"The Global Consciousness Project, also known as the EGG Project, is an international multidisciplinary collaboration of scientists, engineers, artists and others continuously collecting data from a global network of physical random number generators located in 65 host sites worldwide. The archive contains over 10 years of random data in parallel sequences of synchronized 200-bit trials every second."
Dr. Rosenthal is the Editor in Chief of Kaiser Health News. She was an Emergency Room physician before becoming a journalist.
A $1,775 Doctor’s Visit Cost About $350 in Maryland. Here’s Why.
Illustration by Alvaro Dominguez
For the past 18 months, while I was undergoing intensive physical therapy and many neurological tests after a complicated head injury, my friends would point to a silver lining: “Now you’ll be able to write about your own bills.” After all, I’d spent the past decade as a journalist covering the often-bankrupting cost of U.S. medical care.
But my bills were, in fact, mostly totally reasonable.
That’s largely because I live in Washington, D.C., and received the majority of my care in next-door Maryland, the one state in the nation that controls what hospitals can charge for services and has a cap on spending growth.
Players in the health care world — from hospitals to pharmaceutical manufacturers to doctors’ groups — act as if the sky would fall if health care prices were regulated or spending capped. Instead, health care prices are determined by a dysfunctional market in which providers charge whatever they want and insurers or middlemen like pharmacy benefit managers negotiate them down to slightly less stratospheric levels.
But for decades, an independent state commission of health care experts in Maryland, appointed by the governor, has effectively told hospitals what each of them may charge, with a bit of leeway, requiring every insurer to reimburse a hospital at the same rate for a medical intervention in a system called “all-payer rate setting.” In 2014, Maryland also instituted a global cap and budget for each hospital in the state. Rather than being paid per test and procedure, hospitals would get a set amount of money for the entire year for patient care. The per capita hospital cost could rise only a small amount annually, forcing price increases to be circumspect.
If the care in the Baltimore-based Johns Hopkins Medicine system ensured my recovery, Maryland’s financial guardrails for hospitals effectively protected my wallet.
During my months of treatment, I got a second opinion at a similarly prestigious hospital in New York, giving me the opportunity to see how medical centers without such financial constraints bill for similar kinds of services.
Visits at Johns Hopkins with a top neurologist were billed at $350 to $400, which was reasonable, and arguably a bargain. In New York, the same type of appointment was $1,775. My first spinal tap, at Johns Hopkins, was done in an exam room by a neurology fellow and billed as an office visit. The second hospital had spinal taps done in a procedure suite under ultrasound guidance by neuroradiologists. It was billed as “surgery,” for a price of $6,244.38. The physician charge was $3,782.
I got terrific care at both hospitals, and the doctors who provided my care did not set these prices. All of the charges were reduced after insurance negotiations, and I generally owed very little. But since the price charged is often the starting point, hospitals that charge a lot get a lot, adding to America’s sky-high health care costs and our rising insurance premiums to cover them.
It wasn’t easy for Maryland to enact its unique health care system. The state imposed rate setting in the mid-1970s because hospital charges per patient were rising fast, and the system was in financial trouble. Hospitals supported the deal — which required a federal waiver to experiment with the new system — because even though the hospitals could no longer bill high rates for patients with commercial insurance, the state guaranteed they would get a reasonable, consistent rate for all their services, regardless of insurer.
The rate was more generous than Medicare’s usual payment, which (in theory at least) is calculated to allow hospitals to deliver high-quality care. The hospitals also got funds for teaching doctors in training and taking care of the uninsured — services that could previously go uncompensated.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, July 24, 2021
“I’m admitting young healthy people to the hospital with very serious COVID infections. One of the last things they do before they’re intubated is beg me for the vaccine. I hold their hand and tell them that ‘I’m sorry, but it’s too late’.
“A few days later when I call time of death, I hug their family members and I tell them the best way to honor their loved one is to go get vaccinated and encourage everyone they know to do the same.
