All Blog Posts (1,472)

To Scan or Not To Scan for Early Lung Cancer

Lung cancer is the most common cancer other than skin cancer. The survival rate is still dismal so early diagnosis presumably could make an impact. Chest x-rays just do not have the sensitivity to find early lung cancer. Computed tomography (CT Scans) can detect very small lesions in the lung. Another study has now been completed and it was able to find many early cancers.…

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Added by Stephen C Schimpff on January 12, 2011 at 3:36pm — No Comments

Bringing telemedicine to Haiti

I just returned from a cholera mission to Haiti - my first.

I can't believe how little they have there. In response, I am bringing the first telemedicine terminal to the largest hospital in North Haiti. The Justinian Hospital in Cap Haitien.

Details on the project are at the following website: www.porschestoplowshares.org.

I'm relativly new to all this so your comments and suggestions are most…

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Added by John Vitiello on December 29, 2010 at 10:41am — 2 Comments

ConnectMD’s Medical Network Enables Innovative Remote Allocation for Blood Distribution

GCI ConnectMD Increases Safety for Puget Sound Blood Center Patients

DECEMBER 29, 2010, SEATTLE — GCI ConnectMD (ConnectMD) is making a new blood-distribution process possible for the…

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Added by Courtney Hastings on December 29, 2010 at 10:39am — No Comments

Deep Impact

Medical Product Manufacturing News (MPMN) released it's "Top 25 over the Last 25 Years". The list is subject to debate, but serves as solid retrospective of the impact of technology on the delivery of healthcare over the span of a quarter-century ... worth a read!

Added by Clymer/JR on December 16, 2010 at 10:30am — No Comments

Hospitals are Unsafe - There Are Still Plenty of Preventable Medical Errors

Over the past ten years and since the publication of the Institute of Medicine landmark book “To Err Is Human” there have been many attempts to reduce preventable medical errors which are estimated to take about 100,000 lives per year – perhaps many more. The question is whether all of this effort has had a substantial clinical impact.

The results of a recently published study are therefore concerning. A…

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Added by Stephen C Schimpff on December 14, 2010 at 11:54am — No Comments

Two Treatments For Macular Degeneration – At Wildly Divergent Costs

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of blindness in the United States. More than 1 million Americans have neovascular or “wet” AMD and a slightly lower number have “dry” AMD which often progresses to the more severe “wet” form. Since this is a disease of aging, we can expect many more cases as the population expands in the coming years.

Neovascular AMD appears to be related, at lease in part, to excess production of vascular endothelial growth factor… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on December 8, 2010 at 2:25pm — No Comments

Replacing the Aortic Valve Without Open Surgery!

Aortic stenosis (a narrowing and hardening of the heart’s aortic valve) is not uncommon among older individuals. It begins without symptoms and progresses for years but, about 50% will die within 2 years once the fitst symptoms develop. The standard approach is to surgically replace the aortic valve which will improve both heart function and survival. Unfortunately, about 30% of symptomatic individuals cannot undergo surgery because of older age, other heart problems or other medical conditions… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on December 1, 2010 at 10:50am — No Comments

Social Networking: Aggregating Our Pluralistic Health System in Support of Health IT Adoption

The national effort to “e-enable” the healthcare industry is unprecedented in scope. Fully $50 billion has been made available through ARRA for broadband infrastructure, standards, outcomes research and incentivizing healthcare organizations and providers to become “meaningful” users of certified information technologies. This, not to mention the billions more in private sector leveraging happening right now through telecommunications providers, hardware and software companies, consulting firms… Continue

Added by Neal Neuberger on November 23, 2010 at 1:24pm — No Comments

Teamwork Improves Surgical Safety and Reduces Mortality

Like the cockpit, the operating room (OR) is fraught with high intensity, high complexity, high velocity, and high stakes. And as a capital intense location which serves as the financial engine of many or not most hospitals, there is pressure to use the OR efficiently. Like the cockpit, there is hierarchy, and a deep culture which includes strongly held rituals and customs. Unfortunately, there are also errors of omission and commission which lead to adverse outcomes including patient… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on November 14, 2010 at 9:04am — No Comments

HealthSaaS launches new corporate website

HealthSaaS launches new corporate website and announces HealthSaaS Consulting Services

Nov 11, 2010 – HealthSaaS, Inc. a leading Software as a Service organization in the Health 2.0 industry has announced today the launch of its new logo and redesigned website at www.healthsaas.net

The new web site has been updated to reflect all of the products and services HealthSaaS provides including their new consulting services organization.… Continue

Added by frankille on November 11, 2010 at 11:08pm — No Comments

HealthSaaS Releases DiabetesPHR with Connectivity to Microsoft HealthVault

HealthSaaS today announced the release of an online diabetes management tool that is available at www.diabetesphr.com

Clackamas, OR, November 11, 2010 --(PR.com)-- DiabetesPHR is a web based Software as a Service (SaaS) application built on a patent pending framework that enables patients to record conditions, doctors, blood glucose, blood pressure, medications, naturopathic remedies, sleep patterns, weight, treatments, therapies,… Continue

Added by frankille on November 11, 2010 at 11:06pm — No Comments

Leadership In Medicine – New Expectations, Time to Rethink What Leaders Should Be Doing

What should we expect of a physician leader today? I believe it should be something much different than what leaders do now.

