Is Health Care a Right?

  This edition of Health Train will be an aggregation of videos on American Health Care Reform. The sources are many, the opinions diverse. Learn more about it because it may happen to you unless changes are brought about in the coming 2012 election.  Alita Eck MD Town Hall Meeting Q&A Part II Town Hall Meeting Q&A Part I Phil Gingrey (R-Ga) Yaron Brook PhD.  The Immorality of Government Health Care is Not a Right   Leonard Peikof img alt="" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('0e09613d-162a-41d3-a230-4a89d6b1df3f'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "";" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-MD7t9euJZwY/TeGdJN4d0fI/AAAAAAAACi0/O9ck5t-GKOM/video25fe9baf5501%25255B33%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800"...

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What every Patient and Doctor Needs to Watch and Read

  The Doctor's Story: How Obamacare is hurting the patient-physician relationship Your life is at risk ! A frightening perspective, no physicians at the table, but it is what it is. If you don’t want to watch the whole video or don’t have time (and what MD has time?) You may read their testimonies below: 1.Jane Orient MD        2, Richard Amerling MD Jane Orient MD is a former VA Physician, now in private practice. She compares VA medicine with it’s bureaucracy and comparing the efficiency private practice. Richard Amerling MD is a practicing hospital physician. His commentaries are personal opinion and do not represent the hospital. Your New Health Care System A system designed to fail. When will common sense guide our leaders? In the video above,...

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Specialist-o-Phobia

         Have you noticed the recent trend against specialty physicians? Now I am not against primary care, and since the ‘policy-wonks’ and those who know more about medicine than I do,  have determined that primary  care needs incentives to attract medical students away from those ‘highly lucrative’ specialties such as plastic surgery, orthopedic surgery, interventional cardiology, and neurosurgery and others for a choice of primary care. Our federal government believes in equal opportunity, except in medicine, and even more so if you wish to become a family doctor.There are incentives sponsored by cities, states, Indian reservations, public health service, and more if one wants to become a family...

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Why Health Reform and Medicare Reform is so Difficult

  Here’s a classic intercourse and debate between Republicans and Democrats…Watch The video: Do reasonable men disagree reasonably? Or is that hype for the media and the public? del.icio.us Tags: video,republicans,democrats,medicare reform...

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10 Dumb Things To Do At The Doc’s Office.

    Plagiarized from CNN News These tips and instructions for patients should be printed on a placque in several places in every medical office, clinic and hospital.. From interviews with a gynecologist, a cardiologist, a rehabilitative medicine specialist, a fertility doctor and an internist, here are the Top 10 things patients do to mess up their own care. 1. You talk on your cell phone. (my favorite bugaboo..just plain bad manners) This is your health we're talking about. Other calls can wait. Turn the (f**king) thing off. 2. You lie. "I need to treat you the best way I can, so if you're gay, tell me. If you drink a bottle of tequila every night, I need to know. If you're having an affair and not using condoms, let me know,"...

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USB & Your Health

  This afternoon I was at my local Drugstore in line waiting for my prescription medication.  I regularly scan the shelves to see how technology is impacting the retail pharmacy business. There are the usual blood pressure monitors, glucometers, pregnancy tests,  STD tests, HIV tests, etc. Even with all the hype about PHR, there has been a paucity and near absence of products which are supposed to make home health monitoring accessible to the patient’s physician. Today I saw a glimmer of hope. My eye caught “USB” on a package, and no I was not in the electronics department.  Closer investigation revealed the Bayer’s CONTOUR USB meter. It looks quite like a standard USB flash device. Closer inspection reveals a few important...

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The Reform Is Not the Change

According to Joseph Flower who writes in The Health Care Blog this weekend, Health Reform is not the Change, but rather The Catalyst, and according to him, “The enabler, and an accelerator of the change we are going through. It is not the change itself, and is not even the cause of it, because the change is driven by much larger economic and demographic factors, especially by the crushing cost of healthcare. If the reform law were to go away, the change would not go away.” I agree with Joe. Many readers ask me if I am for or against health reform. My short answer is ‘yes’, to both.  Anyone who is vested in the present system, i.e., physicians, hospitals, health plans, pharma, payers, etc. exist with a certain level of ‘tension’ with their...

