Medical students graduate, on average, with $140,000 in debt, with many having loans in excess of $200,000.

The majority who enter school wishing to practice primary care often change their minds when greeted with this fiscal reality. Combined with the fact that primary care role models are overburdened in a practice environment so toxic towards generalist practice, it is no wonder that most students change their minds, and gravitate towards Read more »

Some professors at the Harvard Medical School are the biggest beneficiaries of funding and gifts from the drug industry.

These conflicts of interest are causing some dissension within the student body, with some feeling “violated” when being lectured by professors who are paid consultants to drug makers.

This places the school in a difficult position. On one hand, especially at a school as revered as Harvard, the industry pays Read more »

Will there ever be a scenario where doctors will accept a third-party entity restricting care to patients?

Pauline Chen talks about comparative effectiveness research, and finds that, when recommendations are transparent and based on solid evidence, some doctors will accept this more regulated paradigm.

Dr. Chen is completely right when she observes that there is a “sense that some of [a health insurer's] decisions are based Read more »

What if a retired physician, Harvard-trained no less, wanted to give away medical care?

You’d think the huge demand would make it easier for him to accomplish this, but that’s not the case.

When funding dried up for New York physician Lloyd Hamilton’s free care clinic, he wanted to continue serving the same patients, even depriving himself of a salary. Unfortunately, it wasn’t so easy, as appeals to charities and community organizations Read more »

Louise McMenemy, the BMA Medical Student Committee lead said: ‘We are concerned about the obstacles that lie in the path of many pupils from lower socio-economic backgrounds who want to study medicine’.

The BMA also believes that universities should publish their strategies of how they intend to widen participation.

‘It is important for the NHS, students and society that we have a medical workforce that Read more »

Despite the fact that almost 100,000 patients die from medical mistakes each year, only 30 percent of those errors are ever disclosed to patients. Saying “I’m sorry” is morally and ethically proper. It re-establishes trust and empathy between doctor and patient, and makes it easier for everyone involved to learn from the incident. Hospitals that have instituted full disclosure programs have seen a decrease in the number of malpractice lawsuits Read more »

An article in the British Medical Journal accuses him of medical paternalism.

Calling Dr. House (via ScienceRoll) a “paradigm of a paternalistic physician,” who, “repeatedly disregards their wishes in order to diagnose and treat their illnesses,” Mark Wicclair of the University of Pittsburgh wonders why, at a time where American patients value autonomy, so many love the crusty, oft poor-mannered, doctor?

Too bad the full article Read more »

Read it to believe it.

The traditionally physician-hostile health insurer is backing up its commitment to the patient-centered medical home with dollars. In a pilot project involving IBM workers in Arizona, they are listening to physicians, and helping small and solo practices meet the strenuous requirements that the medical home demands.

If all the goals are met, primary care doctors in the program could see a 30 percent increase Read more »

It appears so.

Chris Rangel points to a study showing that 21.2 percent of medical students (that’s more than 1 in 5), suffer from depression, compared to 10 percent in the general population.

Depression seems to hit its peak during the second year of medical school, and then gradually improves. In general, the rates of depression for students were generally higher than in residency.

Indeed, the second year of medical Read more »

We are in the midst of a golden age of medical education, with schools expanding at an unprecedented level.

MedPage Today reports from a recent summit of medical educators, where they concluded that, with nine medical schools set to open and the majority of the remaining 126 schools planning to expand class size, this is an “unparalleled opportunity” to reform physician training.

That time can’t come soon enough.

The Read more »