During my training days, one of my finest memories of roundsmanship was watching two esteemed senior physicians in the same specialty duke it out for the better treatment regimen of a patient. After spending hours in the library tediously searching the indexes of every major American journal and textbook for references to the disease in…
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What’s the Most Important Solution to Making EHRs Usable for Physicians?
I’ve written before about my use of EMR, and what I’ve heard from some of you. I tend to place blame for a lot of the problems physicians tell me they have with their EMR on the unintended consequence of Meaningful Use (MU) requirements. In their rush to put the requirements into place and remain…
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How Do You Judge a ‘Good’ Hospital?
“Dad, what hospitals are good?” Working for the Pennsylvania Medical Society, traveling to many hospitals, and speaking to physicians across the state, I was flummoxed when my son, a surgeon to be, asked me that question. There are so many ways to measure good. My readers know that one of my favorite phrases is “the…
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‘You Make So Much Money’ … Or Do You?
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently released Medicare physician payment data. As the pundits, the press, and analysts pore through the data, it reminds me of the need for context and, yes, the devilish details. I once had an attorney tell me I obviously made too much money. Of course, this was…
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