Doctors

Do you think your doctor is open and honest with you? Maybe not always, according to a new survey. Researchers from Harvard Medical School and the Mongan Institute for Health Policy at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston surveyed 1,891 physicians nationwide and one-tenth said they had told a patient something untruthful in the last year. Nearly 20 percent of physicians surveyed said they had not fully disclosed an error to a patient in the previous year because they feared a malpractice case.

Orioles second baseman Brian Roberts knew the significance of Wednesday's date. It marked the one-year anniversary of Roberts' last game, when his headfirst slide at Fenway Park triggered a second wave of concussion symptoms May 16, 2011. Roberts said Wednesday that he has thought about the date - and about being out of the game for a full year - but that it helps that he feels closer than ever to a return. Roberts, who averaged 152 games a year from 2004 through 2009, has played in just 98 games since the beginning of the 2010 season.

A Johns Hopkins bioethicist joined other government and health officials in calling on the U.S. Congress to do more to protect doctors in war zones such as Syria. In recent remarks to Congress, Leonard Rubenstein, a bioethicist at Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics specializing in protection of human rights in areas of conflict, said violations of medical neutrality must have consequences. “Adherence to norms won't take place unless it becomes a diplomatic priority, with the U.S. and other states using their considerable leverage to demand adherence to international law,” he said in a prepared statement.

Susan G. Komen for the Cureon Thursday announced $58 million in grants to support breast cancer research.  The 154 grants were given to researchers in 22 states, including Maryland, and 7 countries. The grants will cover a wide spectrum of breast cancer research, including prevention, environmental issues, more sensitive screening, personalized treatments and factors that lead to worse breast cancer outcomes in minorities and special populations. Maryland grants were given to: Dr. Preethi Korangath of John Hopkins University, $120,000 Angela Brodie of the University of Maryland, $250,000 Vered Stearns of Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, $175,000 Sarah Sukumar of John Hopkins University, $250,000 Antonio Wolff of John Hopkins University, 62,500 grant  

Doctors who have access to computer test results order more tests than doctors who don't, according to a new study that challenges an assumption about electronic health records. The study in the March issue of the journal Health Affairs found that doctors with access to computerized images ordered 40 to 70 percent more imaging and lab tests. The study authors warn that pushing for more health information technology might not deliver cost savings from reductions in duplicative or inappropriate tests and could drive up costs.

Right tackle Jared Gaither lasted one practice this week before the Ravens decided to send him back to a Los Angeles physician for another opinion on the mysterious injury that has derailed his season. For the first time, Coach John Harbaugh acknowledged Friday that there was a limit to how long the Ravens could wait for Gaither to get healthy before putting him on injured reserve for the season. "There's … always a clock running on that because you've got to make decisions based on injuries," Harbaugh said.

Nurse practitioners who educated legislators, negotiated with MedChi and reached out to all stakeholders were happy with the outcome of legislation to reduce the administrative burden of a physician collaborative agreement. The lengthy form and approval process was eliminated and will be replaced with a written statement by each nurse practitioner on file at the Board of Nursing. This highlights two things. First, public acceptance of the high quality, safe and cost effective care by nurse practitioners.

We physicians are not a trade union ("Got a better plan for reducing Medicare costs?" April 5). We have a monopoly on an essential service. As such, we are not permitted to unionize without violating antitrust laws. However, medical practice is voluntary. If pay does not cover costs, especially of massive student loan payback and practice startup costs, there will be less and less access to care. Marylanders should contact their legislators about real tort reform if they expect any reduction in their Medicare costs, as elderly patients and their families expect prompt diagnosis, timely treatment and excellent outcomes regardless of age or prior severe illness.

Washington. -- First the big freebies from drug companies were ruled out of bounds for doctors, thus eliminating the mellow custom of all-expense-paid medical seminars conducted between snorkeling sessions on Caribbean resorts or apres-skis the Alps.Now, the reformers of medical ethics have trained their piety on one of the most ancient fringe benefits of the doctoring trade, ''professional courtesy,'' the genial term for doctors caring for other doctors and kin of doctors for free.According to a survey reported in the New England Journal of Medicine, 96 percent of a broad sampling of practicing physicians said they offered free or cut-rate health care to doctors and their family members.

Inside a small stucco pavilion built as a urology clinic - one of the few buildings in the hospital complex deemed structurally sound - patient after patient was wheeled into the makeshift operating room on an old bed Saturday. Workers doused the walls with disinfectant as a couple of nurses prepped the wounded and gave them a bit of anesthesia. Then out came the saws. The work was amputations. On the grounds of the heavily damaged General Hospital, injured people, some with crudely severed limbs, moaned or stared vacantly.

