Friday, December 18, 2009
Santa's reindeer quarantined over Lyme disease fears
North Pole reindeer have been quarantined following the discovery of ticks carrying Lyme diseases, bringing into question their availability on Dec. 24 and the possibility of causing a global Lyme disease pandemic should they cross international borders.
Elves first found reindeer ticks on Rudolph, which they reported to Santa. Responses to the question, "Who will guide my sleigh?" were greeted mostly by much tugging on beards and shuffling of pointy slippers.
"Normally, culling the herd is the best response," said one epidemiologist specializing in animal-human disease vectors, who declined to be named due to fears of being labeled a Grinch. "But I don't want to be the one to have to explain that my kids."
The issue has created considerable response, though, for fears of widespread Lyme disease infection. The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is now tracking Santa's sleigh and mulling possible responses.
"We'll track Santa," NORAD's commander emphasized. "But I have no authorization from the President to engage him under any circumstances. Besides, how would he explain that to Congress?"
Global pandemic experts remain concerned, however. "What if reindeer ticks can fly, too," asked one epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, who declined to be named for fear of nothing in his stocking this year. "Frankly, I don't want to be the one to have to explain that. I can't explain that."
Labels: epidemiology, humor, infectious disease, Lyme disease, superbugs
posted by Ryan DuBosar at
8:00 AM
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Friday, December 4, 2009
QD: News Every Day--punishing med schools for graduates
ACP Internist's daily digest of news and events continues with punishment for medical schools that don't train enough primary care doctors.
Physician shortage
The CEO of the Texas Academy of Family Physicians wants to reward medical schools that train primary care doctors, and punish those that don't. Quotas would reserve a percentage of slots for family practice. Countering the idea are the heads of Texas' med schools, who say they can reward students who choose primary care, but that they can't force students into it.
One way to satisfy the need to train more doctors is to open another medical program, a measured approved by the University of North Texas in Fort Worth. But, the existing osteopathic program worries that start-up costs for a school for MDs will drain its funding. They'd rather see more support for their program, saying it produces more primary care doctors than any other program in the state. (The Texas Tribune, North Texas Daily)
Health care reform
The Senate is tackling the growing list of amendments for health care reform. Of four that came to a vote, two passed and two didn't. Passing were amendments that the Secretary of Health and Human Services could require health plans to cover preventive services for women, (such as mammograms, in the wake of the recent controversy) and the bill would not cut any access to basic Medicare services. Failing to pass were amendments that would strip out a half-a-trillion dollars in Medicare spending cuts to pay for some of the costs, and another that said abortion could not be considered a preventive care service. (Politico, Kaiser Health News)
Meanwhile, 19 groups representing nearly a quarter-million surgeons object to various facets of the law, including:
--an independent Medicare advisory board whose recommendations could become law without congressional action,
--mandatory participation in the Physician Quality Reporting Initiative,
--bonus payments to primary care physicians,
--relying solely on U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendations for minimum coverage standards,
--the provision that many types of providers could be reimbursed, and
--the lack of a permanent fix to Medicare reimbursement.
H1N1 influenza
H1N1 influenza rates are waning in Canada, says the country's chief public health officer. But, it may just be a lull. (ABC News)
Rhode Island is using its e-prescribing database to track H1N1 outbreaks. Prescribing data from the state's pharmacies gives epidemiologists at the Rhode Island Department of Health weekly updates that act as a proxy for detecting a potential outbreak, including its location and affected age group. It's then compared to the state's Sentinel system, made up of 25 physician practices that report flu outbreaks to the health department. David R. Gifford, ACP Member, director of the Rhode Island Department of Health, said, "This provides another important tool for the state's public health officials to look at trends related to the course, severity and treatment of the H1N1 pandemic." (Electronic Medical Record)
Labels: electronic medical records, epidemiology, H1N1, health care reform, medical education, primary care shortage, QD
posted by Ryan DuBosar at
11:32 AM
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Friday, October 9, 2009
QD: News Every Day on insurance coverage, primary care shortage and H1N1
ACP Internist's daily digest of internal medicine in the news continues with who's covering the uninsured, students weighing in on why they eschew primary care careers, and H1N1's widespread but less lethal path.
Covering the uninsured
While the number of uninsured people rose slightly from 2007 to 2008, more people were covered by government programs as employer-sponsored coverage continued to decline, according to the U.S. Census. The ACP Advocate reports census figures showing that 15% of the population was uninsured in 2008, increasing from 45.7 million to 46.3 million. However, coverage by private plans fell from 67.5% to 66.7% and coverage by employers fell from 59.3% to 58.5%. Government coverage rose from 27.8% to 29%.
Primary care shortage
Medical students weigh in on health reform, and have their doubts. Also, they won't go into primary care. "When it's a difference of $200,000 in your paycheck, it's tough," one student said.
