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Doctor's Memoir Exposes Dark Side of Medicine

Sandeep Jauhar puts his life on stark display to illustrate harmful financial intrusions into medicine in his newest book.

CardioBuzz: Toward the $500 an Hour Physician

In this guest blog, Mark Jay Zucker, MD, JD, an attorney and transplant cardiologist at Rutgers University New Jersey Medical School in Newark, explains why he thinks it's time to talk money.

Friday Feedback: Zero-Tolerance Employment Smoking Bans?

Should hospitals, schools, and companies refuse to hire smokers for teachers and healthcare providers?

AMA Highlights: VA, Cheerleaders, and Guns

CHICAGO -- Wrapping up a full agenda, the AMA agrees cheerleading is a sport, doctors outside the VA need to pitch in to help care for veterans, and e-cigarettes need to be regulated.

AMA Agrees to Recharge Advocacy

CHICAGO -- The AMA will bolster their political advocacy efforts, recognize presurgical transgender birth certificates, and support insurance to cover young pregnant women and newborns, their House of Delegates voted here.

AMA Mulls Gun Violence CME

CHICAGO -- As the AMA's House of Delegates was meeting in a downtown hotel here, 29 local residents were shot and four killed within a 10-mile radius.

Give Me That Old Time AMA

After an absence of a few years, I find myself back in Chicago for the AMA's annual meeting and discover that not much has changed.

Lethal Injections, MOC, and E-Cigs on AMA Agenda

The American Medical Association is being asked to strengthen its ethical stance on physician participation in execution by extending its ban on doctors participating to include all health professionals.

CCSVI Practices Suboptimal but Patients Don't Mind

DALLAS -- Canadian multiple sclerosis patients who left the country to undergo the controversial procedure called chronic cerebrospinal venous insufficiency (CCSVI) often received poor pre- and postoperative care, but most were still relatively satisfied overall, a researcher reported here.

Real-Time Monitoring Cuts Cardiac Cath Radiation

LAS VEGAS -- A radiation detector that emits audible beeps might help interventional cardiologists and others in the cardiac catheterization laboratory reduce their exposure, researchers found.

Edible Dynamite, Cockney Rhyming Medical Slang: That's Improbable!

A weekly report from our friends at Improbable Research.

'This Page Left Intentionally Blank'

Blank pages in correspondence from insurance companies are just an emblem of the endless waste and inefficiencies built into our healthcare system, says internist Fred Pelzman.

War Wounds: Hearing Loss Tracks Gulf War Vets

Battlefield wounds are often both life-threatening and life-changing, but when hearing is the casualty, the wound is too often undiagnosed or untreated, but a new initiative is underway to change tackle the silent wounds of war.

Top 5 Reasons Why Internists Are Sued

Not properly diagnosing a condition and nonmedical errors such as equipment failure accounted for more than half of the malpractice lawsuits against internists, a study found.

How to Replace IV Nitroglycerin in the Shortage

What are the alternatives for IV nitroglycerin in the emergency setting as the shortage saps reserves? Several experts share their thoughts.

Culture Shock: Homeopathic Recall is No Joke

Did you hear about the homeopathic physician who was treating himself and one day forgot to take his pills?

Top 5 Reasons Cardiologists Get Sued

Problems with diagnosis -- failing to make one, making the wrong one, or taking too long to get to one -- lead the list of reasons behind cardiology-related lawsuits, revealed closed claims data from a medical malpractice insurer.

What You Need To Know About New .health Domains

Should doctors grab a shiny new .health domain?

ICD-10 Follies: Watch Where You're Walking

Yes, there's a code for that. To mark the forthcoming move to the ICD-10 coding system, 番茄社区 is spotlighting some of those thousands of new codes that might just be getting a bit too granular.

What's Your Favorite Doctor Joke?

When some patients groan, it's in laughter, not pain.

5 Ways Doctors Can Use Data Analytics

Data analytics takes claims data, a providers' electronic health record, and any of piece of information available to help physicians become more aware of the patients they're treating. Here are five ways the technology can help meet payers' demands for higher-quality, higher-value care.