“They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color they wouldn’t get as sick. They thought it was ‘just the flu.’
“So they thank me and they go get the vaccine. And I go back to my office, write their death note, and say a small prayer that this loss will save more lives.
Dr. Brytney Cobia, MD is a Hospitalist at Grandview Medical Center in Birmingham, AL.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, May 26, 2018
The American Association of Family Physicians website had a glaringly obvious spelling goof in their headline criticizing Board Certified Advanced Practice Registered Nurses.
In a strangely ironic, even cruel twist, the American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) authored a letter dated 10 May 2018 criticizing the efforts of the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) to encourage states to expand their Nursing Scope of Practice laws to more accurately reflect uniformity of standards, and allow professionally Board Certified Advanced Practice Registered Nurses (APRN-BC) with ability, education, and training to practice to the fullest extent of their license for the benefit of patients and Public Health. News of the AAFP’s letter was published on their website 16 May.
However, since that news item’s publication, the website contained an obviously glaring spelling error, which negatively reflects upon the physicians’ professional organization, and has neither been noticed, nor corrected as of the date of publication of this entry – Saturday, 26 May 2018.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Monday, October 23, 2017
In a recent exchange online dialogue with friends – some, whom to the casual observer would be diametrically opposed on many policy ideas – I was, once again, pleased to note that, despite the SEEMING APPEARANCE of differences, we share SIGNIFICANT common ground.
In fact, I have found that to be quite true with many, that when we move past the vitriolic venomous sport of castigating political candidates, and speak in respectful tones, patiently explaining the whys and wherefores of potential policy, we share many common bonds, and similar ideas.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, June 27, 2017
The Department of Justice, United States Attorney’s Office, Southern District, announced that Mobile, Alabama physician Dr. James Matthew Crumb, MD (AL license number MD.24535, AL Controlled Substances Certificate ACSC.245, National Provider Identifier: 1629079793 ) a Physical Medicine and Rehabilitative physician who currently practices as Mobility Metabolism and Wellness (MMW), and a local neurosurgeon group Coastal Neurological Institute, P.C. (CNI), 3280 Dauphin Street, Suite A, Mobile, AL 36606-4060, (NPI:1740212174), have collectively paid $1.4 million to settle allegations that they violated the False Claims Act (“FCA”) by engaging in fraudulent schemes to maximize payment from the Medicare, Medicaid, and TRICARE health care programs.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, May 12, 2017
A friend had shared the opening paragraph, upon which I remarked.
My response follows.
“At the risk of stating the obvious, I feel compelled to note that insurance companies do not exist to provide health care. They exist to make money. Big money. Big money at your time of greatest vulnerability. This happens by raising income as much as possible and limiting “risk” as much as possible. Now go ponder the implications.”
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Sunday, October 26, 2014
Editor’s Note, Saturday, 15 October 2016: Since Sunday, October 26, 2014, the original publishing date of this article, Yellowhammer News blog has thought to create their own entry (herein linked) obliquely contradicting the data supplied and referenced in this entry, which has now been published for over two years. Though they do not refute the data cited herein, instead, they refer to an Alabama-based data analysis company, and present data exclusively from the United Nations’ Human Development Index to support their assertion. In stark contrast, we use source citation and and references to the variety of sources used to compare Alabama to Third World Nations.
Also entitled as: How does Alabama compare with Third World Countries?
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In so many comparative rankings for quality of life within our 50 United States, Alabama and Mississippi seem in a dead heat for last place. In a veritable “Race To The Bottom,” Alabama and Mississippi scrap over being in last place. In fact, it’s been a long-standing joke — with the sad, bitter sting of truth — that Alabama’s State Motto is not “Audemus jura nostra defendere,” which has been translated as: “We Dare Maintain Our Rights” or “We Dare Defend Our Rights,” but rather “Thank God For Mississippi.”
