Primary Care Doctors Moving to the Concierge Model

So if you haven’t heard by now, many primary care physicians have been, as of recently moving to a “concierge model.” In fact, a primary care doctor I was seeing for a while decided to do this. When is the last time you have been to your primary care physician (pcp) as perhaps they have as well? Just go on pcp websites across the U.S. and you may see the trend. For example, a practicing physician Dr. Rob discusses how he is Dropping Out over on http://more-distractible.org/2012/09/08/dropping-out/. “I will be starting a solo practice that does not file insurance, instead taking a monthly “subscription” fee, which gives patients access to me.” In the post he discusses his top 3 frustrations with the current health care system too many patients, not getting paid properly for providing care, and non-patient issues such … Read more

Health Care Should Not Be Framed in the Personal Responsibility Narrative

I read an interesting article by Micah L. Berman titled “From Health Care Reform to Public Health Reform” appearing in the Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics (Fall 2011, pages 328-338). In the article Micah L. Berman discusses how the Affordable Care Act contains an “individualist/biomedical paradigm” which includes a number of provisions and programs which focus on public health but are in fact misaligned and at odds with public health research. He does this by first (A) arguing that in America there is a large cultural emphasis on personal responsibility which is shaped by powerful political, social, and psychological forces and second (B) that influential industries profit at the expense of public health. A) Micah states: “This paradigm focuses on what can be done by or to individual patients, and it leads to policies that seek to either (a) … Read more

Multi-Million Dollar Award In New York for Wisdom Tooth Extraction

A 49 year old man had issues with a wisdom tooth. He went to several different times and had him attempt to remove it. He was sent home believing the extraction had been performed. However, the dentist had stopped the extraction after learning that the tooth was fused to the bone. Several hours after returning home, the man was rushed to the emergency room and was diagnosed with air emphysema and residuals roots by an oral surgeon. The oral surgeon than extracted the remaining portions of the wisdom tooth. Both the oral surgeon and dentist were found liable for the man’s injuries as neither obtained informed consent for the procedures they performed. The man has been unable to return to work as a hydro-geologist, and remains totally disabled as a result of his constant pain. He suffered extensive oral nerve … Read more

Do Physicians and Researchers Profit and Trade Stock on Privileged Information

An interesting article titled “Do Physicians/Researchers Trade Stock Based on Privileged Information?” written by Elie Donath and Mark J. Eisenberg appears in the Summer 2012 issue of The Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics (vol. 40, issue 2, pages 391-393). Speculation is made that “…physicians/researchers are inappropriately profiting (by buying or selling stock) from information derived from advance copies of high-impact clinical trial data distributed by medical conferences or journals.” A case study is made looking at the American Society of Clinical Oncology. Up until 2008 ASCO selectively and discreetly distributed abstracts from all forthcoming presentations at the ASCO Conference to ASCO members 2 weeks prior to them becoming publicly accessible at the conference. The authors used multiple linear regression to look at the percentage change in stock price on the first trading day following the release of these abstracts. A … Read more

Politics of Dental Anesthesiology

A recent article titled “Dental anesthesiology falls short of becoming ADA specialty,” by Rob Goskowski, Nov. 1, 2012, located at http://www.drbicuspid.com/index.aspx?sec=sup&sub=rst&pag=dis&ItemID=311903, discusses a recent vote that took place at the House of Delegates during the 2012 American Dental Association (ADA) Annual Session. The House of Delegates voted against recognizing Dental anesthesiology as the 10th ADA recognized specialty. Steven Ganzberg, a clinical professor and the chair of dental anesthesiology at UCLA says: “This action by the ADA confirms that the ADA process of specialty approval is fatally flawed….This was clearly an effort by the ADA, through AAOMS [the American Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons], to restrict professional activities that specialty recognition would have provided.” Dr. Ganzberg and some other supporters were hoping that the specialty would be approved as they felt it would lead to increased training and emergency preparedness … Read more