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February 27, 2007
Cancer Survivorship Dialogue
The Case Center for Reducing Health Disparities will hold a Cancer Survivor Dialogue on Friday, March 9th from 3:00 p.m. until 4:00 p.m.
This will be a roundtable discussion with providers, community members, and researchers.
Location: Case Medical School - T503 10900 Euclid Avenue.
Please RSVP your attendance to Sharon Lowstetter at slowstetter@metrohealth.org or by calling 216-778-8484. We look forward to seeing you there.
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 27, 2007
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Category: Works in Progress
February 26, 2007
For Best Health - Tell The Truth
Carla K. Johnson of the AP recently posted an article that talks to the issue of patients who lie to their doctor.
There's an open secret in medicine: Patients lie.
They lie about how much they smoke and whether they're taking their medicine. They understate how much they drink and overstate how much they exercise. They feign symptoms to get appointments quicker and ask doctors to hide the truth from insurance companies.
And there are consequences for these lies.
"I definitely learned my lesson. I could have ended up in a coma," said Michael Levine, a 28-year-old financial adviser in Los Angeles, who lied to a specialist he saw for a wrist injury. Misguided pride, he said, kept him from mentioning the Xanax he was taking for anxiety. He didn't think the doctor needed to know.
"He wasn't my regular doctor. He was treating my wrist," Levine explained.
The doctor prescribed the pain reliever Vicodin and Levine took it on top of Xanax. The next few days vanished in a cloud of grogginess. Levine slept through ringing phones and alarms and woke up exhausted. His wrist pain was easing, but he could barely function. Eventually, he stopped the Vicodin, returned to the doctor and, under questioning, confessed.
The problem is widespread.
A study by researchers at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine found a big gap between what patients said and what they did. Researchers looked at how patients with breathing problems used an inhaler equipped with a device that recorded the date and time of use and compared that with what the patients said.
Seventy-three percent of patients reported using the inhaler on average three times a day, but only 15 percent actually were using it that often. And 14 percent apparently deliberately emptied their inhalers before their appointments to make it look as if they were good patients.
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 26, 2007
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Category: Health Care
February 23, 2007
Kaiser Foundation Webcast on Health Disparities
On Friday, March 2nd the Kaiser Foundation will host a webcast that will present findings from their 2006 Healthcare Disparities Report.
The webcast is interactive as questions can be emailed in prior to the broadcast.
More information about the webcast here.
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 23, 2007
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Category: Health Disparities
February 22, 2007
Lead Astray
The Cleveland Free Times consulted Center Director Ash Sehgal M.D. on the issue of revising the federal standard for lead poisoning.
"There are new medical studies that suggest that there's adverse effects for kids at levels below 10, things like intellectual impairment, attention deficit disorder, decreased muscle growth, decreased bone growth," says Sehgal. "So we as a public health community in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County have been considering whether it would make sense, based on this new medical evidence, to lower the action level from 10 down to five. [I]f you do that, then the percentage of kids in Cleveland who have elevated blood levels would go from 11 percent to 42 percent."
And later in the article:
As to the assertion that establishing a threshold below 10 would be arbitrary, Sehgal says, "We feel that there's all these kids in Cleveland who are suffering the adverse effects of lead, and, sure, it would be arbitrary to lower it to five instead of three or six or whatever, but you have to start somewhere and we think going down halfway is a good place to begin. Maybe in the future there'll be more studies that'll say it should be even lower, but based on the scientific evidence, we think that five is a reasonable place to shoot for."
You can read the complete story here.
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 22, 2007
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Category: Health Care
February 20, 2007
Uninsured at an All-Time High
From Ivanhoe.com:
The latest data from the U.S. census bureau shows the number of uninsured people in America is at an all-time high at 46.6 million. One expert warns the problems of the health care system in America are getting worse.
And the lack of insurance usually leads to less care.
Davis also points out people who are uninsured or underinsured are more than twice as likely to report going without needed care because of costs. When they do get care, they often spend so much money on out-of-pocket expenses, the uninsured face financial hardship.
Links to more information on health disparities and the uninsured.
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 20, 2007
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Category: Health Disparities
February 08, 2007
You Have The Appointment - Will You Be Given The Time?
NYTimes.com is reporting on an article in Health Services Research, Time Allocation in Primary Care Office Visits.
From NYTimes.com:
The median time for visits, the researchers said, was just under 16 minutes.
During that time, patients tended to bring up six subjects. About five minutes was devoted to one major topic, with the others receiving as little as one minute.
“With only about two minutes of talk time on even the major topic from each speaker,” the authors wrote, “we could not help but wonder how much is accomplished during such a brief exchange.”
When a patient presents a complex problem, the doctor has two basic choices: extend the visit by taking time from another patient, or limit the time spent on other subjects. The second choice was the most common one, the study found.
Sixteen minutes. Start the clock.
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 08, 2007
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Category: Health Care
February 05, 2007
Community-Campus Partnerships: Keys to Sustained Success
The Center for Reducing Health Disparities will present the next in our Works in Progress series on Friday, February 9, 2007 from 3-4 pm.
Community-Campus Partnerships: Keys to Sustained Success will be presented by Deborah Lindell, DNP, APRN, BC, CNE. Ms. Lindell is an Assistant Professor of Nursing and Director of the Graduate Entry DNP Program for the Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing at CWRU.
LOCATION:
Case Medical School- T503
10900 Euclid Avenue
Please RSVP your attendance to Sharon Lowstetter at slowstetter@metrohealth.org or by phone 778-8484. We look forward to seeing you there!
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 05, 2007
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Category: Works in Progress
February 01, 2007
Losing a Leg Because You're Poor?
Reuters Health is covering an article that appears in the January issue of the Journal of Vascular Surgery.
Patients from poor neighborhoods in the low-income bracket, non-white patients, and patients without commercial insurance, and those on Medicare or Medicaid, had significantly higher rates of amputation than those who were more affluent, the team reports in the Journal of Vascular Surgery.
"Of particular interest is the Medicaid patients who were on average younger than private and Medicare insurance recipients," Eslami noted. "This group still had a very high amputation rate."
Send news items related to health disparities to ReduceDisparity(AT)case.edu
Posted by: David Porter on February 01, 2007
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Category: Health Disparities