Grand Rounds (Vol 3, No. 34)

 

(Jan von Calcar, Frontispiece to De corporis fabrica (1543), Vesalius.  The very fine Blocker History of Medicine Collection at UTMB's Moody Medical Library is fortunate to have an authentic 1543 edition of this work, and I have had the privilege of both touching its pages and gazing at this frontispiece, which is an extremely significant piece of the relevant (art) history).

The work, then, is both an important aspect of the medical humanities -- literally -- and serves as an apt introduction to Vol 3, No. 34 of Grand Rounds, the weekly fling around the blogosphere for all things biomedical.  For those of you new to the MH Blog, feel free to kick off your shoes and stay a spell, read some posts and engage us.  I did not expressly request a theme, and no meta-narrative captures the ecletic set of submissions for this week, though my crude categorizations are noted after each post.  No. 35 will be at ImpactED Nurse.  Enjoy!

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Amy Tenderich at Diabetes Mine ponders the significance of the side effects from the use of statins in managing high lipid profiles {EBM}.

At Medicine for the Outdoors Blog, Paul Sauerbach considers the tragic case of the New Jersey man who died of dehydration on a wilderness adventure {Standard of Practice, Liability}.

In Pallimed, Christian Sinclair reviews an important update in NEJM on empirical findings in the Netherlands regarding euthanasia {Palliative Care, Ethics, Policy}.

Cancer misdiagnosis is the subject of a post at Insureblog.  The horror! {Standard of Care, Liability}

Hospital Impact covers how patient blogs are changing healthcare {Pathblography, Metablogging}.

Healthline Connects reports on work being done to "Unravel[] the Mysteries of Neurogenerative Disease," and discusses the well-known case of Carol Carr {Research, Genetics}.

Want to start a blog but don't know how? The Clinical Cases and Images Blog gives a great how-to {Metablogging}.

David E. Williams of the Health Care Business Blog, a fellow Wesleyan Cardinal, discusses the reasons why employers should transfer wealth to their employees in exchange for better adherence.  Williams states that "As long as the programs are directed toward reducing overall medical costs than I'm not concerned about abusive promotional practices."  I disagree with this on a number of levels, not least because the propositions might well be dependent variables (don't abusive promotional practices tend to drive up aggregate costs? Such practices are ethically problematic for other reasons, as well), but the post is certainly worth engaging.

Kerri over at Six Until Me daydreams of a training and motivational session with fitness and diabetes coach Larry Bird {Pathblography}.

The latest installment of ED Sonnets is up at Rickety Contrivances of Doing Good {Pathblography}.

Sick of reading and thinking about DNA? Go all Mr. Wizard with Eye on DNA's Five Cool Things You Can Do with DNA.

TSCD continues her fine series on Med School Survival with a post on How to Survive Lectures (ed. - coffee?) {Humor}.

You know what they say happens when you assume? Sometimes worse than that, as Dr. George explains {Practice}.

The "Theme of My Day Was Fast" at ERnursery {Practice}.

Jenni Prokopy from ChronicBabe announces a book giveaway {Support}.

Dr. Val reminisces about her first day as an intern.  Move over, Sam Shem! {Practice}

Patient Anonymous adds another installment in em's insider account of being an inpatient in a psychiatric facility {Disability, Pathblography}.

Colin gives us a reflection on the place, if any, of race and ethnicity in medical care over at From Medskool, host of Vol 3, No. 36 Grand Rounds.  FWIW, I'm not at all sure it is a wise idea to try to entirely excise race and ethnicity from patient care, and I am dubious that it is possible to do so.  Of course, this is no justification for disparities, but if anything, the plethora of the empirical evidence of the latter suggests how much work needs to be done to remove even the manifestations of race and ethnicity that seem undesirable {Practice}.

