The state of Maryland is putting some financial sting in its efforts to get hospitals to lower the number of patients who contract deadly infections while hospitalized. Nine hospitals are being fined a total of $2.1 million for having higher than usual infection rates. The hospitals are: in the Washington, DC area: Prince George’s Hospital….
Continue ReadingArchives for February 2011
Arizona bill would shield medical students from malpractice lawsuits
A bill currently awaiting action in the Arizona state Senate would prevent patients injured by medical students from being able to sue them. If the bill passes, students under the supervision of a licensed health care professional would not be liable for malpractice unless there was clear and convincing evidence that the student acted with….
Continue ReadingKidney transplanted into the wrong patient — luckily without apparent harm
After transplanting a kidney into the wrong patient, the University of Southern California University Hospital has shut down its kidney transplant program pending an investigation. While this may be a unique event at USC, mixups in transplants unfortunately pop up around the country on a regular basis, because of the lack of rigorous safeguards to….
Continue ReadingNew Dietary Guidelines May Be Overly Influenced by Agribusiness
One thing you won’t see mentioned much in the new U.S. Dietary Guidelines: red meat. Nutrition experts know that to fight back against our national epidemic of obesity, it’s important that we eat red meat only sparingly. But the guidelines, a product of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the U.S. Department….
Continue ReadingMedical Malpractice in Breast Biopsies
Most breast lumps found in women need to be looked at under the microscope to make sure they’re not cancer. But new research says too many women are getting unnecessarily aggressive open biopsies, which produce a scar, when most of them could get enough tissue for sampling with a simple needle stick. About 1.6 million….
Continue ReadingIs Grandfathering of Medical Devices Bad for Your Health?
The vast majority of medical devices recalled by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) were subject to a less stringent regulatory process that requires only that the device prove that it’s similar to something already on the market, according to a recently published study. Of the 113 devices recalled from 2005 to 2009 because….
Continue ReadingStudy casts doubt on effectiveness of routine lymph node removal in some women with early breast cancer
Many women with early breast cancer do not need to have their armpit lymph nodes removed, according to a new study. Currently, this painful procedure has long been routine, as physicians believed it would prolong women’s lives by keeping the cancer from spreading or coming back. However, the study shows that removing the cancerous lymph….
Continue ReadingOhio hospitals save $13 million by cutting infections
More than two dozen hospitals in Ohio that collaborated to reduce hospital infections and drug mix-ups saved $12.8 million in health care expenses by doing so, according to a recently released report. The Solutions for Patient Safety initiative, launched by a coalition of business and hospital groups in January 2009, included 17 hospitals acute care….
Continue Reading“Best Hospitals” Ratings Don’t Measure Up
Last spring, we reported in this blog about an obscure medical journal study that punctured the balloon of the U.S. News “Best Hospitals” rankings. The study by Dr. Ashwini Sehgal found that the rankings were based almost purely on the subjective reputation of the hospitals among similarly situated health care institutions, a self-fulfilling prophecy. More….
Continue ReadingPhysicians wouldn’t order fewer tests under malpractice reform, study finds
One of the main arguments made by proponents of malpractice reform is that physicians would order fewer medical tests if patients could receive only a limited amount of money in a potential lawsuit. But that assumption may not be true, according to a recent study published in the journal Health Affairs. In that study, researchers….
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