"Health & Medical News"

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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Washington — Becoming a doctor isn’t cheap. The average debt for medical school graduates is approximately $140,000, according to the American Medical Association. But the burden could get a little lighter for some medical students under a bill passed last month by the House.

A provision inserted into legislation reauthorizing the federal government’s student loan programs would allow medical specialists with five or more years of graduate medical education to qualify for up to $2,000 in loan forgiveness annually for serving in areas of need. The maximum amount would be $10,000 for five years of service.

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Three Clemson University fraternity brothers were charged with furnishing the alcohol that contributed to the overdose death of an 18-year-old freshman student, the Associated Press reported Jan. 31.

The misdemeanor charges were filed against the members of Sigma Nu even though victim Benjamin Garrison Sprague was not forced to drink and prosecutors determined that their actions did not directly lead to his death.

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A Texas middle-school student found sniffing a teacher’s alcohol-based hand sanitizer was not committing a crime, prosecutors in Denton County have ruled.

The Dallas Morning News reported Jan. 26 that the 15-year-old seventh-grader at Killian Middle School in Lewisville picked up a bottle of hand sanitizer from a teacher’s desk, rubbed it on his hands, and sniffed it. The boy was sent to the principal’s office, subjected to in-school suspension, and then referred to police on suspicion that he was inhaling the gel to get high.

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Nearly one in ten first-year college students at a mid-Atlantic university have a cannabis use disorder (CUD), according to a National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) funded study of drug use conducted by Center for Substance Abuse Research (CESAR) investigators.

First-year students attending new student orientation were randomly selected to participate in a multiyear follow-up study. Overall, 9.4% of first-year students met the clinical definition for cannabis abuse (5.4%) and/or dependence (4.0%).

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The University of Iowa is offering extra funding to departments that schedule more Friday classes, as part of an initiative to curb student partying that increasingly begins on Thursday nights and continues through the weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported Jan. 7.

Currently, only about 1,400 classes are held on Fridays at the school, compared to an average of 2,400 from Monday to Thursday. Students and faculty agree that the lack of Friday classes encourages an early start to weekend revelry. “Sometimes a Thursday will definitely beat out a Saturday,” said sophomore Greg Meyer, 20.

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The millennial generation is a big topic among those who teach medical school as they seek to shape an educational experience that meshes with this group’s particular characteristics and learning styles.

“This is a new generation of students,” said Michael Kavan, PhD, national vice chair of the Assn. of American Medical Colleges’ group on student affairs and associate student affairs dean at Creighton University School of Medicine in Omaha, Neb. “How do we interact with them? How do we help guide them? There’s a lot of talk about it but not a lot of guidance.”

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By Bob Curley

? A bid to end federal student-aid penalties for those with drug convictions was launched with high hopes earlier this year, but now appears to be in deep trouble in Congress.

A broad coalition of drug-reform, educational, and addiction-related organizations?  threw its weight behind a plan to amend the federal Higher Education Act (HEA) and overturn a policy of denying federal financial aid to students convicted of drug offenses. The policy, devised by Rep. Mark Souder (R-Ind.) and passed by Congress in 1999, requires students to divulge information about convictions for drug offenses — but not any other crimes — on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).

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An economic hardship student loan deferment program that medical school graduates use as they go through residency will remain in place until fall of 2008, and more students are eligible to participate.

The U.S. Dept. of Education announced Nov. 1 that it will temporarily reinstate the program, with a final decision on its fate due next year.

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Drug testing has only a minimal deterrent effect on high-school athletes’ use of steroids, according to a new study.

The New York Times reported Oct. 18 that researcher Linn Goldberg of the Oregon Health & Science University and colleagues compared self-reported drug-use rates at 11 Oregon high schools — five with random drug-testing, and six that don’t require drug testing of student athletes.

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