Thoughtful piece by David Leonhardt of the New York Times, “In Medicine, The Power of No.” Excerpts:
“Can we solve the entire problem of rising health costs by getting rid of needless care? Probably not. But the money involved is not trivial, and it’s the obvious place to start.
Learning to say no more often will be a three-step process, and if the new agencies created by the health act are run well, they can help with all three.
…
The first is learning more about when treatments work and when they don’t.
…
The second step — and maybe the most underappreciated one — is to give patients the available facts about treatments. Amazingly, this often does not happen.
…
The final step is the bluntest. It involves changing the economics of medicine, to reward better care rather than simply more care.”
Disclosure: Dr. Michael Barry, who is quoted in this article, is president of the Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making, which funds the HealthNewsReview.org project.
Opinions on other issues in news, journals, PR, advertising, marketing
We’ve written about the hype of liquid biopsies for years (see link in comment below). And now this…. https://www.statnews.com/2022/01/12/medicare-shouldnt-cover-liquid-biopsies-early-cancer-detection/
Case counts still matter. “(There) are stories that may not be told adequately if only hospitalizations and deaths are emphasized.” @garyschwitzer interviewed by @dbauder of @AP. https://apnews.com/article/omicron-changing-news-outlets-covid-data-da9272f7c4c8a109c3bfb56bed9e9c76
My friend Gary @garyschwitzer wrote to his city council representative in a Minnesota town about a Viva Las Vegas event scheduled for January.
The response he got seems to perfectly capture where we are now.
https://www.healthnewsreview.org/2021/12/2021-ends-with-covid-craziness-in-sports-and-politics/
Comments
Please note, comments are no longer published through this website. All previously made comments are still archived and available for viewing through select posts.
Richard Crane
April 12, 2010 at 6:28 pmWhat are we old people to do? The Primary Care Physicians are so overbooked and in short supply that when we do get an appt. the session is quick because the Dr. all of a sudden has to enter all his information into a computer that he is not used to using or getting old information out ie; tests and conditions. He listens to my heart, lungs, looks in my throat and reiterates the same thing I have heard him say in prior appts. I know have lost all faith in having and internal medicine doctor look at me. This is a lost art and no young person wants to go into internal medicine but they now are charging more than my cardiologist or other specialist.
Elaine Schattner, M.D.
April 14, 2010 at 7:37 amLeonardt’s excellent essay adds to the dialogue on how to control health care costs. Of note – the 3 excerpts above are all about learning and more effective (even “blunt,” if you will) communication in medicine.
Our Comments Policy
But before leaving a comment, please review these notes about our policy.
You are responsible for any comments you leave on this site.
This site is primarily a forum for discussion about the quality (or lack thereof) in journalism or other media messages (advertising, marketing, public relations, medical journals, etc.) It is not intended to be a forum for definitive discussions about medicine or science.
We will delete comments that include personal attacks, unfounded allegations, unverified claims, product pitches, profanity or any from anyone who does not list a full name and a functioning email address. We will also end any thread of repetitive comments. We don”t give medical advice so we won”t respond to questions asking for it.
We don”t have sufficient staffing to contact each commenter who left such a message. If you have a question about why your comment was edited or removed, you can email us at feedback@healthnewsreview.org.
There has been a recent burst of attention to troubles with many comments left on science and science news/communication websites. Read “Online science comments: trolls, trash and treasure.”
The authors of the Retraction Watch comments policy urge commenters:
We”re also concerned about anonymous comments. We ask that all commenters leave their full name and provide an actual email address in case we feel we need to contact them. We may delete any comment left by someone who does not leave their name and a legitimate email address.
And, as noted, product pitches of any sort – pushing treatments, tests, products, procedures, physicians, medical centers, books, websites – are likely to be deleted. We don”t accept advertising on this site and are not going to give it away free.
The ability to leave comments expires after a certain period of time. So you may find that you’re unable to leave a comment on an article that is more than a few months old.
You might also like