Around the blogs

So what are the other medical blogs saying?

assumptions about her level of understanding – a nice piece about the importance of physicians gauging their patient’s understanding of their disease. That piece links to this important issue – Death Talk Two. Let me add that very early in my career I did some ER work and had to give this talk. My father (a clinical psychologist) taught me to lead the loved ones to be the first to use the word dead. Thus, I generally would sit down with them in a room. I would start the conversation by outlining why the patient had come to the ER. Then I would state clearly that I had bad news. I would lead them to use the word dead – and almost always succeeded. Then like Richard Winters I would continue my shift and finally go home and think. Giving bad news is very necessary and it never feels right.

As a ward attending, I often model giving bad news to students, interns and residents. After each session (for example, we told a patient on Friday that he had metastatic cancer), we do a debriefing. We criticize my style – both positive and negative comments are encouraged. I grade my performance! I share what I thought I did right and how I could have improved that performance. Those of us involved in medical education must teach these skills by both role modelling and explicit discussion of the process.

Medpundit has recently tackled lawyers. This link will get you started – and take you over to Jane Galt’s continuation of this topic – More Lawyer Letters. This dialogue should continue and I would hope gain national recognition. We need better understanding of their viewpoint. I believe that they need to better understand our angst (I assume they care). I also note the Rangel is weighing in on these issues. Start here – Reform the legal system! And also check out this – It’s Not Just ‘Sue the Docs’ Anymore

Yesterday’s Bloviator (see the links on the left column and then scroll to Sunday as he does not provide links to individual rants) provides more discussion of the vaccination issue I ranted about recently.

But as the OpEd points out (and as I pointed out a month ago, although I say it with far less shrill of a tone) the Thimerosal suits opened up the door to a new type of lawsuit concerning vaccines that, for whatever reason, the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program did not appear to cover. Failing to close that loophole means opening up the childhood immunization program (and, yes, the companies that make those vaccines) to a much greater risk of lawsuit, thereby jeopardizing the vaccine supply.

The vaccine ingredient bill should be refined to accommodate such things as extended statutes of limitations for injuries such as autism (should such a connection be definitively made), and to tie up the funding-related loose ends left out of the Homeland provisions. But it should not be revoked.