The hospital where Donald Trump was rushed after an assassination attempt scores high on patient safety, but having that consistency nationwide should be a policy choice.

A webinar on artificial intelligence organized by NEJM AI presented a fascinating snapshot of ambivalence about the radica…

This began to feel like a turning point in the power of the patient voice in federal health policy related to patient safety, medical AI and patient empowerment.

The health policy issues that were largely invisible at the Republican and Democratic conventions taught a crucial lesson about politics.

ChatGPT’s question-answering choices remain somewhat of a black box. Magic 8 Ball is a black ball.. I asked both how to solve the healthcare crisis.

Artificial intelligence-aided diagnosis may seem futuristic, but a recent National Academy of Medicine workshop heard compelling examples of promise and perils right now.

Health services research, the basis of health reform, needs to focus on real-world impact and communicate its benefits says Aaron Carroll, the new president of AcademyHealth.

Cincinnati Children’s is a patient safety unicorn, a place where achieving zero patient harm is a genuine cornerstone of the corporate culture.

A new study highlights a pervasive government failure to prevent hospital mergers that give providers excess pricing power. Price transparency is unlikely to compensate.

Researchers examining how patients make medical decisions are turning up some unexpected results.

The Coalition for Health AI wants to be the “curator of best practices of AI in health,” but it’s unclear if that will involve enabling true patient empowerment.

When it comes to warning the public about potentially harmful health care, ChatGPT and Gemini clam up, even if the misdeeds were widely publicized..

Researchers applied game theory to find out whether incorporating patient-generated health data into the clinical work flow will boost or bring down providers’ profits.

The phrase “health care crisis” long ago evolved into an incantation, but even well-intentioned crisis-mongering can hurt the crucial task of facing political reality.

The effectiveness of the effort to reduce healthcare-associated infections is obscured as much as revealed in the latest data from the CDC.

AbbVie’s “patent thicket” strategy and aggressive drug pricing tactics have made it a prominent example of pharma finagling. But the company isn’t the only beneficiary.

It was an unexpected message: invest in Israeli health technology today in order to reap the benefits tomorrow of innovations spurred by the Israel-Gaza conflict.

A lawsuit spurred by a series of STAT stories accuses UnitedHealth of deploying an algorithm with a known high error rate, as investigative journalism flourishes.

It’s open enrollment season for Medicare, but star ratings for Medicare Advantage plans, meant to promote consumerism and value, can contain misleading information.

Grappling with what ChatGPT and generative AI will mean for health and medicine? The president of the National Academy of Medicine is both “excited” and “scared.”

The patient safety movement has succeeded in getting the president to consider their policy proposals, but if hospitals are hesitant, implementation will be difficulty

It’s hard to read the latest report on Medicare ACOs without feeling a tinge of sadness about what could ave been.

Hospital performance measures need to get beyond the failed report card format and present information in a way that resonates with the public.

Lives ruined by questionable artery clearing surgery and penis enlargement surgery both are connected to one controversial FDA rule.

“Every Man His Own Physician,” by Dr. John Theobald, bore an impressive subtitle: ” Being a complete collection of efficacious and approved remedies for every disease”

Medicare’s value-based payments to hospitals don’t reflect what its beneficiaries value most, which is clinical outcomes.

This study of the impact of “kangaroo mother care” on premature babies could save countless children’s lives.

The National Institute for Health Care Management annual awards aim to spotlight important research combined with great storytelling.

Ask ChatGPT about a surgeon or hospital’s care and it declines to give details. But Google’s Bard will even recommend a “consultation” with particular clinicians.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that the chatbot’s solo brilliance will need the right “supporting cast” – as Jordan famously referred to teammates – to achieve its transformational potential in medicine.

Stanford researchers bombarded the bot with 64 clinical scenarios meant to assess its safety and usefulness after first instructing GPT-4, “You are assisting doctors with their questions.”

