Tag: doctors
News (68)
September 25, 2012 8:34 pm
A Shortage of Doctors (New York Times)
There is nothing “woeful” about the response of the country’s medical schools to the need for more doctors (“America’s Health Worker Mismatch,” by Kate Tulenko, Op-Ed, Sept. 14). Facing doctor shortages of more than 130,000 by 2025, medical schools have committed to admitting and educating 30 percent more students by 2015. With 12 new medical schools established since 2002 and six more in the accreditation pipeline, along with existing schools that are increasing their enrollments, schools are on track to meet the expansion goal by 2016.
September 12, 2012 8:07 pm
Study: Doctors With More Empathy Have Patients With Better Outcomes, Fewer Complications (WBUR)
It found that diabetics whose doctors were more empathic fared better clinically and had fewer medical complications. The study doesn’t get into the why of things. But it suggests that the unique bond between patients and their doctors goes far beyond prescriptions and blood pressure checks.
September 10, 2012 1:57 pm
When Patients — Not Doctors — Make Medical Mistakes (TIME)
For most patients in the real world, getting good medical care involves complicated decisions. It’s not as simple as what often gets shown on TV, where a patient goes in, the doctor figures out what’s wrong, and then he performs some lifesaving surgery. Most of modern medicine, especially for the elderly, is a lot messier — usually there’s not “right” answer, no perfect treatment.
September 5, 2012 7:51 pm
Docs, nurses may overestimate quality of their care (Chicago Tribune)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Doctors and nurses may overestimate the quality of the care they provide hospital patients in the hours leading up to a serious complication, according to a small new study. After reviewing the records of 47 patients, Dutch researchers found that for more than half there were delays in recognizing that the patients’ conditions were deteriorating in advance of a crisis, such as an unplanned admission to intensive care. Meanwhile nurses, doctors-in-training and specialists reported far fewer delays.
August 28, 2012 12:45 pm
Doctors Refuses To Treat 200-Pound Woman Because Of Her Weight (Business Insider)
In an interview with WCVB-TV, Dr. Carter explained, “After three consecutive injuries (with other patients) trying to care for people over 250 pounds, my office is unable to accommodate a certain weight and we put a limit on it.”
And Carter is completely within her professional rights to do so. Under Opinion 9.12 of the AMA Code of Medical Ethics, both physicians and patients are free to decline a relationship. “A physician may decline to undertake the care of a patient whose medical condition is not within the physician’s current competence,” the code says.
August 27, 2012 8:51 am
Prenatal genome sequencing expected to pose challenges to doctors (American Medical News)
“My instinct is this will be available certainly in the next decade, and probably sooner,” said Benjamin E. Berkman, MPH, deputy director of the Bioethics Core at the National Human Genome Research Institute in Bethesda, Md. But the medical community is not prepared to address the clinical challenges and ethical issues that probably will accompany the procedure, say some bioethicists and geneticists.
August 26, 2012 5:49 pm
Kidney for Ohio patient's transplant put in trash (USA Today)
TOLEDO, Ohio (AP) – A nurse accidentally disposed of a kidney from a living donor this month at an Ohio hospital, and doctors tried unsuccessfully for at least two hours to resuscitate the organ in what medical experts describe as a rare accident, health officials said. “Human error rendered the kidney unusable,” University of Toledo Medical Center spokesman Toby Klinger said Saturday, but he declined to give more details, citing the hospital’s investigation into what happened and its respect for the privacy of the patients involved.
August 22, 2012 5:08 pm
Doctor burnout: Nearly half of physicians report symptoms (USA Today)
Differences varied by specialty: Emergency medicine, general internal medicine, neurology and family medicine reported the highest rates. The authors note other studies show burnout can decrease the quality of care, lead to increased risk for errors and push doctors into early retirement, as well as cause problems in their personal lives. “There have been other studies done on doctor burnout, but we assumed it was the surgical specialties who would be at primary risk,” says Shanafelt. “Instead we found out it’s the physicians on the front line of care who are at the greatest risk.”
August 14, 2012 7:54 pm
Doctor sued for posting breast augmentation photos (Kansas City Star)
A St. Louis area doctor is facing lawsuits from 10 women claiming she put before-and-after pictures of their breast augmentation surgeries on her website. The suits in federal court in St. Louis accuse Michele Koo of Kirkwood of negligence for displaying pictures linked to the names of the women. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that in most cases, the images showed no faces and were authorized by patients who expected their names to remain confidential.
August 14, 2012 7:51 pm
Doctors Fail to Review Tests Before Hospital Discharge (Businessweek)
Doctors who order tests for hospital patients don’t always read the results before the patient is discharged, raising the risk of missing potentially dangerous conditions, an Australian study found. About half of the unread tests were ordered on the day the patient left the hospital, according to research today in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Many of those results still hadn’t been reviewed two months later, the researchers said.