And just so we’re singing on the same sheet of music, and on the same verse, a “Third World Nation” is one which were at one time colonies “formally lead by imperialism. The end of imperialism forced these colonies to survive on their own. With lack of support, these colonies started to develop characteristics such as poverty, high birthrates and economic dependence on other countries. The term was then affiliated to the economic situation of these former colonies and not their social alliances to either capitalism or communism.” In a more modern sense however, a “Third World Nation,” is more readily thought of as being one of several “underdeveloped nations of the world, especially those with widespread poverty.” And it is in that sense to which I refer to Alabama as “a Third World Nation.”
In essence, what that term refers to is Quality Of Life. And, there are many aspects of life that can be measured, such as rates and incidences of crime, employment/unemployment, education, health/sickness/disease, responsive & efficient government, availability of clean water, sewerage, utilities such as electricity, natural gas, supporting infrastructure to deliver those utilities, which includes transportation, roads, highways, airports, railways, and access to the same. There is much more to life than the mere availability of food, clothing and shelter. For example, who would want to eat raw meat, wear bearskins, and live in a cave? In context, those three items are certainly fulfilled. And if that’s all there is, then all is well… right?
Demonstrating that, again, there is MUCH MORE to life than the mere availability of food, clothing and shelter.
Consider, for example, Public Health.
Rates of Obesity, and Obesity-related Diseases (also called chronic, or long-term problems) such as Diabetes, Hypertension (High Blood Pressure), Stroke, and certain types of Cancer, in Mississippi and Alabama are among the highest in our United States. While Obesity is quickly becoming an epidemic of significant national proportions, it is particularly problematic in Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, June 6, 2014
Official portrait, Parker Griffith, MD as freshman member of the United States House of Representatives, Alabama 5th Congressional District.
Campaign photograph – 53rd Alabama Governor Robert Bentley, Jr., MD
As a politician, Parker Griffith has been described as “maverick.”
To describe it diplomatically, he has been “somewhat unpredictable.”
To be blunt, he’s a loose cannon.
His most recent political aspiration includes 2014 candidacy for Alabama governor under the Democratic ticket, challenging first term Republican Robert Bentley (described as “wildly popular”), whom is similarly a retired physician, and former Alabama State House Representative from Tuscaloosa, whom has publicly announced his opinion that he will be re-elected during a tour of Julia Tutwiler Prison for Women, where sexual assaults, and abuses of innumerable kind have become so rampantly commonplace that Alabama’s prison system is verging upon federal takeover.
Griffith’s greatest obstacle is his past. More specifically, the greatest mountain he must conquer is his decision to switch parties (from Democrat to Republican) while in his first term in Congress, which abruptly ended his political aspirations.
The nightmare of his actions still haunts Alabama voters, many whom have not forgotten – including those in his hometown, Huntsville & Madison County. Like the ghastly spectre in Charles Dickens’ classic fiction “A Christmas Carol,” Parker Griffith must come face-to-face with the Ghost of Election Past, and Bentley with the Ghost of Alabama Yet to Come.
And in this real-life play, Bob Cratchit is played by the people, while 18.1% of the state’s population (the state poverty rate) are cast as the sickly child, Tiny Tim. They and others are the ones whom are denied by the Scrooge, played by Governor Bentley and Republican-dominated state legislature.
In reality, Griffith and Bentley play dual roles in this real-life political /social /medical /economic drama.
Charles Dickens circa 1850: he ‘kept on going by taking on too much’. Photograph: Herbert Watkins
Is there salvation for Griffith?
Will Bentley expand Medicaid?
Can anyone really help the citizens of Alabama?
Tune in next time! when we hear _?_ say…
Griffith’s last foray into politics – as Representative for Alabama’s 5th Congressional District – did not bode well, for after the first full year of a two-year term, he announced he was changing political party affiliation, for which he was resoundingly criticized at home by his constituency, in the press for his actions, and then subsequently resoundingly defeated by GOP challenger “Mo” Brooks in the 2010 Republican primary.
