicals That Can Harm

The chemical, bisphenol-A (BPA), is used to produce polycarbonate plastic and epoxy resins and is found (get this!) in water bottles, baby bottles, food containers, compact discs and dental sealants. The chemical can leach into foods, be inhaled or enter by other routes and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found this chemical in the urine of 95% of people they sampled. BPA is

Withdrawl of Kid's Cough Medicines

McNeil Pharmaceutical has stepped up to the plate and done the right thing by voluntarily withdrawing a number of cough and cold preparations that may be harmful to kids under the age of 2. Recent findings show these medications can be overused by parents and there are no safe guidelines for tiny tikes and these preparations. McNeil has begun by informing physicians of the following:We have

Thought for the Day

Optimism is an intellectual choice.

Sport Concussions

One of my most "googled" blogs was "A bump on the head". Falls and head injuries are common and an estimated 300,000 sports-related concussions (also known as mild traumatic brain injury) occur annually in the United States. Researchers estimate that 63,000 of those occur in high schoolers playing football.The tough thing about concussions is that there is no marker or test to know if a person

Medicare Drug Plan - Profitable to Insurers

The New York Times has an article that is no surprise to physicians and pharmacists who care for patients. Guess what? The wonderful Medicare Drug Plan for seniors has turned into a cash cow for insurance companies that administer it. Duh! Since when do Insurers ever do anything with the government that doesn't fatten their pockets? Audits, conducted by the Department of Health and Human

Doctors and Email

I tried to phone a patient last night with the results of her bone density test. She wasn't home and the thought of playing phone tag for the next few days was not appealing. I asked her husband for her email address and emailed her the results with my recommendations. Mission accomplished!Everyone emails. My son chats online with all of his friends together every night. You can order shoes

Thunderstorms and iPods

Letters have been circulating in the New England Journal of Medicine about the potential dangers of iPods (and MP3 players) and their ear wires attracting lightning to strike during a thunderstorm. An initial report of a jogger wearing his iPod and being struck by lightning came from Vancouver, BC. The patient did not lose consciousness, but he had amnesia, perforated eardrums and a fractured

Give an Hour - mental health for vets

Just when I feel so discouraged about the direction our country is headed, I get a lift by learning about a new organization that is developing a national network of mental health professionals that will provide free care for returning Iraq and Afghanistan vets and their families."Give an Hour" is a non-profit of volunteer mental health professionals across the United States that will donate an

How to Interpret Medical Studies

We are bombarded with news of medical breakthroughs every day. How can you know what studies are valid and important, and which ones are just fluff? Here are some ways to tell the difference:How many people were in the study? The more the betterWho were the subjects, researchers and sponsors? The funding source of the study is important and might change the motives. Do the researchers have