High Quality, Low Cost HealthCare Video Interview Series: Dr. Joseph Valenti Talks About The Physicians Foundation

May 18, 2013

By Joan Justice

First Posted at HealthWorks Collective on 5/14/2013

Joan Justice, Moderator, HealthWorks Collective

Joan Justice, Moderator, HealthWorks Collective

Last week we heard Ivana Schnur tell us about Sense.ly and the remote assessment hub that diagnoses and treats and helps those with post-discharge activities.  This week, Dr. Joseph Valenti, a practising physician in Texas, talks about The Physicians Foundation, an non-for-profit organization founded in 2003 to support healthcare improvements in the delivery of patient care, provide physicians with a support system, promote physician leadership and education, and further improve physician practices.  The Physicians Foundation sponsors grants, white papers and research in order for decision-makers to have the information they need to improve the healthcare system.

The Physicians Foundation has released a new white paper that suggests “redesigns” of the US healthcare system based on four core principles: [click to continue…]

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Why it is called the Affordable Care Act?

May 18, 2013

By Paul Levy

First Posted at Not Running a Hospital on 5/18/2013

Paul Levy, Host of (Not) Running a Hospital

Paul Levy, Host of (Not) Running a Hospital

Sometimes when something is right in front of you, you don’t see it.

A friend who serves on a Boston hospital board writes:

Great cover story in the New York Times today on how the new private owners of Bayonne Hospital made it for-profit and canceled their insurance contracts.  By becoming out-of-network they were able to jack up their prices and make a lot of money. Talk about gaming the system!

The writers of the story, “New Jersey Hospital has the Highest Billing Rates in the Country,” missed the major point. My friend did, too, but less so.

This is not about the relative prices in the hospital’s chargemaster, nor is it about gaming the system.  It is the system.

The name of the game is to have sufficient market power in a geographic area that you can demand higher than market prices from the insurance companies. [click to continue…]

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Population Health Must Include Social Determinants: The Approach in the Patient Centered Medical Home

May 17, 2013

By Dr. Jaan Sidorov First Posted at Disease Management Care Blog on 5/16/2013 The Disease Management Care Blog’s primary care colleagues are undoubtedly aware of how “social determinants” can undermine the best care planning. So, if you’re going to rely on the Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) to increase health care quality and reduce costs, [...]

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The physician-consumer health IT chasm: most doctors lagging in online patient support tools

May 17, 2013

By Jane Sarasohn-Kahn First Posted at Health Populi on 5/16/2013 In the long-run, health information technology (HIT) will improve the quality of health care, according to 73% of U.S. physicians. However, about the same number (7 in 10 physicians) believe that the ROI on health IT is inflated and that implementing EHRs will cost more, [...]

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Angelina Jolie, BRCA1, Public Health and Patent Law

May 17, 2013

By David Harlow First Posted at HealthBlawg on 5/16/2013 Going public with her story of a prophylactic double mastectomy after testing positive for BRCA1 (a gene linked to breast cancer) via an op-ed piece in the New York Times, Angelina Jolie is clearly trying to get the message out that radical choices must sometimes be made [...]

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Finding the BAT to Combat the FAT

May 17, 2013

by Kevin Fickenscher First posted on The Fickenscher Files on 5/17/2013 New research from The Joslin Clinic suggests a new alternative for fighting the obesity epidemic…I’ve been very open over the years that I had an obesity problem.  Up until I had bariatric surgery (i.e. duodenal switch, which is both a constrictive and malabsorptive type of bariatric procedure) [...]

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Telemedicine’s Achilles’ Heel – The Telephone

May 17, 2013

By Dan Munro First Posted at Forbes on 5/6/2013 We’ll get to the antique telephone in a minute – but first a little background. Last week, the results of Oregon’s Health Insurance Experiment were published in the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine (here). Not surprisingly, the summary conclusion was quickly heralded by some who are clearly anxious [...]

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Low Sodium Diets Prevent Heart Disease? Not So Fast

May 17, 2013

By Thomas Emerick First Posted at Cracking Health Costs on 5/16/2013 U.S. dietary guidelines have historically suggested a low sodium diet as a way to help prevent heart disease. A new article in the WSJ calls that notion into question. Jennifer Corbett Dooren is the author. She writes, “The Institute of Medicine, in a report released [...]

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Big Blue pushes accessibility, with help from others

May 16, 2013

By Paul Levy First Posted at Not Running a Hospital on 5/14/2013 Back in the late 1970s, when I was Director of the Arkansas Department of Energy, the state disabilities commission ran an awareness event in which corporate and governmental leaders were given a disability for the day and were expected to try to carry [...]

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Breast cancer and the Angelina Jolie effect

May 16, 2013

By Dr. Kenny Lin First Posted at Common Sense Family Doctor on 5/15/2013 There is nothing like a celebrity to call attention to a preventable disease, especially if that disease is cancer. In March 2000, then-Today Show host Katie Couric, whose husband Jay Monahan died of colorectal cancer in 1998, underwent a live colonoscopy to promote uptake [...]

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