Noteworthy Posts From The Last Two Weeks

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Halibig, King, and the ACA; and some posts in honor of a powerful voice for the patient experience.

Last week started out with a judicial bang in health policy news when two rulings by appeals courts on cases involving subsidies contradicted each other Tuesday, coverage here from the NY Times as well as a concise what happens next item.

Following those decisions this op-ed appeared in the Wall Street Journal and prompted this response by Nicholas Bagley (law professor at University of Michigan) on The Incidental Economist. Then, Jonathan Adler of the WSJ piece responded with this, to which Bagley replied with this. Others have weighed in on this, but I don’t want to get too carried away…

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Clean Out Your Bookshelf and Donate to a Good Cause!

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Clean out your bookcase and do a good deed. I suspect there are many health care providers who no longer need their medical books and would like to donate them to students and practitioners in developing countries but don’t know how. The following are four organizations that can distribute your books within the United States and around the world. Some donations are tax deductible; check each site for details. Also, please keep in mind that recent materials with current information will have the greatest impact, and some materials may be too outdated to responsibly donate to fellow practitioners or students. Continue reading →

MSK Proclaimed #1 Cancer Hospital in the U.S. and more…

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MSK has achieved the top position among cancer hospitals in this year’s U.S. News & World Report ranking of U.S. hospitals, edging out MD Anderson Cancer Center which had the lead for the past 7 years. More patients will be inclined to seek care at the #1 hospital and the institution will also attract increased funding. One of the factors which contributed to MSK’s receiving the top ranking was its achievement of significantly higher marks in safety as compared to MD Anderson.

Today about 14.5 million Americans who have been diagnosed with cancer are surviving. This figure is expected to grow to 19 million in 2024. Weighing in on this good news, MSK’s Dr. Kevin Oeffinger, Director of the Adult Long Term Follow-Up Program, commented on this “really exciting” news and said the number of cancer survivors is greater than what had been expected just a few years ago. Continue reading →