It may be time for some men to wave farewell to “the finger.” And in other good news, new evidence supports therapy for localized prostate cancer that avoids the risks of incontinence and impotence that have long haunted more aggressive treatments.

Artificial intelligence is quietly giving patients the ability to find, create and act upon an unprecedented breadth and depth of authoritative information.

“The reality is that we have a disaggregated, fragmented system with a lack of organization around common, transparent, high-quality information.”

“The purpose of Datapalooza is getting beyond the hype to show what’s going to work in the real world, what’s the value to patient care.”

A recent JAMA article proposing a different way of measuring hospitals’ sepsis care contained for me a powerful “between the lines” message. “Could this have saved Brad from having parts of both arms and legs amputated?”

Deere’s “smart machines” incorporate computer vision, soil moisture sensing, GPS with precise signal correction, machine learning and cloud computing…In health care terms, that adds up to personalized, evidence-based farming.

The Department of Health and Human Services is launching an Action Alliance to Advance Patient Safety that aims to recruit the nation’s largest health systems as participants.

Though I’d never myself experienced a medical error, I became an activist. Recently, however, a relative was a victim, and the frustrating persistence of error became personally painful. [So I examined] more closely what the profession euphemistically …

Digital health firms are increasingly betting that the key to success is offering “one to many” technologies that addresses workforce shortages by expanding the reach of clinicians.

Large numbers of Americans awaiting life-saving organ transplants are dying because many transplant centers don’t do surgery on the weekend. The overall rejection rate for available kidneys could be slashed…by measures such as ensuring centers perfor…

Wen is a public health expert and emergency room (ER) physician who’s become widely known during the Covid pandemic for her regular appearances on CNN, in major newspapers and testifying before Congress.

The recent burst of coronavirus infections could accelerate three significant innovations affecting every Covid-19 survivor.

Surprisingly, the Covid crisis may not be enough to boost hand hygiene compliance at hospitals. What’s urgently needed is leadership that embraces effective tactics and technology.

While political conflict grabs headlines, bipartisan harmony reigned at a recent D.C. health policy. Three slightly cynical secrets plus a carefully crafted agenda, explain why.

While political conflict grabs headlines, bipartisan harmony reigned at a recent D.C. health policy. Three slightly cynical secrets plus a carefully crafted agenda, explain why.

When it comes to choosing a health insurance plan, critical information that could literally spell the difference between life and death is conspicuously absent. Powerful national employer groups demanding transparency could change that.

Speakers repeatedly pointed to portions of the digital health superhighway that sorely need more concrete – in this case, concrete knowledge.

Call it the “delay death discount.” Engage with the Hancock’s diabetes wellness program on a continuing basis, and the insurer will cut your life insurance premium by up to 25 percent.

Can combining tech start-up “rah-rah,” health policy “blah-blah” and the “meh” of academic research accelerate the uptake of digital health innovation? To get better digital health interventions to market faster, we need a Partnership for Innovators, Policymakers and Evidence-generators (PIPE).

In September, 2008, the campaign asked me to serve as a surrogate in a debate with John McCain’s health care adviser when one of Obama’s close advisers – as opposed to me, who’d met the candidate once at a campaign event – couldn’t make it.

Though a record $8.1 billion poured into digital health firms in 2018, the marketplace is far from welcoming to every new entrant. A parade of entrepreneurs, investors and health tech purchasers at a recent MedCity INVEST conference described the reali…

The largest health data steward “on the planet,” the Department of Health and Human Services, plans to make its data releases actionable for entrepreneurs and patients. The clinical and economic impact of this connected health information could be enor…

A little-unnoticed Trump administration regulation offers quiet evidence that bipartisan civility in government is possible. Despite involving Obamacare, millions of Medicare beneficiaries and $100 billion in federal spending, ideological fireworks wer…

The recent Connected Health Conference featured an eclectic mix of corporations claiming cutting-edge expertise in the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT). But to me personally, the most intriguing pivot towards the IoMT future was AT&T’s prominent positioning of a prosthetic foot.