That’s the message of the new edition of the bible for American psychiatrists, DSM-5. Diagnostic inflation is about to become hyperinflation.
“We are all mad here” explains the Cat to Alice when she wonders about the strangeness of Wonderland. Well, life is starting to follow art. If people make the mistake of following DSM-5, the new diagnostic manual in psychiatry that was published on Saturday, pretty soon all of us may be labelled mad.
When I worked on the taskforce for DSM-4, we were very concerned about taming diagnostic inflation – but we only partly succeeded. Then four years ago, I became aware of the excessive enthusiasm around all the new diagnoses being proposed for DSM-5, including many that were untested. I hate to rain on anyone’s parade, but I knew this would be disastrous for the millions of people who were likely to be mislabelled, stigmatised and given excessive treatment.
In the US, the “sick” are distinguished from the “well” by the diagnostic and statistical manuals developed by the American Psychiatric Association.
The problem is that definitions of mental disorders are already written too loosely and are applied much too carelessly by clinicians, especially by the GPs who do most of the prescribing of psychiatric drugs.
And things are about to get much worse. Under DSM-5 diagnostic inflation looks set to become hyperinflation and will lead to an even greater glut of unnecessary medication. I would qualify for a bunch of the new labels myself – and you might too.
The grief I felt when my wife died would now be called “major depressive disorder”; forgetfulness in older age “mild neurocognitive disorder”; my gluttony now “binge eating disorder”; and my hyperactivity “attention deficit disorder”. As for my twin grandsons’ temper tantrums, this could be misunderstood as “disruptive mood dysregulation disorder”. And if you have cancer and your doctor thinks you are too worried about it, there’s “somatic symptom disorder.” It goes on, but you get the idea.
One consolation: the kids are not suddenly getting much sicker – human nature is pretty stable. But the way we label symptoms follows fickle fashions, changing quickly and arbitrarily. And freely giving out inaccurate diagnoses can Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, February 22, 2013
Realistically, what does that mean for you, your loved ones or friends if – God forbid – they’re hospitalized at Huntsville Hospital?
It means that when you, your loved ones’ or friends’ are a patient in the hospital, you or they could get an infection, or some other serious bug or problem while being treated for something else entirely different. And by so doing, it could make your stay more unpleasant, and in fact, could increase the risk of complications of your treatment – up to, and including your death – was well as increase the length of your stay, among other factors.
What does that mean for the Hospital?
Because insurance companies and Medicare/Medicaid have STOPPED paying for the treatment of preventable problems that are a direct result of hospitalization, it means that Huntsville Hospital will be stuck with the bill (the costs of treating their own mistakes upon you while you’re there)… and will try to pass the cost along to you to recoup the cost of the loss, which is a DIRECT result of their own sloppiness.
Huntsville Hospital has essentially become a monopolistic monstrosity of an enterprise, gobbling up numerous hospitals in the North Alabama region, including BOTH hospitals in Decatur, the only hospital in Athens, the only hospital in Red Bay, Helen Keller Hospital in Tuscumbia area of the Shoals, and the only hospital in Lawrence county.
Meanwhile, Huntsville hospital has fought tooth-and-nail to keep other hospitals OUT of competition in the Huntsville market, and spent untold millions of dollars in a protracted legal battle against Crestwood Hospital – and continues to spend millions to prevent Crestwood Hospital from offering services that would benefit the entire city and county.
The commentary of Mr. Burr Ingram – Huntsville Hospital’s official mouthpiece – which is contained in this article is entirely and wholly unwarranted, and weasel-like.
Not only that, but Huntsville Hospital is NOT a Nursing Magnet Hospital.
There are many things Huntsville Hospital is not.
And sadly, quality is one of them.
