A New View Debates Antibiotics for Appendicitis
Here’s what Jane E. Brody, New York Times Personal Health columnist, had to say about surgeons who think appendicitis should be treated with an operation. “This is
View ArticleLipo Blunders, Yet a 4-Star Doc Rating
Here’s another reason to take online physician ratings with several grains of salt Below is a screenshot taken from the Healthgrades website on April 15, 2016 regarding
View ArticleCaribbean invasion: Medical school turf wars
Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported on an interesting situation occurring in New York City’s teaching hospitals. Old established US medical schools are upset because offshore
View ArticleThe Opioid Epidemic: What Was the Joint Commission’s Role?
Last month the Joint Commission issued a statement written by its Executive VP for Healthcare Quality Evaluation Dr. David W. Baker explaining why it was not to
View ArticlePatient Dies 90 Min After Live Broadcast Surgery
“In addition to his tumor, the patient had hepatitis and cirrhosis. Was he a good candidate? A major complication was inevitably to occur during a live broadcast.”
View ArticleMystery solved: Keep your white coats. And your sleeves.
My research staff recently came across a paper that directly addressed this problem. As they say on the Internet, “The results will make your jaw drop.” The
View ArticleDecisions made in Orlando: Is there any law more misunderstood than HIPAA?
On the morning of the tragic mass shooting in Orlando, a tweet by CNN stated, “The White House waived HIPAA regulations so that hospitals could talk with
View ArticleOverestimating the effect of medical errors can be detrimental
An issue with inflated numbers like 251,000 and 440,000 is that they are repeated by naïve journalists… A musician’s cancer diagnosis could have been made 4 years
View ArticleShould Doctors and Nurses Wear Scrubs in Public?
Being “old school,” I don’t like to see people wearing scrubs outside of the hospital. But there is no evidence that bacteria on scrubs spread disease, and
View ArticleCan you trust online physician ratings?
Many people believe you can. But here’s what a recent article in the Harvard Business Review (HBR) about the reliability of online user ratings regarding buying a
View ArticleShocker: Hospitalists’“Unprofessional” Behavior is Normal
By their own admission, medical hospitalists are guilty of many types of unprofessional behavior, says a paper published a in the Journal of Hospital Medicine. A group
View ArticleGas Mix-Up Causes Newborn Death
In mid-July, a baby born by cesarean section died about one hour later due to the administration of nitrous oxide instead of oxygen in the hospital’s neonatal
View ArticleMisinterpretation of Medical Error Deaths from BMJ Paper Continues
About 6 weeks ago, I wrote a post called “Overestimating the effect of medical errors can be detrimental.” I cited a few examples of blind acceptance of
View ArticleWhy can’t more doctors apologize for mistakes?
“The unintended consequences of these seemingly well-intentioned laws are doctors who can’t apologize for harming their patients even if they want to…” A recent JAMA article about
View ArticleIs burnout inevitable during medical training?
An emergency medicine resident blogging on KevinMD, thinks so. Here’s why. He started with the competition for grades in college and the process of applying to medical
View ArticleParking lot needlestick yields $4.6 million payout
A jury awarded a woman $4,618,500 for a needlestick injury she sustained in the parking lot of Target. Skeptical Scalpel shares his opinions. A South Carolina jury
View ArticleUnmatched Graduate: “Med Schools to Blame”
The following was submitted as a series of comments on my Physician’s Weekly post about Missouri’s new law allowing medical school graduates who did not match into
View ArticleA tube misconnection and a death: a medical whodunit
Here’s what we know. In September 2016, a 72-year-old former member of the Australian national soccer team suffered what must have been an extremely painful death when
View ArticleWrong Body Cremated: ID’ing Patients By More Than a Name
The wrong body was cremated by the county coroner’s office in Los Angeles. Jorge Hernandez died of an overdose, and the body of another Jorge Hernandez, an
View ArticleShould patients bail out when their doctor is burned out?
Google “physician burnout epidemic,” and you will find quite a few articles and blog posts on the subject. By all accounts, physician burnout is getting worse. Causes
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