Today, a hospital physician CEO might be expected to develop new or improved clinical programs, in part by recruiting the best and the brightest, by building new wings, and by purchasing new technologies. The measure of success would be improved finances as a result of added admissions. A dean might be expected to develop new research programs by building new… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on November 10, 2010 at 4:45pm — No Comments

Breast Cancer Risk: How does hormone imbalance increase breast cancer risk?

We had a FANTASTIC conversation with Dr. Eldred Taylor on Thursday night!

Dr. Taylor covered a vast amount of information related to breast cancer and hormones and answered a significant number of listener questions. Here are a few of the questions covered:

Why do doctors continue prescribing a medication if research has shown negative results?
If mammograms are not the best way to detect breast cancer, what is?
What is…

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Added by Cynthia Shelby-Lane, MD on October 29, 2010 at 2:20pm — No Comments

Breast Cancer and Hormones: The Big Debate

Tonight we'll be speaking with Dr. Eldred Taylor to discuss "Breast Cancer & Hormones: The Big Debate." There's still time to register and the replay will be available 96 hours after the call!

When: Thursday, October 28, 2010

Time: 8 PM eastern until 9:30 PM eastern (www.time.gov)

Host: Cynthia Shelby-Lane, MD

Special Guest: Dr. Eldred… Continue

Added by Cynthia Shelby-Lane, MD on October 28, 2010 at 3:06pm — No Comments

New Finding May Aid Alzheimer’s Treatment Options

A protein recently found in the brain -- gamma secretase activating protein or GSAP -- increases the production of beta-amyloid, the presumed culprit in Alzheimer’s disease. In a mouse model, reducing GSAP led to reduced beta-amyloid disposition. This prompts in turn the appealing notion that a drug could be found to inhibit GSAP and thereby forestall or prevent the onset of Alzheimer’s disease.

Imatinib (Gleevec, used to treat chronic myelocytic leukemia or CML) does inhibit GSAP… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on October 26, 2010 at 1:05pm — No Comments

The Implications of Chronic Disease

I have written frequently about the importance of chronic illnesses. Most of us are just not aware that their incidence is rising - and rapidly. We tend to think instead about acute illnesses and injury but chronic illnesses are now not only common but last a lifetime once developed and are inherently expensive to treat. On top of that there are enormous losses in quality of life, personal productivity and economic impact on the individual and society.

The Milken Institute quantified some… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on October 19, 2010 at 2:57pm — No Comments

Encapsulated Pig Islet Cells For Diabetes Type 1 – A Trial

Here is a follow-up to the post on islet cell xenotransplantation for type 1 diabetes mellitus. A group in New Zealand has been studying the use of islet cells derived from pigs which have not been genetically modified. The cells are encapsulated to protect them from immune cells. The company reports that they are self regulating (meaning that they will produce insulin as needed based on the body’s blood sugar levels) and efficient at secreting the insulin produced into the patient’s body. The… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on October 15, 2010 at 5:40pm — No Comments

RE: Follow-Up On your reporting on Day 01 Telemedicine Association

There is more questions that come to mind from your reporting of Day 01 at Baltimore. You had some "big names' no doubt, but your reporting does not create opportunities for sepecific topics relating to the challanges on hand on "telemedicine' innovations via PPP, as required by SP Grants now on table.

Not sure what to do with your reporting, how even to enjoy what you just reported on Day 01.

How do we follow up from Day 1 ?

comments for…

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Added by Avi Dey on September 29, 2010 at 5:40pm — No Comments

Content: Day 1 ATA (American Telemedicine Association) Mid-Year Meeting ... Priceless!

"It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” ... Charles Darwin

Colleagues,

In the continuing quest to bring you the 3Cs of "Content, Community and Collaboration", I offer you a summation of… Continue

Added by CC-Conrad Clyburn-MedForeSight on September 28, 2010 at 7:52am — 5 Comments

More on Transplanted Pig Organs – Xenotransplantation

Although xenotransplantation has not progressed far enough to allow transplanting a pig organ to a human, there are other exciting opportunities in the works for xenotransplantation in the not to distant future.

Individuals that develop liver failure often die before a suitable donor can be found or before the damaged liver can heal on its own. There is no artificial liver comparable to the dialysis machine for kidney failure. But using a specially develop pig liver outside the body… Continue

Added by Stephen C Schimpff on September 27, 2010 at 4:52pm — No Comments