"Health & Medical News"

Washington — The Pennsylvania House last month adopted a bill that would expand access to health insurance, but physicians have concerns about the measure’s funding and mandate for physicians to participate in its health plans.

The legislation, passed 118-81 on March 17, would provide coverage through state-subsidized private health plans to an estimated 218,000 of the state’s 767,000 uninsured adults by 2012. It would gradually phase out the state’s medical liability program. Democratic House leaders added the health expansion plan, called Pennsylvania Access to Basic Care, or PA ABC, to the liability reform bill.

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Less than two months ago, American Medical Association President Ron Davis, MD, told the AMA Board of Trustees that he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

Dr. Davis, 51, is continuing to serve as president. But he has reduced his duties to focus on treatment and spend time with his family. He said he realizes that pancreatic cancer has a high death rate, but he plans to be one of the survivors.

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Physicians say a Missouri Supreme Court ruling, though narrow, recognizes the significance of medical staff bylaws and offers doctors some recourse in the face of unfair discipline.

Breaking with a 43-year-old precedent, a unanimous high court opened the door for medical staff members to sue hospitals over privileging disputes if the facilities fail to follow staff bylaws. Justices departed from a long-held principle that hospital privileging decisions were not subject to judicial review, noting that was the “nationwide majority rule” at the time of the high court’s 1965 decision.

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Physicians say a Missouri Supreme Court ruling, though narrow, recognizes the significance of medical staff bylaws and offers doctors some recourse in the face of unfair discipline.

Breaking with a 43-year-old precedent, a unanimous high court opened the door for medical staff members to sue hospitals over privileging disputes if the facilities fail to follow staff bylaws. Justices departed from a long-held principle that hospital privileging decisions were not subject to judicial review, noting that was the “nationwide majority rule” at the time of the high court’s 1965 decision.

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Washington — The jumble of terms in health information technology soon could be simplified. The National Alliance for Health Information Technology announced March 24 that it finished proposed definitions for five key HIT terms and will seek public comment on them until April 9.

The alliance, a nonprofit organization serving as a forum for companies and officials to debate emerging HIT issues, started its work in November 2007 for the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology. The terms are electronic medical record, electronic health record, personal health record, health information exchange and regional health information organization.

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The Florida Supreme Court ignored decades of peer review protections when it ruled March 6 to allow patients to examine records on past adverse medical incidents, physicians and hospital organizations say.

The 4-3 high court decision says a state constitutional amendment giving patients access to records related to adverse medical incidents applies retroactively and opens up related peer review documents created before the amendment passed via ballot measure in November 2004.

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Physicians say a Missouri Supreme Court ruling, though narrow, recognizes the significance of medical staff bylaws and offers doctors some recourse in the face of unfair discipline.

Breaking with a 43-year-old precedent, a unanimous high court opened the door for medical staff members to sue hospitals over privileging disputes if the facilities fail to follow staff bylaws. Justices departed from a long-held principle that hospital privileging decisions were not subject to judicial review, noting that was the “nationwide majority rule” at the time of the high court’s 1965 decision.

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Over a flauta and a chicken-spinach enchilada, Brandon Bolfing and Shahed “Sky” Izaddoost took a breather from their final year at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston to celebrate their Match results with friends and family at a Mexican restaurant.

“This is the first place we went in medical school,” Bolfing said. “And it will be the last now that we’ve matched.”

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Physicians say a Missouri Supreme Court ruling, though narrow, recognizes the significance of medical staff bylaws and offers doctors some recourse in the face of unfair discipline.

Breaking with a 43-year-old precedent, a unanimous high court opened the door for medical staff members to sue hospitals over privileging disputes if the facilities fail to follow staff bylaws. Justices departed from a long-held principle that hospital privileging decisions were not subject to judicial review, noting that was the “nationwide majority rule” at the time of the high court’s 1965 decision.

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It only takes a year to start draining empathy from future physicians, according to a study of medical students in the March issue of Academic Medicine. But empathy is a key quality medical schools should promote, experts said, because it makes for better physicians.

“We know as a medical community that really good communication skills with patients help the patients to comply with the instructions of the physician,” said lead study author Bruce W. Newton, PhD. “It puts them more at ease with the physician, a bond of trust is established, and if something unfortunately goes wrong, if you have this bond and communications skills, you are much less likely to be sued.”

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