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A Story of Drug Addiction, Sadness and Love

Although the original version of this song by Mylene Farmer earned better critical acclaim, this version by “Moby” fits the Health Train Express for  physicians and families dealing with fatal illnesses and drug addiction will find these videos  breathtaking. I hope you will all enjoy this musical interlude:: “Blue Noir” img alt="" galleryimg="no" onload="var downlevelDiv = document.getElementById('6cb39bec-55ff-4aaa-813a-7a8e9c1b6ceb'); downlevelDiv.innerHTML = "";" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/_nNqaciL43D0/TdiFOxKsE7I/AAAAAAAACiU/llLEsfmYM7A/video5825c0e36d4f%5B22%5D.jpg?imgmax=800" style="border-style: none">Moby Version I also cannot help but include Mylene Farmer’s version of, ‘Blue Noir” img alt="" galleryimg="no" onload="var...

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A Thank you to SERMO

SERMO is a physician only  professional social network. It has been existence for about five years. Started by visionary Dan Palestrant MD, SERMO had a  brief romance with the AMA, however SERMO and the AMA parted ways, disagreeing agreeably that their missions were mutually incompatible. SERMO continues steady growth and has a loyal following. The business model is simple and quite stable. It is explained transparently on the web site. Here were my comments upon receiving the SERMO Badge which is on the right hand banner.  Long Live SERMO ! On behalf of Health Train Express and all my fellow bloggers, thanks you to SERMO for the recognition of  Health Train Express.  Just as other bloggers I put some effort into the...

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Health Merger Mania

  Medical Practice Mergers Key in Employer Healthcare Cost Hikes By Emily P. Walker, Washington Correspondent, MedPage TodayPublished: May 20, 2011 WASHINGTON -- Employers can expect to spend an additional 8.5% on employee healthcare costs in 2012, as patients who had been putting off medical treatment during the recession flock to the doctor's office, according to a new survey from the consulting firm PwC.   Last year, employers' costs for providing healthcare to employees rose 8%, and the year before, they grew by 7.5%. Both rates were much lower than predicted. Most larger employers -- including two-thirds of those who responded to the PwC survey -- are "self-insured," meaning that they pay employee healthcare costs themselves...

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Cloud Computing: A Reply from Practice Fusion

Some of you may have read my comments about the  “death of cloud computing”.  My comments may be premature according to Ryan Howard, CEO and founder of Practice Fusion: Mr. Howard sends me this quote; “On April 21-22, there was a major Amazon EC2 outage that brought down many business and websites. Some of the data was unrecoverable and transactions were lost. The outage event, however, actually might have some unexpected beneficial effects, by raising the awareness and understanding of cloud computing – and the differences implicit in their implementation.  In this particular case, the major distinction between two types of cloud computing is infrastructure management/control: a) cloud applications dependent upon and written...

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A Word About SERMO

  I had a bit of a surprise email from SERMO this week. HealthTrain received a prize, no it was not monetary, something even nicer…some recognition for all the early morning wakeups to post prior to the clinical load for the day. It’s in the form of a ‘badge’ (of honor?).  It will be displayed on the right hand side of the ‘widgets’. It gave me an urge to look back in HealthTrain’s Archives to read  observations HealthTrain expressed in mid 2010. : What hath Sermo Wrought? Average Rating  (3 ratings)  Posted by gmlevinmd123 on June 29, 2010 - 01:06PM EDTAuthor Specialties: Ophthalmology, Geriatrics Sermo represents the best of what Matt Holt of The Health Care Blog calls 'Health  2.0'.   While some...