Apple watching over your health could involve more than its new Series 4 watch. The latest iPhone can be used to analyze facial expressions, voice and other information for signs of depression or other mental health issues. Winning hearts and minds isn…

Abbott Ventures chief Evan Norton may have spent part of his youth on a farm, but there’s no manure in his manner when speaking of the medical device and diagnostics market landscape. The key, he says, is to avoid being blindsided by the transformational power of digital data. Others agree.

Trump appointees cheered by both GOPers and Dems. VCs warning about too much VC cash. Tech nerds modest about AI. At Health Datapalooza, the goals of better health care, better health and making lots of money led to surprising harmony

The Gospel of the Great Dealmaker created expectations that Donald Trump’s HHS would strongly support paying providers based on “value.” It didn’t. Now it’s up to Alex Azar to bring capitalism, where deal making demands performance, back to health care policy.

Your health plan is on a Ben Franklin blitz. They want to make you healthy and wise — and, as payment incentives change, themselves wealthy. So get ready for help in living a purpose-driven life…and getting enough sleep.

What I remember most was how quickly she won over a crowd that had good reason to be suspicious; how fluently she spoke…and, most of all, the standing ovation some 2,000 doctors and their spouses gave her….Let’s hope the hard lessons Hillary Clinton learned in the 1990s-era health reform debacle imprint themselves in her actions as well as in her words.

If Lown wants to change the “culture” that prompts those [unnecessary CT] scan orders….I suggest finding some moms willing to publicly agree that not treating their child’s “intracranial bleeds and skull fractures” (as the research phrased it) was perfectly fine.

A quiet effort has been going on for years to persuade hospitals they can make more money preventing patient harm than by allowing it to occur. When the government announced last week that a patient safety partnership with hospitals had saved 87,000 li…

The crucial advice from two of the savviest digerati doctors in Silicon Valley can be summed up this way: disrupt medicine without disrupting the lives of those who practice it.

Health Datapalooza is dedicated to transforming American medicine. But despite talk of “data liberation” and “health data hippies,” the success of the open data movement is a direct result of a synergistic relationship between government and capitalism…

Health Datapalooza is dedicated to transforming American medicine. But despite talk of “data liberation” and “health data hippies,” the success of the open data movement is a direct result of a synergistic relationship between government and capitalism…

“Better compliance” and “better patient decisions” can certainly co-exist in health IT, but there’s also an implicit tension: What happens if the shared decision making bucks what the doctor thinks best?

“Better compliance” and “better patient decisions” can certainly co-exist in health IT, but there’s also an implicit tension: What happens if the shared decision making bucks what the doctor thinks best?

The makers of missiles and of farm products, of attack planes and baby strollers all want a part of the health IT action. Profits, not a prophet, as motivation — but maybe “world peace,” anyway.

The makers of missiles and of farm products, of attack planes and baby strollers all want a part of the health IT action. Profits, not a prophet, as motivation — but maybe “world peace,” anyway.

Dr. Charles Denham, a physician-turned-entrepreneur-and-activist, has agreed to pay $1 million to settle government charges of taking a $12 million kickback to influence a national patient safety standard in favor of one company’s product. Though the l…

Dr. Charles Denham, a physician-turned-entrepreneur-and-activist, has agreed to pay $1 million to settle government charges of taking a $12 million kickback to influence a national patient safety standard in favor of one company’s product. Though the l…

The deal to produce clinical summaries under the Mayo Clinic name for Google searches symbolizes the medical priesthood’s acceptance that information technology has reshaped the doctor-patient relationship. More disruptions are already on the way.

The deal to produce clinical summaries under the Mayo Clinic name for Google searches symbolizes the medical priesthood’s acceptance that information technology has reshaped the doctor-patient relationship. More disruptions are already on the way.

After 15 years of asking consumers around the world about who they trust and why, Edelman CEO Richard Edelman offers advice on boosting trust and why it helps earnings and innovation.

