Where you live has a lot to do with what happens to you, sick or well. Why?
When you or someone you love comes home from the hospital and experiences great pain no on warned you about, your first thought is, “What’s happening? What’s wrong?”
It actually could be that you, or the patient, did not get […]

New England Journal of Medicine: Disclosing clinical errors will be the norm within a decade.
This is great news for patients and their doctors.
For some time, there have been efforts to make it safe for doctors to admit errors without risking lawsuits or sky-rocketing malpractice premiums.
Over the next decade, experts say, disclosing errors to patients will […]

For search mavens, ask.com is offering interesting new additions to regular search. What does this mean for Google and you?
The Pew Internet and American Life project has been tracking online use among health seekers (and all other kinds of searchers) at regular intervals — all the way back to the age of dial-up connections.
Pew’s March […]

One of the biggest risks to patient’s safety is that the right pieces of paper (lab reports or doctor’s notes) do not get into the patient’s record quickly enough or never do.
The solution proposed is called an Electronic Medical Record (EMR). These are in use in some group practices and many hospitals. The VA has […]

Medical and/or surgical care brought risk factors down. Behavior changes are still needed. Link.

Richard A. Friedman, M.D., writes in The New York Times, about current and future medical management of depression. The future for people with clinical depression suddenly looks brighter.
“Imagine that you are depressed and see a psychiatrist who explains that you have clinical depression (link to story) and would benefit from an antidepressant. So far, so […]

Gov’t Report Rates Hospitals on Heart Care: New York Times story explains the first step in releasing information about clinical results.

Computerized Pillbox OK’D By Food and Drug Admin.: For patients who take a lot of pills or those whose memory is poor, this may help. One of the biggest problems for doctors and patients is remembering what medicine to take and when. Any device which helps patients do that is worth a good look.

Why second (or additional) medical opinions save lives or improve care.
Jerome Groopman, M.D., is a Harvard medical professor, New Yorker staff writer and author.
Groopman tells stories of patients and patient’ family members under terrible pressure to make decisions about treatment who manage to get other medical opinions first. He shares a story about himself […]

Community-based mental health care for soldiers always is important. Few soldiers get it.
Ezra Pound, the famous poet, was a patient there. So were senator’s relatives. and those of the famous.  John Hinckley, the then young man who tried to assassinate President Reagan remains there, no longer young.
In what seems a little like time travel, The […]