In honor of Mother's Day, we have The Fitness Fixer's Healthy Mother's Day post, and some thoughts on the Day at Fruit of the Womb. {Ma!}

N=1 over at Universal Health warns of the blurry lines between managing care and practicing nursing without a license {Practice}.

Maggie Wallace marks Florence Nightingale's birthday (May 12) and International ME/CFS Day at Liverpool Leftovers {Disability, Pathblography}.

Joshua Schwimmer surveys the introduction of the first direct renin inhibitor at Tech Medicine.

Over at Notes from Dr. RW, Dr. Donnell attacks the scientific merits of CAM.  Michael, any response?

The NY Emergency Medicine Blog provides an interview with the Director of the New York Poison Control Center regarding the recent Diethylene glycol contamination from China.

Sue at Emergency Room Nurse stresses the importance of a communication in end-of-life scenarios {Palliative Care, Practice}.

Eliminating junk food may not be so easy, as The Family Fork's Andrea Giancoli explains.

Allen of Grunt Doc fame, who, like me, lives Deepinthehearta, sends good wishes to Scott from Polite Dissent {Metablogging, Pathblography}.

Mother Jones at Nurse Ratched's Place warns of seemingly dysfunctional families and the ER {Practice}.

At Aetiology, Tara Smith has a fascinating post on smallpox and vaccinations.  I'm actually taking a history of public health class right now and reading some about the smallpox outbreaks of 18th century colonial America, and some of the policy and public health problems Smith writes of have old lineage.  This is unsurprising under the dialectic model of history {Policy, Ethics, Public Health}.

And, last, but certainly not least, Bob Coffield proffers some thoughts on an area near and dear to my own heart (health law), in posts on tools for keeping track of regulatory develpoments, empirical assessments on technology utilization, and a new HIPAA Enforcement website at CMS. 

Comments

[George]

Thanks for including me.

[hgstern]

 
Super 'Rounds, Daniel! Thank you for hosting, and for doing such a great job!
 

[tscd]

Thanks for including my post in this week's Grand Rounds (and for recognising it as humour!) :)

[patientanonymous]

I join the Greek Chorus and say thank you for the inclusion. Well done on putting this together. It looks like a lot of great reads.

[N=1]

What a rich GR! This requires a full carafe, a little early music and some time to savor! Thanks for including my entry.

[David E. Williams of the Health business blog]

Nicely done, Daniel. Nothing like a little disagreement to get the discussion going. Don't you just hate it when the host agrees with all the submissions?

In any case I hope readers will give my argument for negative copays a fair hearing. I'm not arguing in favor of abusive practices; I'm hoping employers will steer financial incentives in ways that help patients. If that helps drug companies , too I don't mind.

[Daniel Goldberg]

Hey David,

I certainly didn't mean to imply you were in favor of abusive practices, only that you are willing to tolerate them for other advantageous ends. I'm not sure I agree with this formulation, but more so, the interests of employers and employees arguably diverge far too much and too often to hope that by attaching health care delivery to labor markets we can maximize both health and rents. In fact, the declining rate of employer-sponsored HI suggests that more and more employers are becoming aware of this divergence.

JMO. Thanks for reading and commenting, especially from a fellow Card.

[GruntDoc]

Well Done!

A small correction: Scott's blog is Polite Dissent.

[Maggie]

Thank you for including my post, and thank you very much indeed for a set of interesting links that have kept me entertained and enlightened for several hours now (and still have some to look at!). Having difficult times over here, and it really helps to have something to distract from them. Best wishes from grey Liverpool

[ERnursey]

Thanks for including me, super job putting this weeks edition together.

[Jenni Prokopy]

Excellent edition of Grand Rounds - thanks for your hard work and for including ChronicBabe. Best wishes -

[Leigh Shevchik]

Great Grand Rounds! Thanks for putting this together.

[Andrea N. Giancoli]

Impressive! thanx for including me!

[JC Jones]

Love that blockprint! Thanks for including my post and all the fascinating stories here.