After 15 years of asking consumers around the world about who they trust and why, Edelman CEO Richard Edelman offers advice on boosting trust and why it helps earnings and innovation.

The biotech industry cheered President Obama’s proposed $215 million Precision Medicine Initiative, but the varying results and genetic basis of three DNA-based tests to predict breast cancer recurrence show the gap remaining between branding and real …

The biotech industry cheered President Obama’s proposed $215 million Precision Medicine Initiative, but the varying results and genetic basis of three DNA-based tests to predict breast cancer recurrence show the gap remaining between branding and real …

Joe Kiani, the Iranian-born entrepreneur who built Masimo Corp., is behind a Patient Safety Movement that hopes to use the clout and charisma model of the Clinton Foundation to eliminate preventable medical errors by the year 2020.

Joe Kiani, the Iranian-born entrepreneur who built Masimo Corp., is behind a Patient Safety Movement that hopes to use the clout and charisma model of the Clinton Foundation to eliminate preventable medical errors by the year 2020.

Hospitals have zealously followed the rules that protect doctors and others from being infected by patients with the HIV virus. But many are much more lax about protecting patients from a hospital-caused infection called CLABSI that is deadlier than ma…

Hospitals have zealously followed the rules that protect doctors and others from being infected by patients with the HIV virus. But many are much more lax about protecting patients from a hospital-caused infection called CLABSI that is deadlier than ma…

What this ruling really gives Obama the opportunity to do is rediscover the benefits of politics, democracy and leading the American people.

Buried in a footnote to the recently unveiled GOP alternative to Obamacare is the admission that Republicans are not going to try to repeal the parts of the law related to Medicare reform. Oddly, neither press nor pundits seem to have bothered to ask w…

Did laxity by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in eliminating an often deadly infection caused by hospitals leave the way open for infection control lapses that hinder the Ebola fight?

Did laxity by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in eliminating an often deadly infection caused by hospitals leave the way open for infection control lapses that hinder the Ebola fight?

Like everyone else, I’ve cheerfully hummed, whistled and sung along to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer for as long as I can remember. But when I listened carefully to the lyrics this holiday season, I realized I’d missed the underlying message of a song that teaches invaluable lessons about the challenge […]

Hard-right Republicans said they shut down the government to stop Obamacare and “restore patient-centered healthcare in America.” Huh? “Patient-centered healthcare.” Really? The ACA can be accused of many failures, but it’s the most patient-centered law ever.

Image via Wikipedia While Texas Governor Rick Perry rails against the evils of  federal involvement in health care on the GOP presidential campaign trail, businesses back home are busy raking in record profits from government dollars. “By largely exiting the employer market and focusing on Medicare and Medicaid, Texas HMOs have enjoyed […]

A patient in an intensive care unit (Photo credit: Wikipedia) The Leapfrog Group has just released its latest report grading the safety of hundreds of individual hospitals, but the real news isn’t the “incremental progress.” It’s how a group started by some of the most powerful corporations in America has quietly […]

In modern terms, Downton Abbey seems to offer long-time employees comprehensive and generous health and disability coverage. But how does it compare to Obamacare?

Andy Rooney died of complications from “minor surgery.” What do you think he’d have to say about that?

The phrase “clinical nuance” conjures images of a surgeon who spends his spare time restoring antique Swiss watches, but it’s a term some Obamacare haters and lovers alike are uniting around as a desired change to the traditional Medicare benefit. The less-sexy description is “value-based insurance design.”

The phrase “clinical nuance” conjures images of a surgeon who spends his spare time restoring antique Swiss watches, but it’s a term some Obamacare haters and lovers alike are uniting around as a desired change to the traditional Medicare benefit. The less-sexy description is “value-based insurance design.”

