A few items from the blogosphere:
(1) Niko Karvounis writes at Health Beat about Wyeth vs. Levine. The core issue is whether FDA approval of a drug preempts a patient’s right to sue for harm caused by that drug. The WSJ Health Blog has a post about FDA officials’ view of the preemption argument – they [...]
Fri, October 31 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments
DrRich thinks conservatives shouldn’t sweat Senator Obama’s belief that health care is a right, because it will force us to ask: “exactly how much healthcare are you entitled to if you have a right to healthcare?” Fair enough – except that he argues this will result in an “extremely painful” debate that will “traumatize our [...]
Thu, October 30 2008 » Uncategorized » 2 Comments
The Washington Post has an article on McCain’s health care reform, specifically the part about creating high-risk pools for people with pre-existing conditions. In theory, this would address most sick people’s concerns about insurance – but in practice it doesn’t often work:
California’s high-risk pool is so strapped that it put a limit on enrollment this [...]
Wed, October 29 2008 » Uncategorized » 2 Comments
The last couple of days, I’ve been seeing Charlie Baker pop up here and there in the blogosphere. Charlie has a blog called Let’s Talk Health Care. I somehow thought he was a doc, but he’s not: he’s the President and CEO of Harvard Pilgrim Healthcare and former Secretary of Health and Human Services for [...]
Wed, October 29 2008 » Uncategorized » 2 Comments
In an article that verges on alarmist, the AP discovers that patients are being left in hallways after ER visits. [My first read of that article was a little off, so I've revised the rest of the post accordingly.]
The problem is that patients are filling up ERs and not being admitted to the hospital proper. [...]
Tue, October 28 2008 » Uncategorized » 1 Comment
Grand Rounds is up at Emergiblog, complete with NASCAR theme. Kim flatters me with one of her “pole position” links, so many thanks to her. I think somebody just earned herself a slot in my blogroll, and I’ll probably pull a couple posts from her to comment on here in the next few days.
Just for [...]
Tue, October 28 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments
Several years ago I volunteered for a clinical trial at the NIH, testing a drug to treat Crohn’s disease. The doctor running that study, Peter Mannon, published the results in a NEJM article. As it happens, I’m the “Patient 2″ described in the article (on pages 2076-2077 in the PDF). That single dose of medicine [...]
Mon, October 27 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments
Through sophisticated genetic engineering techniques, medical scientists have now created a purple tomato. This fruitological breakthrough is touted as having advanced cancer-fighting properties, but it will take years of study and FDA approval before you’ll find them in the produce section of your local pharmacy.
Of course, if you can’t wait that long and don’t have [...]
Sun, October 26 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments
Dr. Wes is angry – the “government” is forcing doctors to adopt a new coding scheme for diagnoses. Apparently this will force physicians to spend a lot more money on overhead, which Dr. Wes is against. For the record, I’m against physicians spending more money on overhead, but I don’t think Wes quite gets what’s [...]
Sun, October 26 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments
Anna Wilde Matthews writes the Healthy Consumer column for WSJ Online. In her most recent column, she cites a study of McCain and Obama’s health plans:
The Lewin Group, a health-care consulting firm, found in a new analysis that 65% of families would see their health-insurance costs decline by at least $250 a year with the [...]
Fri, October 24 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments
A novel crime against decency by Duncan Cross