The Supreme Court's ruling on the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, expected in June, will determine the future for countless Americans. Health care reform debates have elevated the plight of millions of uninsured Americans to the national consciousness. However, the physician workforce that would be needed to care for millions of newly insured people deserves equal attention. There is a growing shortage of primary care physicians in the U.S., and it has been forecasted for decades.

First Lady Michelle Obama is on a mission to get our kids to eat healthy, but every now and then she is known to indulge on a cheeseburger or other food that is not so good for the body. A few years ago she made a lunch run with staff to a Five Guys inWashington, D.C. Well, a physicians group said this is a no-no and wants Michelle Obama and the rest of the first family not to be photographed eating unhealthy foods. The Physicans Committee for Responsible Medicine said that President Obama has posed in a number of staged photos eating unhealthy foods, including hot dogs at a basketball game with British Prime Minister David Cameron.

Facebook has launched a program to promote organ donation, which grew from a conversation between the social media company's chief operating officer and a Johns Hopkins surgeon already passionate about the cause. COO Sheryl Sandberg and Dr. Andrew M. Cameron took the chat they had about the shortage of organs at their 20th college reunion at Harvard University and turned it into reality. Facebook announced Tuesday a new organ transplant initiative that could reach hundreds of millions of people around the world.

It's well known that world-renowned doctors from Johns Hopkins Hospital regularly treat royalty, other dignitaries and U.S. service members. According to the CBS news show 60 Minutes , they also have been called upon to patch up those who don't appear on America's side. As part of a report Sunday about the harsh interrogation techniques used by the government after the9/11attacks, the news program said a Hopkins doctor was brought in to operate on a suspected terrorist.

The Maryland medical society and attorney general's office launched a website Saturday aimed at helping doctors file complaints with the state when insurance companies refuse to cover patient care. "Essentially, our goal was to educate our patients and our physicians that there is an avenue for these complaints," said Gene Ransom III, CEO of MedChi, the state medical society. "We thought, 'Let's make it easier.'" The site, called Insurance Watch, is hosted on the Internet by the medical society.

For the first time in the six years since Victoria Chakwin was diagnosed with a deadly lung disease, the gown she wears won't be hospital issue. The 18-year-old from Martinsburg, W.Va., will go to her senior prom Saturday night in a red-and-black number she found on the Internet. A rite of passage for most teens, the event is more momentous for Victoria - who's known as Tori - because people diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis generally live only three to five years. That she is headed to her prom demonstrates not only the possibilities of modern medicine but the will of the teen and her mother, according to Tori's doctors at the University of Maryland Medical Center, who in late January replaced her scarred, dysfunctional lungs with a donor set. "We can do a lot with technology, if we're not afraid to use it," said Dr. Aldo T. Iacono, medical director of Maryland's lung transplant program, one of the few in the country that will transplant scarce organs into someone so sick.

Forward Marco Terminesi , the leading scorer for the Major Indoor Soccer League's Milwaukee Wave, has been placed on injured reserve as he undergoes an examination for what doctors believe could be a brain tumor. Terminesi, the league's third-leading scorer, has missed five of the Wave's past six games with nausea, headaches and symptoms of vertigo. In a letter to teammates Monday, Terminesi, 25, said doctors believe he has a tumor on the pineal gland in the center of the brain. The type of tumor and its status is unclear, he said.

I'm fascinated with the conversation that IBM's Watson computer system's victory on the TV program "Jeopardy!" has opened up regarding the future of medicine. If you missed the matches, the IBM system competed against the game's best performers, Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter. Watson answered complicated questions filled with literary allusions, puns and wordplay — the sort of things that delight humans but traditionally baffle computers. So what does this "Jeopardy!" game have to do with the next generation of medicine and health care across the United States?

Patients may be getting blood transfusion too often during surgery, according to a new study by Johns Hopkins researchers. The study shows wide variation in the use of transfusions, and those who receive blood fare no better, and sometimes do worse. The problem may be that doctors don't have clear guidelines about when to use the expensive and scarce resource. “Over the past five years, studies have supported giving less blood than we used to, and our research shows that practitioners have not caught up,” said Dr. Steven M. Frank, leader of the study published in the journal Anesthesiology . “Blood conservation is one of the few areas in medicine where outcomes can be improved, risk reduced and costs saved all at the same time,” he said in a statement.

An appointment with a pediatrician Thursday was a "big relief" to Katie Bauer, whose seven-month pregnancy with rare "momo" twins was at first confusing and then exhausting. "It's all behind them, these guys are doing just fine," Dr. Joseph A. Garcia said after he finished immunizing Nolan and Brooks Bauer, identical boys who developed in the same fetal sac, exposing them to dangers not encountered during most pregnancies. The boys were born Feb. 13. Babies like Nolan and Brooks have at least one chance in 10 of dying during the last weeks of pregnancy or the first month after birth — so Garcia's upbeat assessment at two months was an important milestone for the Perry Hall family.