Dr. Charles Denham rattles off names like the Clinton Global Health Initiative, the Discovery Channel, the Mayo Clinic and Harvard Medical School when discussing those he’s worked with. Now, the Justice Department has named him as taking a nearly $12 m…

It’s paternity test time for Obamacare. Beneath the bogeyman label that the GOP leadership has attached to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the truth is that health reform has almost as many Republican as Democratic fathers. If you care about the country as much as political hand-to-hand combat, that […]

When Homer Warner first started using computers in a hospital, the computers were analog and the house call was state-of-the-art. Warner, who died recently at age 90, did more than anyone else to translate research into innovations that continue to hav…

After sitting through a 90-minute webinar by a Washington law firm on Medicare’s new draft regulations for Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), I realized why they sounded familiar. In their complexity and utter failure to accomplish their purpose – give doctors and hospitals a clear financial incentive to reorganize care delivery […]

When my mother died back in 1993, the best way to alert the community was to get the local newspaper to run a news item people would see when they scanned the morning headlines. Unfortunately, our hometown paper was The Washington Post. The Post obitua…

Dr. Charles Denham rattles off names like the Clinton Global Health Initiative, the Discovery Channel, the Mayo Clinic and Harvard Medical School when discussing those he’s worked with. Now, the Justice Department has named him as taking a nearly $12 m…

Buried in a footnote to the recently unveiled GOP alternative to Obamacare is the admission that Republicans are not going to try to repeal the parts of the law related to Medicare reform. Oddly, neither press nor pundits seem to have bothered to ask w…

OK, maybe I misread the cover of the dog-eared copy of Glamour perched in a magazine rack at the gym. Perhaps I was confused by the multi-colored headlines promising an improved physical appearance (“101 One Minute Makeover Tricks”), a more organized daily routine (“12 Ways to Get Your Sh*T Together”) […]

Ceremony of receiving berets. IDF Nahal brigad…
Image via Wikipedia

When an Israeli Army officer says, “Follow me!”, the soldiers under his command may be confused whether he means Facebook or a firefight.

In the near-decade since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the “War on Terror” has cost the United States about $1.3 trillion, according to the National Center on Defense Information. By comparison, it took just six months for the U.S. to spend that…

Hard-right Republicans said they shut down the government to stop Obamacare and “restore patient-centered healthcare in America.” Huh? “Patient-centered healthcare.” Really? The ACA can be accused of many failures, but it’s the most patient-centered law ever.

If you want to see the future of health information technology, take a look at the dueling visions of two Thomas Watsons that are on display this month in a game show and a trade show. The  juxtaposition unintentionally demonstrates what doctors and patients will be doing together and also separately .

If you wanted to know what doctors thought about money and medical practice you’d read American Medical News. That’s the American Medical Association newspaper where you could read about plumber envy, protesters burning their AMA membership card and, today, what sounds suspiciously like an ode to Obamacare.

If you wanted to know what doctors thought about money and medical practice you’d read American Medical News. That’s the American Medical Association newspaper where you could read about plumber envy, protesters burning their AMA membership card and, today, what sounds suspiciously like an ode to Obamacare.

A patient in an intensive care unit (Photo credit: Wikipedia) The Leapfrog Group has just released its latest report grading the safety of hundreds of individual hospitals, but the real news isn’t the “incremental progress.” It’s how a group started by some of the most powerful corporations in America has quietly […]

Money and power are embracing the patient engagement movement because of the bottom-line connection to better outcomes in chronic disease and higher payments to providers meeting new government benchmarks.

Money and power are embracing the patient engagement movement because of the bottom-line connection to better outcomes in chronic disease and higher payments to providers meeting new government benchmarks.

In modern terms, Downton Abbey seems to offer long-time employees comprehensive and generous health and disability coverage. But how does it compare to Obamacare?