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Watchdog Report: Consumer Reports gives both hospitals in Huntsville low safety ratings
Published: Thursday, July 12, 2012, 9:06 AM Updated: Thursday, July 12, 2012, 9:30 AM
HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — Consumer Reportsmagazine ranked the two hospitals in Huntsville as the least safe in Alabama. But the magazine’s list of hospitals is far from complete.
“We were kind of perplexed at some of what it reported,” said Burr Ingram, spokesman at Huntsville Hospital. “When you think about it, it’s fashionable for everyone to rate hospitals. And Consumer Reports is the latest to use public data that is available.
“But at times, it’s difficult to know how these ratings come about.”
Huntsville Hospital, The Huntsville Times
The magazine’s August edition lists scores in four safety categories. Both Huntsville Hospital and Crestwood Medical Center received low marks for poor communication with patients and for high rates of infection. Both received mediocre marks for high rates of re-admission and unnecessary scans.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Recollecting, one of my patients was similarly diagnosed, suffering terminal lung cancer of the small cell carcinoma type, and had one lung removed. He had presented to the ED (Emergency Department) with extreme hypoxia (lack of oxygen), to such an extent that his lips had a distinctive blue cast to them. His oxygenation was so exceedingly poor, that he would turn in bed, and his sats (oxygen saturation level) would drop to 70% – neither a good, nor one that would sustain life.
In conversation with him, I asked him what he wanted to have happen to him, how he wanted things to turn out for him. He wasn’t under any misguided notion about his state of well-being or health and wanted to depart the ICU.
He said, “I want to go home to die.”
I responded by saying, “We want you to go home too. Let’s see what we can do to get you back there.” At that point, I began some very simple teaching about his breathing. He was a habitual mouth breather, and he knew it. I’d glance up at him, and his mouth would be gaping open as he watched teevee. Problem was, that every time his mouth opened, his sats dropped, even though he was receiving high flow O2 therapy via specialized nasal cannula.
So I instructed him that by keeping his mouth closed and breathing through his nose, his sats would increase. And barring any other unforeseen circumstance, were his sats to consistently maintain above 90%, that would be the greatest step toward his objective to go home.
At the end of my shift, he was consistently satting 98%.
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Doctors are practicing irrational medicine at the end of life
I just took care of a precious little lady, Ms. King (not her real name), who reminded me that, too often, we doctors are practicing irrational medicine at the end of life. We are like cows walking mindlessly in the same paths; only because we have always done things the same way, never questioning ourselves. What I mean is that we are often too focused on using our routine pills and procedures used to address abnormal lab values or abnormal organ function, to rightly perceive what might be best for the whole person, or even what may no longer be needed. Our typical practice habits may in fact become inappropriate medical practiceat life’s end.Ms. King was a case in point: She was a 92-year-old nursing homepatient on hospice for metastatic breast cancer. Ms King had been transferred to the ER for a sudden drop in blood sugar, presumably due to her oral diabetes medication. Her appetite had apparently been trailing off, as is common at the end of life, and her medication appeared to have become “too strong.” Her glucose level had been corrected by EMS during her trip from the nursing home to the Hospital, so when I came into see Ms King she was at her ‘baseline.’I opened the door to bed 24 and a grinning little white-haired lady peered at me from over her sheet. “Hi,” she said greeting me first.“Hi, Ms King,” I smiled back at her and picked up her hand.
She reached over with her free hand to pat me on my forearm, “You sure are a cute little doctor,” she said smiling.
I couldn’t hold back a little laughter. “Well, you sure are a cute patient too,” I smiled and winked at her.
She winked back at me.
“Wow, this is the most pleasant 90-year-old I have cared for in a while,” I thought to myself.
As we chatted it became clear to me that she had some mild dementia but had no pain or complaints at the time. She just said, “I think I had a ‘spell’” ( a “Southernism” for some type of unusual and undefined episode of feeling ill or fainting); and “I’m not hungry” when I offered her food.