Flu update
The H1N1 pandemic has been more widespread than lethal, notes the Harvard Health Letter. The virus seems to cause fewer cases of serious disease than expected. Harvard experts discussed the latest at a forum, with video posted online. In short, estimates for the death rate for H1N1 range between one death for every 2,000 symptomatic cases and one death for every 14,000 (0.007%). In comparison, the death rate for seasonal flu is roughly one death for every 1,000 to 2,000 cases. Seasonal flu infects roughly 5% to 20% of the population annually, whereas pandemics infect 25% to 40%. This H1N1 epidemic may not rise to pandemic levels.
In case you missed it ...
Doctors drive medical consumption, not patients. Illness and patient preference play a much smaller role. NPR reports on one epidemiologist's lifelong work. Meanwhile, a Newsweek columnist weighs evidence-based medical treatments against clinical judgment. It's the age-old question: How does a study impact treatment of the patient sitting before a doctor, seeking a cure?
Labels: epidemiology, evidence-based medicine, flu, H1N1, health insurance, medical education, primary care shortage, QD
posted by Ryan DuBosar at
12:34 PM
0 Comments
Monday, March 2, 2009
Urbanites have trouble finding healthy food
The availability of healthy food choices and quality of diet is worse for impoverished urban denizens than suburban residents, according to two studies conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The studies examined healthy food availability and diet quality in the city of Baltimore and its surrounding county.
They found 46% of lower-income neighborhoods had a low availability of healthy foods, items such as fresh fruits and vegetables, skim milk and whole wheat bread as recommended by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Geography plays a larger role in dietary health than previously estimated. And, 24% of the black participants lived in neighborhoods with a low availability of healthy food compared with 5% of whites.
The second study examined the availability of healthy foods across 159 neighborhoods and 226 neighborhood stores in Baltimore and the surrounding county. Researchers found that 43% of predominantly black neighborhoods and 46% of lower-income neighborhoods had low availability of healthy foods, compared to 4% and 13%, respectively, in predominantly white and higher-income neighborhoods.
Where you live is a major determinant of your health, and staff at ACP Internist noted that this study could happen in our hometown of Philadelphia and probably get the same result. It could happen in any city, we suspect.
Labels: epidemiology, Nutrition
posted by Ryan DuBosar at
8:00 AM
1 Comments
Monday, February 16, 2009
Database may speed diagnosis of drug-resistant TB
A new publicly available Web database allows quick searches of specific mutations associated with drug-resistant tuberculosis. The tool includes the most common mutations found for the major groups of anti-TB drugs, something researchers hope will speed development of new sequence-based diagnostic tools and avoid treatment delays "during which patients receive suboptimal therapy that may lead to development of additional resistance and further spread of drug-resistant TB," according to researchers who developed the tool.
The database is easy to use, just click on a drug class, such as aminoglycosides or ethambutol, select a gene associated with resistance, and a histogram pops up displaying the mutations and corresponding confidence levels.
The research behind the database is explained in a study by led by Harvard epidemiologists published in the current issue of PLoS Medicine.
Labels: epidemiology, tuberculosis
posted by Janet Colwell at
9:51 AM
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Monday, November 17, 2008
Congrats, Burlington: America's healthiest city
Congratulations to Burlington, Vt., which a CDC report found to be America's healthiest city because 92% of its residents reported being in good health.
The AP reported Burlington has relatively low poverty, higher average education, a large employer offering generous health benefits and community support for recreational activities and healthy foods.
At the bottom of the list was Huntington, W.Va., which had twice as much poverty and less than half of the number of college-educated people.
Labels: CDC, epidemiology
posted by Ryan DuBosar at
9:33 AM
0 Comments
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Googling the flu
The datameisters at Google say they can track potential flu epidemics two weeks earlier than the CDC by tracking people's searches for flu information online.
Google's non-profit arm, Google.org, is trying to apply its heft as the most popular search engine to tackle poverty, renewable energy and small-business growth. And now, they're applying the power of the millions of global users looking for health data to track the flu.
According to Google's blog, millions of users around the world search for online health information weekly. There are more flu-related searches during flu season, more allergy-related searches during allergy season, and more sunburn-related searches during the summer. A pattern emerges when all the flu-related search queries from each state and region are added together, Google says.
To test their hypothesis, Google compared search queries with CDC data to find out which searches occured during flu season, and then extrapolated that frequency provides an estimate how much flu is circulating. They used last year's flu season as a test and now claim to have accurately estimated flu levels one to two weeks faster than published CDC reports across the nine U.S. surveillance regions.
Additional details are available in a draft manuscript and a later version has been accepted in Nature.
Labels: epidemiology, flu, infectious disease
posted by Ryan DuBosar at
9:09 AM
0 Comments
ACP Internist hosted Grand Rounds on June 16, wrapping up the best of the medical blogosphere. Click here for the complete wrap-up.
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