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Pay For Performance Medicine: UK's Quality and Outcomes Framework Delivers Modest Improvements in Quality

A systematic review of the growing body of evidence regarding the United Kingdom's Quality and Outcomes Framework, the most comprehensive national primary care pay-for-performance scheme in the world, finds modest improvements in quality of care since its introduction in 2004.

The review, which included 94 studies, found the QOF was associated with an increased rate of improvement of quality of care for incentivized conditions during the first year of implementation, returning to preintervention rates of improvement in subsequent years.

Dramatic Increase in Chronic Illness Diagnoses - What It Means For Primary Care And Drug Costs

Chronic illness diagnoses have shot up to 45 percent of the U.S. population and 40 percent of people older than 60 are now taking five or more medications.

Researchers have raised questions about the nature of the relationship between the expanding definition of chronic illness and the explosion in pharmaceutical use in the United States.

Team Models Could Provide Care for Increased Patient Loads

While patient studies show that cancer survivors don't even want to use a primary care physician for anything more elaborate than shining a light in their ear, service surveys show that doctors are already trying to see too many patients - a problem that will only get worse when the Afforadable Care Act mandates go into force.

Cancer Survivors Don't Want To Go Back To Primary Care Physicians for Follow-Up Care

Patients want the best treatment at the lowest cost; if they are not paying for it, because either insurance or the government is, every patient wants the best doctor in the world. For cancer survivors, that includes seeing a specialist even if they may not need it.

Nearly one-third of office visits for cancer are handled by primary care physicians, yet this study finds cancer survivors have concerns about seeing their primary care physician for cancer-related follow-up care.

Doctor concern: Longer office hours associated with lower health costs for patients

As an election with the Affordable Care Act at its core draws near, a new analysis will be cause for concern to doctors: patients who have access to a regular source of health care that offers evening and weekend hours have significantly lower health expenditures than those who do not.

That means doctors could be forced to work a lot more weekends and evenings.

Albert Einstein College of Medicine hosts its first stem cell institute symposium

September 21, 2012 – (BRONX, NY) – The promise of adult stem cells, iPS and even hESC seems limitless. Adult and iPS can already be coaxed into rebuilding organs, repairing damaged spinal cords and restoring ravaged immune systems, and these malleable cells could revolutionize medical treatment. But stem cell research is still in its relative infancy as scientists seek to better understand the role of these cells in normal human development and disease.

Undertreatment of common heart condition persists despite rapid adoption of novel therapies

A novel blood thinner recently approved by the FDA, dabigatran (Pradaxa), has been rapidly adopted into clinical practice, yet thus far has had little impact on improving treatment rates for atrial fibrillation. This is according to a new study led by researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health that examined national trends in oral anticoagulant use. They found that despite rapid adoption of dabigatran for the treatment of atrial fibrillation, a large proportion of patients–two in five–did not receive oral anticoagulant therapy.

Edmund Burke: Rare writings by 18th century British political icon found

Three political essays by one of the greatest British statesmen of the last 250 years have been discovered by a historian at Queen Mary, University of London.

The new finds constitute the earliest political writings by Edmund Burke (1729-97), dating from around 1757, when he was 27-years-old, a period often described as the 'missing years' of his biography.

Professor Richard Bourke, from the School of History at Queen Mary, came across the early essays among a series of notebooks belonging to William Burke, a close friend and distant relation of parliamentarian, Edmund.

Mount Sinai researchers identify predictors for inpatient pain

Researchers from Mount Sinai School of Medicine have identified reliable predictors of pain by surveying patients throughout their hospital stays about the severity of their pain and their levels of satisfaction with how their pain was managed by hospital staff.

How do we make moral judgments? Reappraising emotions makes cooler heads prevail

New research published in Psychological Science claims intriguing insights into some of the factors that influence how we make moral judgments.

>Reappraising Our Emotions Allows Cooler Heads to Prevail

We might like to think that our judgments are always well thought-out, but research suggests that our moral judgments are often based on intuition.

Our emotions seem to drive our intuitions, giving us the gut feeling that something is 'right' or 'wrong.' In some cases, however, we seem to be able to override these initial reactions.

Obama leads in Michigan but a lot of voters supposedly undecided

Union-heavy Michigan has given President Barack Obama a substantial lead in Michigan over Republican challenger Mitt Romney, despite their economic collapse - but many of the state's voters remain undecided, according to Michigan State University's latest State of the State Survey.

Swedish journalists skew even more left than the public and politicians

On the political scale, Swedish journalists can be placed to the left of the Swedish public and their elected politicians. And the distance between the two sides has increased significantly in recent decades - just like in America.

But in Sweden, the public and politicians have moved a little bit to the right while journalists have either stayed left or moved a little, according to results from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Money key factor in driving med students from primary care careers

Primary care physicians are at the heart of health care in the United States, and are often the first to diagnose patients and ensure those patients receive the care they need. But researchers from North Carolina State University, East Carolina University (ECU) and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University in New York have found that many students are choosing to pass up a career in primary care because those physicians make substantially less money than specialists, such as dermatologists or radiologists.

'Half-match' bone marrow transplants wipe out sickle cell disease in selected patients

In a preliminary clinical trial, investigators at Johns Hopkins have shown that even partially-matched bone marrow transplants can eliminate sickle cell disease in some patients, ridding them of painful and debilitating symptoms, and the need for a lifetime of pain medications and blood transfusions. The researchers say the use of such marrow could potentially help make bone marrow transplants accessible to a majority of sickle cell patients who need them.

Move to less impoverished neighborhoods boosts physical and mental health

Moving from a high-poverty to lower-poverty neighborhood spurs long-term gains in the physical and mental health of low-income adults, as well as a substantial increase in their happiness, despite not improving economic self-sufficiency, according to a new study published in the Sept. 20 issue of Science by researchers at the University of Chicago and partners at other institutions.