Leaving her room still smiling after our pleasant exchange, I went back to look at her medical record from the nursing home and two things immediately struck me: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Saturday, June 23, 2012
Here is another prime case in point why the state of Alabama should eliminate the Certificate of Need Board, the CON law, and the entire process associated with it.
First, aren’t companies and their Chief Executives, Financial Officers, Managers and others capable of determining whether or not they could provide services in a cost-effective, or even profitable manner?
Yes, they are. So why should government – by and through the CON law – tell them that they are incompetent to do so, and in fact, forbid them from making that decision?
Literally, if Bill Gates wanted to build a free hospital in Alabama, he could NOT because FIRST he would have to obtain permission from the CON Board. And just to eliminate any confusion, a CON Board permit to build a hospital is NOT a construction permit. In fact, a CON Board permit must FIRST be obtained BEFORE a construction permit is granted.
For those not aware of what the CON Board does, they are a group of politically-appointed individuals before whom any group, organization or individual desiring to build a hospital must cajole, plead and beg for permission to build a hospital.
They must literally make and prove a case for why a hospital is needed before they can even move the first shovelful of dirt. Even then, if they are not given permission from “BIG BROTHER” to build a hospital, they must then appear before a judge to further plead their case. And strangely, they’re not merely opposed, but are actively fought, tooth and nail throughout the entire process by the very folks that should be helping improve patient health and providing care… other hospitals. It forces healers to become sworn cutthroat enemies.
And just so you, dear reader, will be aware, the original CON law was first written by the U.S. Congress, the purpose of which was designed to keep healthcare costs from increasing at an uncontrolled rate. However, the Congress quickly abandoned and rescinded the law after it was demonstrated that it had no effect upon rapidly escalating costs. The only state to NOT enact any form of CON law was Louisiana.
I’ve written about the process here on this blog (Tuesday, June 22, 2010), and have, as a private citizen, communicated with the Alabama state legislature and governor to encourage them to abolish the law, board and process.
If you care at all about healthcare – either for you, your family, loved ones, friends or anyone – I wholeheartedly encourage you to read that post, because it more fully details the reasons why the CON process actually serves to deteriorate public health, and drain Alabama’s public tax dollars.
In a nutshell, the fussing, fighting, feuding that is associated with the CON process co$t$ $ignificantly, which co$t$ are pa$$ed onto the patient & in$urance companie$.
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FLORENCE – The behind-the-scenes struggle between publicly owned Helen Keller Hospital and Huntsville Hospital and privately owned RegionalCare Hospital Partners has invaded the local political arena.
My colleague loved performing surgery as much as anyone I had ever met. Every morning he bounded into the hospital, full of energy and cheerful anticipation of the day’s surgical schedule, his prominent mouth stretched into a broad grin.
“Too bad his foot is always in it,” another doctor whispered one day as our colleague passed by.
The sad truth was that despite his gusto, patients often complained about our colleague. He was brusque when the moment required sensitivity, flip when the conversation was grave, and heavy-handed when the situation called for a light touch. Just a few days earlier, we were shocked to learn he’d bluntly told an elderly war hero in the hospital for his diabetes, “I need to cut off your leg.”
As a group, they have consistently earned six-figure salaries, typically upwards of $125,000/year.
Among Advanced Practice Nurses, CRNAs have continually earned significantly more than the average APN.
In fact, according to a salary survey report performed in 2005 by LocumTenens.com, CRNA respondents reported income ranging from $90,000-$250,000, with 63% reported earning between $110,000-$170,000/year.
The average salaries reported were: 2008-$163,467 / 2009-$169,043 / 2010-$166,833.
And, in 2011, the average reported salary for CRNAs in that survey was $168,998.
Research published by the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists in AANA Journal, April 2008, indicated that the median range for CRNA faculty – academic and clinical – earned between $120,000 and $140,000.