When Homer Warner first started using computers in a hospital, the computers were analog and the house call was state-of-the-art. Warner, who died recently at age 90, did more than anyone else to translate research into innovations that continue to hav…

Forget finances and the fiscal cliff: raising the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 67 is likely to kill some of those left behind ­– even if they already have private insurance. And cutting provider reimbursement too deeply? Ditto. Most of the criticism of a proposed two-year age hike has focused […]

Forget finances and the fiscal cliff: raising the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 67 is likely to kill some of those left behind – even if they already have private insurance. And cutting provider reimbursement too deeply? Ditto. Most of the criticism of a proposed two-year age hike has focused […]

The flap greeting Mitt Romney’s cheerful admission that as president he’d defund Big Bird’s nesting place on public television could turn out to be good news for a federal agency promoting safe medical care that faces a similar extinction threat. But we won’t know till after the election whether the […]

The flap greeting Mitt Romney’s cheerful admission that as president he’d defund Big Bird’s nesting place on public television could turn out to be good news for a federal agency promoting safe medical care that faces a similar extinction threat. But we won’t know till after the election whether the […]

What this ruling really gives Obama the opportunity to do is rediscover the benefits of politics, democracy and leading the American people.

If conservatives on the Supreme Court overturn the ACA, they should do it with the “all deliberate speed” they applied to segregation (another federal vs. states rights conflict). That should let health reform continue until at least the mid-century

If conservatives on the Supreme Court overturn the ACA, they should do it with the “all deliberate speed” they applied to segregation (another federal vs. states rights conflict). That should let health reform continue until at least the mid-century

Hospital execs are walking a tightrope over a cost-quality chasm to bring their organizations safely from a world of pay-for-volume to pay-for-value health care.

Hospital execs are walking a tightrope over a cost-quality chasm to bring their organizations safely from a world of pay-for-volume to pay-for-value health care.

When my mother died back in 1993, the best way to alert the community was to get the local newspaper to run a news item people would see when they scanned the morning headlines. Unfortunately, our hometown paper was The Washington Post. The Post obitua…

The protest organized by Regina Holliday over a patient’s right to access their medical information has intriguing similarities to the crusade Rosa Parks launched against segregated buses back in the 1950s. Both involve a refusal to accept second-class status and a resolve to push back against entrenched institutions.

The protest organized by Regina Holliday over a patient’s right to access their medical information has intriguing similarities to the crusade Rosa Parks launched against segregated buses back in the 1950s. Both involve a refusal to accept second-class status and a resolve to push back against entrenched institutions.

What the partisan obloquy about “Obamacare” too often obscures is that the ACA transforms utterly non-political and critical aspects of care, like patient-centeredness.

What the partisan obloquy about “Obamacare” too often obscures is that the ACA transforms utterly non-political and critical aspects of care, like patient-centeredness.

Putting aside the spiritual benefits of supplication, can strong prayer bend the medical cost curve? Here’s how you would try to find out.

Putting aside the spiritual benefits of supplication, can strong prayer bend the medical cost curve? Here’s how you would try to find out.

You can’t get much cooler than HealthTap: slick Silicon Valley start-up, social media darling, savvy and successful backers. But when you closely examine the service HealthTap actually provides, the money and good looks fall away. Like in the fable about “the emperor’s new clothes,” behind the buzz, there’s nothing there. OK, […]

You can’t get much cooler than HealthTap: slick Silicon Valley start-up, social media darling, savvy and successful backers. But when you closely examine the service HealthTap actually provides, the money and good looks fall away. Like in the fable about “the emperor’s new clothes,” behind the buzz, there’s nothing there. OK, […]

Is the New York Giants bathroom more sanitary than your hospital room? Could be. And that player cleanliness may even have helped send the team to the Super Bowl. Freakonomics co-author and self-confessed germophobe Stephen Dubner, working on a Footbal…

Is the New York Giants bathroom more sanitary than your hospital room? Could be. And that player cleanliness may even have helped send the team to the Super Bowl. Freakonomics co-author and self-confessed germophobe Stephen Dubner, working on a Footbal…

