Sens. Herb Kohl (D-WI) and Susan Collins (R-ME) have reintroduced a bill to establish a nationwide system of background checks to prevent people with criminal histories from working in long-term care settings. The bill, the Patient Safety and Abuse Prevention Act, expands on a three-year pilot program that helped to...
Author Archives: anthony
Mentally Ill More Prevalent in Nursing Homes
According to a new article by the Associated Press the mentally ill are becoming more prevalent in the nursing home population. Younger, stronger residents with schizophrenia, depression or bipolar disorder are living beside frail senior citizens, and sometimes taking their rage out on them. Numbers obtained through the Freedom of...
Lack of Primary Care Physicians Will Continue
Last week was Match Day, when graduating medical students found out where theyÛªll be doing their training. Just over 42% of the family medicine residency slots went to seniors receiving their M.D.s from U.S. med schools. Forty nine percent of the slots went to foreign medical school graduates and others....
End of Life Care Less Costly When Physicians Communicate
In a follow up to yesterdayÛªs guest post about end of life care and the engagement of health care providers comes this. The March 9 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine reports that patients with advanced cancer who discuss end-of-life care with their physicians appear to have lower health care...
Advance in Long Term Care Management
Read my guest blog in Advance in Long Term Care Management about how health professionals handle the end of life care of their patients.
Be Observant of Observational Care or Face Medicare Non-Payment
There is a new category of patients that private insurers and Medicare are using called “observation” patients. Typical patients for observational care include those with chest pain, asthma attacks, kidney stones, dehydration, dizziness and mild trauma. These patients are a step up from an emergency department patient but not classified...
Social Networking for Physicians – Good for Medicine or Bad? A Second Opinion You Might have an Opinion About
Physician Danine Rydland, MD was searching for a drug that would suppress her patient’s menstruation in preparation for her hysterectomy. But she didn’t know exactly what to prescribe. Unsure of how to proceed, Rydland requested permission from the patient to post a description of the condition and history on Sermo,...
Who’s Reading Your Scan?
I am sure you have heard of radiologists in Australia reading the scans you had today at your hospital or imaging center. The upsurge in imaging studies, demand for fast turnaround and a shortage of radiologists has prompted this. For some that spells opportunity. Telerays, a Houston company, has started...
WhoÛªs Reading Your Scan?
I am sure you have heard of radiologists in Australia reading the scans you had today at your hospital or imaging center. The upsurge in imaging studies, demand for fast turnaround and a shortage of radiologists has prompted this. For some that spells opportunity. Telerays, a Houston company, has started...
If Your Doctor Asks Say No!
To what you ask? In this era of transparency, doctorsÛª ratings are all the rage. In a case of freedom of speech meets the bureaucracy, Dr. Jeffrey Segal, IÛªm afraid to say from my state of North Carolina has made a business of helping doctors monitor and prevent online criticism....