The most effective way we can reduce the global burden of smoking is to target young people. During the debate on standardised packaging of tobacco products, an initiative which has for now been stalled by the government, MP Bob Blackman stressed that, “Two thirds of current smokers began under the age of 18” and that […]
Category: US healthcare
Jen Gunter: Why the recent abortion law in Texas has nothing to do with patient safety
The US Supreme Court recently ruled in a 5:4 decision against an emergency application to stop a Texas law that requires doctors who perform abortions to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles. The basis for the Supreme Court ruling is that this restriction doesn’t place an “undue burden” on a woman seeking […]
Edward Davies: The assassination of JFK and cholesterol
The American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions have rolled into Dallas this week and the city is awash with two conversations: whether the latest cholesterol guidelines will result in the gross over-prescription of statins to the healthy masses, and the assassination of JFK which happened here 50 years ago this week. And while these two disparate […]
Edward Davies: Open data – are you a great big hypocrite?
During the Scientific Sessions of the American Heart Association I spoke to several people and attended a session with several speakers on the importance of open data. On the availability of patient level data, every talk and conversation has had the same two competing threads: 1) Making data more open is hugely important to the […]
William Cayley: Doing more with less in healthcare
The newer the better—or so it seems in much of commercialized medicine. At least in “developed” or “higher income” countries, medical innovation seems inextricably tied with commercial endeavors, which often translate to more expensive ways to do the same things (sometimes, even if we’re not sure the outcomes are truly better) The Bulletin of the […]
Richard Lehman’s journal review—18 November 2013
NEJM 14 Nov 2013 Vol 369 1880 As the Affordable Care Act splutters into action in the USA, JAMA devotes a whole issue to discussing the problems of healthcare in America. But for sheer gut-wrenching impact, there is nothing to beat this free-access article in the NEJM, Dead Man Walking. An uninsured man has just […]
Tiago Villanueva: Is active travel good for health?
If you thought Australia was the envy of the rest of the world in terms of having the most physically active people, think again. Peter McCue, executive officer for the New South Wales Premier’s Council for Active Living, recently gave a talk entitled, “Walk hand in hand: health and transport collaborations,” organised by C3 Collaborating […]
Gabriel Scally: International health starts at home
The sheer number (more than 600) and range of exhibitors that set up stall at the American Public Health Association’s annual meeting is, for me, one of the most interesting aspects of the entire event. The biggest group of exhibitors by far are the academic institutions. A huge number of US universities and schools of […]
Edward Davies: What’s the point of all this? Existential angst at the AAMC
What’s the point of all this? I ask not as a suicidal prelude or remark of self-indulgent philosophy, but after two days at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) annual meeting in Philadelphia, I am finding myself asking, what is our endgame here? As conference delegates, as academics, as doctors, as a research journal—what’s […]
Gabriel Scally: A grotesque parody of fairness
It’s a long way to go from Bristol to Boston for a conference, but I’m adding to my carbon footprint and attending the 141st American Public Health association meeting. It’s an enormous meeting. Despite some tough times in the US local public health departments, 13 000 people are making this meeting, yet again, the biggest […]