News Brief
American Academy of Family Practice
This is for doctors. As the journal article notes, many doctors do not have an easy time discussing sex with their patients. The purpose of this article is to make it easier for them to do that.
Why don’t you read it too if your are female? You never know when […]

News Brief
There is growing interest in ways to help elderly parents and relatives remain as independent as they can for as long as they can. This study shows that keeping them independent can be done, but it takes a complex set of community interventions to accomplish the goal. That is far preferable to their going […]

Feature
A new book advises adult children and the friends and families of the elderly to go about caring for them differently. The physician-author calls his approach Slow Medicine.
In a column in The New York Times, by Abigail Zuger, M.D., the book’s author, Dennis McCullough, has this to say about adult children’s ability to assess […]

News Brief
Wall Street Journal
Google is unveiling its new medical record feature with great fanfare—-following Microsoft and Revolution Health, the company started by AOL founder Steve Case.
1. Most doctors’ offices have not converted to the Electronic Medical Record (EMR) system, as the story says. Conversion costs—-converting paper records into electronic ones— are a subject of […]

News Brief
When adult children and relatives see that their elders are becoming what people tend to call frail, they often panic or are filled with dread.
“Nothing we can do now.” “This is just how it is.” “We have to face it.”
Maybe. Maybe not.
The word, frail, also has a precise medical meaning.
In this News Brief, you […]

News Brief
Medical News Today
The number of Americans taking advantage of precautionary DNA testing appears to be going down, and the reason is thought to be fear of genetic discrimination from health insurers and employers.
Some health experts are so concerned that they have called for new legislation to protect US citizens from being discriminated against should […]

News Brief
For people who don’t like writing more than lists, it may seem surprising to discover that writing helps cancer patients. Most accounts of journal-keeping are from cancer patients or those who are scribbling their way through a difficult life event.
Why not heart or diabetes patients?
One possibility is that cancer is a deadline disease. It […]

Headline News
Health Insurer Must Pay $9 Million for Canceling Sick Woman’s Policy
 
 

News Brief
Newsweek
“The emerging paradigm views addiction as a chronic, relapsing brain disorder to be managed with all the tools at medicine’s disposal. The addict’s brain is malfunctioning, as surely as the pancreas in someone with diabetes. In both cases, “lifestyle choices” may be contributing factors, but no one regards that as a reason to withhold […]

News Brief
There likely will be more investigating before the facts of this patient’s story are settled, but they are tragic.
This story, about a chronically ill passenger who died on board an airplane, should prod all patients who have serious conditions to consult with their doctors about what to do while traveling.
If you, a friend or […]