So, as you read the following items, please bear that in mind.
Among Nurses, NPs and Those in the West Earn the Most
Jennifer Garcia
Authors and Disclosures
Journalist
Jennifer Garcia
Jennifer Garcia is a freelance writer for Medscape.
Disclosure: Jennifer Garcia has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.
May 11, 2012 — Nurse practitioners are the top earners among nurses, according to the Physicians Practice 2012 Staff Salary Survey. The survey reports salary averages from 1268 respondents, including nurse practitioners, registered nurses, and nurse managers. Salary information from other staff members such as physician assistants, medical records clerks, medical assistants, front desk staff, billing managers, and medical billers was also included in the survey.
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, April 17, 2012
From a holistic healthcare perspective, a problematic issue that remains a common thread among many healthcare practitioners is the notion that a patient is a collection of symptoms, problems to be solved, or diseases cured.
This is not some witchcraft mumbo jumbo hyperbole, akin to the fallacious notion that frequently accompanies “naturopathic” ideology, which itself is wholly without any merit, scientific or otherwise… save that some damn fools spend money on that snake oil peddled by unscrupulous vendors.
This simple idea is that we are an entire collection of things – emotions, thoughts, physiological symptoms and more – all work together to make us who we are. It’s kinda’ like asking the proverbial question, ‘which leg of a three-legged stool is most important?’
A very simple question is changing the delivery of medical care: How is your health affecting your quality of life? Laura Landro explains on Lunch Break. Photo: Robert Neubecker/WSJ.
A very simple question is changing the delivery of medical care: How is your health affecting your quality of life? Laura Landro explains on Lunch Break. Photo: Robert Neubecker/WSJ.
A very simple question is changing the delivery of medical care:
How is your health affecting your quality of life?
For decades, numbers drove the treatment of diseases like asthma, heart disease, diabetes, and arthritis. Public-health officials focused on reducing mortality rates and hitting targets like blood-sugar levels for people with diabetes or cholesterol levels for those with heart disease.
Doctors, of course, are still monitoring such numbers. But now health-care providers are also adding a whole different, more subjective measure—how people feel about their condition and overall well-being. They’re pushing for programs where nurses or trained counselors meet with people and ask Read the rest of this entry »
(a) A person commits the crime of hindering prosecution in the first degree if with the intent to hinder the apprehension, prosecution, conviction or punishment of another for conduct constituting a murder or a Class A or B felony, he renders criminal assistance to such person.
(b) Hindering prosecution in the first degree is a Class C felony.
(Acts 1977, No. 607, p. 812, §4636; Acts 1979, No. 79- 471, p. 862, §1.)
MADISON — A doctor who practiced in Athens was arrested Friday night by Madison police, accused of hindering prosecution for allegedly aiding his teen son, a murder suspect, in an attempt to flee Alabama.
Dr. Iqbal Memon, who occasionally wrote medical columns for The News Courier several years ago, was arrested after his son, Hammad Memon, 17, was captured in Dallas with his mother and 6-year-old sister. Authorities said Hammad had a Pakistani passport in his possession.
The family members apparently left Alabama Wednesday or Thursday after an express mail delivery person reported Hammad had signed for an envelope believed to contain a passport, which was a violation of the terms of Hammad’s bail on a charge of shooting to death classmate Todd Brown, 14, at Discovery Middle School in 2010. Brown lived in Madison with his mother at the time; his father Michael Brown is from Tanner.
The Memon family lives in Madison, where Memon had a second physician’s office.
Hammad was 14 at the time of the shooting but was to be tried as an adult on June 18.
Dr. Memon was charged with hindering prosecution after Madison Police investigators suspected he was not being forthcoming about his family’s location. Read the rest of this entry »
CMS plans to base the 2015 bonuses or penalties on what happens to a doctor's patients during 2013.
