'Pimple on a Duck's Butt': What We Heard This Week

— Quotable quotes from 's sources

MedicalToday

"Don't ever, ever say to a patient: 'Do you have a vibrator?' Say to them: 'When you use your vibrator ... ' That way, if they have a vibrator, they're just relieved and if they say 'I don't have a vibrator,' you say 'Really? Everybody else does.'" -- Lauren Streicher, MD, of Northwestern University, on treating orgasmic dysfunction in women.

"I truly believe that if he had access to [CSC] when he was first getting sick, that his life could have been very different." – Lisa Dixon, MD, MPH, of Columbia University Medical Center in New York City, on treating first-episode psychosis.

"We're catching people at the point where they're kind of giving up. They have very high A1cs -- 10%, 11%, 12%, 13% -- and they're frustrated." -- Allison Hess, associate vice president for health and wellness at Geisinger Health System, in Benton, Pennsylvania, on a program providing meals for people with type 2 diabetes.

"In a rainstorm, you don't have to count every drop to know how much rain there actually is." – Lyle Petersen, MD, director, vector-borne diseases at the CDC, on case tracking for Lyme disease.

"Surgeons should be aware of time as a significant factor of upstaging and should prioritize early resection." -- Harmik Soukiasian, MD, of Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, discussing management of early lung cancer.

"The amount of spending by those U.S. citizens in foreign destinations is a pimple on a duck's butt." -- Irving Stackpole, president of Stackpole & Associates of Newport, Rhode Island, on overinflated numbers for U.S. tourists traveling out of the country for medical care.

"Americans always do the right thing after exhausting every other possibility. I would suggest to you that we are close to having exhausted every other possibility in healthcare. So, we must be about to do the right thing." -- Tom Price, MD, former HHS Secretary, on the prospects for healthcare reform.

"If the sponsor wants to continue with drug development, they should do it in a standard way, which is a phase III study... and spend the money instead of hoping the healthcare system and parents will undertake the burden." -- Peter Havens, MD, of the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, at an FDA advisory committee on a drug for severe neonatal hyperbilirubinemia.