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Legal duty to nonpatients: Driving accidents
Question: Driver D strikes a pedestrian after losing control of his vehicle from insulin-induced hypoglycemia. Both Driver D and pedestrian were seriously injured. Driver D was recently diagnosed with diabetes, and his physician had started him on insulin but did…
Who’s increasing health care costs? Not us!
Determining who is responsible for the increase in health care cost in the United States has seemingly limitless possibilities. There are enough culprits to go around, but a recent analysis points a finger at hospital-based care (Health Aff. 2019 Feb;38[2]:184-9).…
What I learned from Navy SEALs about resilience
In 2017, the National Academy of Medicine recognized the urgent need to address burnout, wellness, and resilience in physicians. A consortium was subsequently put together comprising many cosponsoring organizations, including the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME), and the…
Medical ethics and economics
The balance between medical research and the pharmaceutical world has always been unsettling. The recent spate of articles in the press reporting the large payments by industry to a number of highly paid medical staff of the Memorial Sloan Kettering…
Commentary: INR instability in the NOAC era
Progress in the development of new oral anticoagulants (NOACs), as well as agents for their reversal, has lowered the threshold to use these therapeutics as first line agents for the management of nonvalvular atrial fibrillation and venous thromboembolism.1,2 Despite this…
Law & Medicine: Which doctors get sued?
Question: Doctors are more prone to lawsuits if they: A. Have been sued before. B. Spend fewer dollars per hospitalized patient. C. Show poor communication skills. D. A and C only. E. A, B, and C. Answer: E. Two very…
Analysis finds 28.8% prevalence of depression in residents
The estimated prevalence of depression or depressive symptoms was 28.8% among residents and interns worldwide in a meta-analysis of 54 studies of the issue, according to a report published online December 8 in JAMA. The depression rate ranged from 20.9%…