The surgeon who blogs as the Skeptical Scalpel – and who is a frequent critic of the proliferation of robotic surgical systems – is at it again, this time posting “Robots attack America, but Canada not so much.” (Addendum on April 12: Don’t miss our later post on direct-to-consumer website promotion of robotic prostatectomy.) [...]
Bloomberg reports,”Prostate Cancer Therapy Too Good to Be True Explodes Health Cost.” It was Harvard health economist Amitabh Chandra who used the “death star” analogy in the story. He also said, “It’s a metaphor for all the problems we have in American medicine.” Further excerpts: Yet even though the machines are breathtakingly expensive, hospitals and [...]
A “research letter” in the Archives of Internal Medicine this week concludes: “To our knowledge, we show for the first time that the availability of a technology, in this instance a proton beam facility, in one’s HRR (hospital referral region*) is associated with a higher likelihood of receiving proton beam therapy compared with those living [...]
As far as I can tell, Marilynn Marchione of the AP is the only mainstream news media journalist to report that “A study of Medicare records found that men treated with proton beams later had one-third more bowel problems, such as bleeding and blockages, than similar men given conventional radiation.” She reports that results “were [...]
We should not overlook the Journal of Clinical Oncology editorial (opens as pdf file) that accompanied the robotic prostatectomy side effects paper about which we’ve already blogged. That editorial – by 3 authors from the University of California San Francisco cancer center – reminds readers that the costs of robotic prostatectomy (on average, they say, [...]
This story focuses on a family that may have a rare genetic mutation that increases their risk of heart disease. Unfortunately, the “rare” part wasn’t mentioned until 1,600 words into this 2,100 word story.
While this story adequately addressed 7 of our 10 criteria, the 3 on which it missed were significant omissions, yet could have been easily addressed.
Solid medical conference reporting, with many expert interviews and good context provided. Goes far beyond the conference presentation itself.
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