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KEYNOTE BLOGGERS IN THE HEALTH UNIVERSE

  About five years ago there were few physicians and/or health industry gurus who even knew what a blog was. Pedal forward a few years to today in mid-2011 and the scene has changed enormously.  Although I have been a blogger since mid 2004, using blogging to bring a newsletter to our community of IT aficionados information about our health information exchange, I am a ‘newbie’ compared to elementary, middle school and high school bloggers, FBers, and tweeps.  My own children and grandchildren have blocked me from their personal sites.  FBing, tweeting, and blogging are categorized now into personal, business, and professional. Blogging or FBing, tweeting in the wrong space is considered taboo, and marks you as ‘inappropriate’...

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Health Care & Newt Gingrich

  Health Care Policy and reform will now take an abrupt shift into the political lane. The stage is the same and the players are about to change as they audition and pose for their own ‘stake’ in the game. Some are already withdrawing from their auditions, Trump, Huckabee, and others.  Others such as Gingrich are attempting to revive their political careers, and return to the ‘Broadway’, inside the beltway. The issues now are not ‘should we have health reform”, but should we deconstruct it before it is built. The specifics of the Obama Bill are coming at us along a planned timeline. It is complex with mandates dependent upon financial plans, exchanges, individual mandates, threatened penalties/incentives, insurability and ‘willingness’...

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Health Train’s Aggregation Today

May 17,2011 From iHealthBeat Standards Panel Seeks Feedback on EHR Certification ProgramRead more…………here   The Health IT Standards Committee's implementation work group is seeking public comment. What Percentage of Surveyed Physicians in the U.S. Have Adopted Smart Phones?Read more:…….here. Hospitals launch ED online reservation systems. Plan your emergencies, sounds like an oxymoron as our health system attempts to use new technology to address basic systemic flaws in healthcare delivery. here . Can Federal Health Care Websites Tap Best Practices from the Private Sector?  here The new websites -- which include HHS' vaccines.gov and healthcare.gov -- are much more dynamic and consumer-friendly than previous government websites. ...

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Why Cloud Computing may be Dead for Healthcare and Medicine

  Much has been said about the advantages of cloud computing, or what used to be termed ‘asp’ solutions for EMR in lieu of in house client server applications, less costly, reduced maintenance and upgrade challenges, Despite these advantages this methodology has not caught fire in medicine. The main reason is now apparent by the outcome of a demonstrated failure of AWS (Amazon Web Servicesl) Many EMR vendors do not own their own servers. They are rented from companies like Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, ,and other less well known data bank companies. Chances are good that your EMR flows on the same server, and hard drives as Twitter or Facebook. The uproar over the down time in those spaces was huge….and that for what has become an income...

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Singularity University

  How Will Technology Impact the Future of Healthcare and Medicine? By exploring and driving the future of medicine through  exponential, game changing technologies. A 5-day program at Singularity University in Silicon Valley in the NASA-Ames Research Park brought together participants who gave an over-the-horizon perspective in what is emerging in the lab and clinic and where opportunities in medicine are rapidly moving through disruptive, convergent technologies.     Here is a summary of day one of the FutureMed at Singularity University. FutureMed’s Executive Director Daniel Kraft, MD presents “What’s next in healthcare?” at TEDxMaastricht’s Future of Health   Dan Kraft MD delivers a fast paced view into the current...

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Social Media for Physicians IV

I am continuing my literary masterpiece from Parts I-III on Social Media for Physicians. Let’s say you have invested some time and money into a social media presence. Now you have your Facebook, Twitter and/or email sites operating.  It has been several months and you have followed 1000 other tweeters but the number of followers is 5.  Humbled by this statistic you realize this is not going to be an easy expedition to become the next Paris Hilton or Charlie Sheen of the social media medical circle.  After all medical things just don’t have the same Shock and Awe value as Charlie Sheen’s tour of “Winning”, nor Paris Hilton’s vapid face and torso in a million dollar chic dress.      Marketing experts will...

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