OK, maybe I misread the cover of the dog-eared copy of Glamour perched in a magazine rack at the gym. Perhaps I was confused by the multi-colored headlines promising an improved physical appearance (“101 One Minute Makeover Tricks”), a more organized daily routine (“12 Ways to Get Your Sh*T Together”) […]

Like everyone else, I’ve cheerfully hummed, whistled and sung along to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer for as long as I can remember. But when I listened carefully to the lyrics this holiday season, I realized I’d missed the underlying message of a song that teaches invaluable lessons about the challenge […]

Image via Wikipedia While Texas Governor Rick Perry rails against the evils of federal involvement in health care on the GOP presidential campaign trail, businesses back home are busy raking in record profits from government dollars. “By largely exiti…

My wife was lying in the back of an ambulance, dazed and bloody, while I sat in the front, distraught and distracted. We had been bicycling in a quiet neighborhood in southern Maine when she hit the handbrakes too hard and catapulted over the handlebar…

My wife was lying in the back of an ambulance, dazed and bloody, while I sat in the front, distraught and distracted. We had been bicycling in a quiet neighborhood in southern Maine when she hit the handbrakes too hard and catapulted over the handlebar…

Andy Rooney died of complications from “minor surgery.” What do you think he’d have to say about that?

Spend some time with the Society for Medical Decision Making, and “shared decisions” starts to seem less a clinical ideal and more an offshoot of picking a monthly cell phone plan. The fine line between “motivating” and “manipulating” behavior (albeit sometimes unintentionally) starts to blur. At the group’s recent annual meeting […]

Spend some time with the Society for Medical Decision Making, and “shared decisions” starts to seem less a clinical ideal and more an offshoot of picking a monthly cell phone plan. The fine line between “motivating” and “manipulating” behavior (albeit sometimes unintentionally) starts to blur. At the group’s recent annual meeting […]

To get doctors and hospitals to participate in the Accountable Care Organization (ACO) experiment, the government has simplified the rules, sweetened the pot and pulled up a few more chairs

To get doctors and hospitals to participate in the Accountable Care Organization (ACO) experiment, the government has simplified the rules, sweetened the pot and pulled up a few more chairs

Ceremony of receiving berets. IDF Nahal brigad…
Image via Wikipedia

When an Israeli Army officer says, “Follow me!”, the soldiers under his command may be confused whether he means Facebook or a firefight.

It’s paternity test time for Obamacare. Beneath the bogeyman label that the GOP leadership has attached to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the truth is that health reform has almost as many Republican as Democratic fathers. If you care about the country as much as political hand-to-hand combat, that […]

In the near-decade since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, the “War on Terror” has cost the United States about $1.3 trillion, according to the National Center on Defense Information. By comparison, it took just six months for the U.S. to spend that…

After sitting through a 90-minute webinar by a Washington law firm on Medicare’s new draft regulations for Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), I realized why they sounded familiar. In their complexity and utter failure to accomplish their purpose – give doctors and hospitals a clear financial incentive to reorganize care delivery […]

Game Show Watson wants to be a doctor. Well, almost.

Physician Assistant Watson? Forget the sound of of a world champion Jeopardy star. Watson, can you say, “Yes, Doctor”?

The future of medicine lies somewhere between the mainframe and the telephone.

Maybe the uninsured could learn something from Egyptians and the Arab street. At a time when landmark health reform granting most of the uninsured access to medical care for the first time in their lives is being seriously threatened, protests by the u…

Maybe the uninsured could learn something from Egyptians and the Arab street. At a time when landmark health reform granting most of the uninsured access to medical care for the first time in their lives is being seriously threatened, protests by the u…

The launch of Medicare’s Physician Compare website at year-end should have been a watershed event in the long campaign for health care transparency and patient empowerment. Instead – and it pains me to write this – Physician Compare is a case study in how the interests of the average citizen can be shunted by indifferent government, lazy journalists and solipsistic special interests. That remains true despite all of those involved being Good People Trying To Do The Right Thing.