ICD-10 Follies: Struck by an Orca

Yes, there's a code for that. To mark the forthcoming move to the ICD-10 coding system, 番茄社区 is spotlighting some of those thousands of new codes that might just be getting a bit too granular.

ICD-10 Follies: The Birds

Yes, there's a code for that. To mark the forthcoming move to the ICD-10 coding system, 番茄社区 is spotlighting some of those thousands of new codes that might just be getting a bit too granular.

Can You Get Paid For Prescribing Exercise?

How do doctors get reimbursed when they prescribe exercise? We asked Jordan Metzl, MD, author of the new book, "Exercise Cure."

5 Problems With Mobile Health App Security

No federal agency has the power to properly regulate the fast-growing world of mobile health applications and telehealth systems, researchers noted while outlining several security risks and privacy threats.

A Brain-Dead Mother, a Million-Dollar Baby

The costs associated with maintaining a pregnant, brain-dead, Texas woman on life support until her fetus is viable are likely to approach $1 million, and long-term costs could easily top $1.5 million.

10 Questions: Rep. Phil Gingrey, MD (R-Ga.)

If you could change one thing about the healthcare system, what would it be? Eliminate Obamacare, says Rep. Phil Gingrey, MD (R-Ga.). That's his answer to just one of the 10 Questions the 番茄社区 staff is asking leading clinicians, researchers, and leaders in their community to get their personal views on their chosen profession. In this series we share their uncensored responses.

'Out of Network': More Money but Some Problems

Whether they plan to or not, a growing number of physicians no longer have contracts with some of the nation's largest health insurance carriers, but being "out of network" has both benefits and drawbacks.

What Bystanders Should Know About CPR -- and Why

Bystander-initiated cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) has poor neurological outcome, and this is true even when bystanders are family members, which suggests deficits in public CPR training.

FDA: Nipple Test No Substitute for Mammogram

A nipple aspirate test shouldn't take the place of mammography or otherwise be used on its own to screen for breast disease, the FDA warned.

10 Questions: John P. Erwin, MD

What's the biggest barrier to practicing medicine today? That's just the first of 10 questions the 番茄社区 staff is asking leading clinicians and researchers to get their personal views on their chosen profession. In this series we share their uncensored responses. Here, answers from John P. Erwin, MD, of Scott & White Healthcare in Temple, Texas.

Debate: Who Should Prescribe CPAP?

Should primary care physicians and other nonspecialists be able to prescribe sleep apnea treatment after home testing? Experts debated that issue this month in Chest.

Use of Expired Auto-Injectors OK'd by FDA

WASHINGTON -- The FDA cautioned emergency medical staff to retain recently expired auto-injectors by Meridian Medical Technologies and to use them in emergencies if no other product is available.

Fast-Acting AMA Group Hopes to Fix SGR

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. -- A large coalition of American Medical Association members met in seclusion Sunday morning here at the interim meeting of the House of Delegates and rapidly found consensus on a proposed resolution for the repeal of Medicare's sustainable growth rate (SGR) formula.

Rape Laws Offer Little Protection

BOSTON -- The world over, laws to protect rape victims are paper tigers, often enacted but rarely enforced, a researcher said here.

Prime Time: Skin Docs Name 5 Unnecessary Procedures

The American Academy of Dermatology joined more than 80 other medical societies in the Choosing Wisely campaign, naming five treatments or procedures that may not be necessary. Prime Time is a blog by Chris Kaiser for those interested in primary care.

Combo Drug Qsymia Tops for Weight Loss

Overweight people who took the phentermine/topiramate combination diet drug Qsymia lost more weight than people taking a placebo or either drug alone in an industry-funded study.

Few Lupus, IBD Patients Getting HPV Vaccine

SAN DIEGO -- Despite being at greater risk of infection, few children and young adults with autoimmune diseases are being vaccinated against human papillomavirus, according to a study.

Morning Break: Addictive Oreos and Sperm-Slaying Bacon

Health news and commentary from around the Web, gathered by the 番茄社区 staff.

Striking a Nerve: MS Cured With an OTC Drug?

A neurology researcher is planning a clinical trial of a widely available drug that he thinks could stave off disability in multiple sclerosis patients. How much should he (or we) say publicly about it?

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