Tag Archive | health care reform
Building a New Marcus Welby To Cut Costs
Marcus Welby, M.D. was a popular TV drama that ran from 1969 to 1976. The titular character was a symbol of a traditional physician archetype that was already fading from reality — the cradle-to-grave general practitioner that took care of patients in the clinic, in the hospital and at their homes. In the very first […]
The Price Tag on a Patient-Centered Medical Home
Everyone in the health care world has one eye on Washington this week, as the Supreme Court is expected to finally hand down their ruling on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act. Commonly known as the “health care reform bill” or “Obamacare,” depending on your political leanings, the legislation contains both immediate changes (the […]
The Many Faces of Medical Professionalism
Every patient wants their doctor to be a professional. But the broader concept of “medical professionalism” is not a cut-and-dry matter, as it opens the door to debates over how physicians interact with politics and society, the regulation of doctors’ ethical and legal behavior, and the role of the physician in the new world of […]
Linkage 2/25: AAASing From Afar, NOVA Venom, Magnetic Turtles
I’ve said it before, but the AAAS Meeting is my favorite scientific conference, a cross-disciplinary feast of research that’s perfect for omnivores of science. As I wait for the meeting to return to Chicago (2014!), I spent the week attending from afar through the many online recaps. Depending on your preferences, you can get your […]
Public Health Epidemics Without Diseases
The leading cause of death for American black men between the ages of 15 and 34 isn’t cancer, AIDS, heart disease, or even accidents. It’s homicide, which accounted for more than half of the deaths of black 15 to 24-year-olds and more than a third of those aged 25 to 34. In Chicago, African-American males […]
Can You Sue Over Racial Disparities?
Racial health disparities in the United States have been repeatedly measured, demonstrated, and presented to the point where their existence is no longer in question. But still up for discussion is how to fix them, whether through sweeping legislation like this year’s federal health care reform, local efforts to improve health care access or social […]
A Community Cure for Oklahoma
In a time of worrying American health statistics, some states definitely have it worse than others. On many measures of health and health system performance, Oklahoma ranks near the bottom of the list – or in the case of fattest states, near the top. At his talk for the MacLean Center Seminar Series last month, […]
MacLean Conference Day 1: The Ethics of Health Care Reform
Anyone who dares make predictions about the future of the U.S. health care system in 2010 is standing on shaky ground. With the passing of the Patent Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA)- the legislative product of the health care reform debate – everyone knows that the rules are about to change in this country, […]
The Reality of Health Care Rationing
Tuesday’s midterm election results appeared to deliver a strong message of discontent to the young Obama administration. With Republicans gaining control of the House of Representatives and closing the gap in the Senate, many analysts saw the election as a rebuke of the Democratic agenda of the last two years. Perhaps the highest-profile of those […]
Linkage 11/5: Bacteria and the Fly’s Sex Life
As discussed previously on ScienceLife, the microbiome is the ecosystem of billions of bacterial organisms living inside our bodies, influencing us in as-yet-undetermined ways. Most efforts to study the microbiome thus far have focused on how gut bacteria affect digestion and disease, but a paper this week in PNAS reveals a surprising new power for […]