Twenty-thousand physicians in four Midwest states received a glimpse into their financial future last month. Landing in their e-mail inboxes were links to reports from Medicare showing the amount their patients cost on average as well as the quality of the care they provided. The reports also showed how Medicare spending on each doctor’s patients compared with their peers in Kansas, Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska.
The “resource use” reports, which Medicare plans to eventually provide to doctors nationwide, are one of the most visible phases of the government’s effort to figure out how to enact a complex, delicate and little-noticed provision of the 2010 health-care law: paying more to doctors who provide quality care at lower cost to Medicare, and reducing payments to physicians who run up Medicare’s costs without better results.
Making providers routinely pay attention to cost and quality is widely viewed as crucial if the country is going to rein in its health-care spending, which amounts to more than $2.5 trillion a year. It’s also key to keeping Medicare solvent. Efforts have begun to change the way Medicare pays hospitals, doctors and other providers who agree to work together in new alliances known as “accountable care organizations.” This fall, the federal health program for 47 million seniors and disabled people also is adjusting hospital payments based on quality of care, and it plans to take cost into account as early as next year.
Use it as clothing; place it on the ground, etc. The photog is a retired US Army LTC, MD (Lieutenant Colonel, O-5). Of all people, he SHOULD know better.
Desecration is defined as
• “the act of depriving something of its sacred character—or the disrespectful or contemptuous treatment of that which is held to be sacred by a group or individual,;”
• to “treat (a sacred place or thing) with violent disrespect; violate;”
• “to profane or violate the sacredness or sanctity of something; to remove the consecration from someone or something; to deconsecrate;”
• as “an act of disrespect or impiety towards something considered sacred;”
• and to be “treated with contempt.”
Flag Desecration - writing on flag, and used as a garment
Flag Desecration - flag on ground, written upon, used as garment
[Note: This entry was originally entitled “Privacy,” and was transferred to this site, having previously been posted by me on Monday, May 3, 2010 at 2:57pm.]
The development of our right to privacy emerged, interestingly enough, from Griswold v Connecticut, a 1965 Supreme Court Case which challenged the state’s 1879 criminalizing of a married couple’s use of contraceptive devices. Appellants were the Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Okay, let’s get this straight. If you’re “emo” or “goth,” you’re a damn freak. You’re mentally unstable. You need psychiatric help. Period. Let somebody help you… PLEASE!!
Now, onto the news.
Guess what?! Amy Bishop’s husband, James Anderson, has publicly said he met Amy at a Dungeons and Dragons meeting. Yeah, great. What’s that like? Saying, ‘I met my wife – who used to be a man – at a bisexual swinger’s sex-swap party’? It’s just plain messed up. Period.
True, Amy Bishop, PhD, aka “the UAHBomber,” was busted for going postal at the …Continue…
Posted by Warm Southern Breeze on Friday, January 15, 2010
Liar… thief…
Those terms just seem to gravitate toward AL 5th Congressional District Rep. Parker Griffith, MD (R) who recently, halfway through his first two-year term, jumped Democratic ship for the Republican party.
Perhaps it’s not as much his secretive “I’m going to switch parties half-way in my first two-year term,” attitude that bothers people as much as it is his now-broken promises – essentially lies – such as the one to return campaign contributions to disgruntled donors.
I suppose a good analogy would be his sex change. Griffith married a woman, representing himself to be a man. After the birth and rearing of their children (halfway through his life), he announces to his wife and family he’s a woman and will be having a sex change – which in turn, of course, would make her a lesbian – which she is not – and consequently call into question the validity of their marriage.
In that light, two other words seem apropos for Griffith – mentally defective.
Family’s more strident words might include traitor… asshole.
Of course, ultimately, the one to be pitied is Griffith, and secondarily the people he injured (his family representing his constituency) along his selfish and misguided way. And in this case, divorce would only add insult to injury. What is genuinely needed is intensive psychotherapy for Griffith.
Warm Southern Breeze 