In response to the rising rate of drug overdose deaths, 49 states had a Prescription Drug Monitoring Program (PDMP) by 2014. By requiring physicians to report all prescriptions for controlled drugs, and to consult the database before prescribing, state agencies hoped to stop “doctor shopping,” writes John Lilly, M.B.A., D.O., in the summer issue of […]
For patients who do not want all their medical data on the internet in these days of frequent cybercrime, Philip Eskew, D.O., J.D., M.B.A. offers some suggestions in the summer issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Under the HITECH Act (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act) of 2009, patients […]
In 2003, 40% of physicians working at hospitals were independent. Now fewer than one in five physicians are independent, writes Lawrence Huntoon, M.D., Ph.D., in the spring issue of in the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. A 2018 Survey of America’s Physicians reported that 57.5% of physicians “do not agree that hospital employment of […]
Physicians Health Programs (PHPs) are part of the medical regulatory-therapeutic complex intended to protect the public from impaired physicians. Initially, they were supposed to provide a benevolent means to treat physicians with substance-use disorders and return them to the workplace. However, lacking professional or governmental oversight, or an enforceable code of ethics, they may now […]
Physician-assisted suicide (PAS) or physician-assisted death (PAD) are now receiving strong public support, writes Jeffrey Hall Dobken, M.D., M.P.H., in the winter issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. He traces the history of the acceptance of PAS/PAD in public policy and law to the ascendancy of “lifeboat ethics.” Read journal article: http://www.jpands.org/vol23no4/dobken.pdf […]
Of the more than $3 trillion dollars per year spent worldwide on health services, an untold amount is drained through corruption, according to the non-governmental anticorruption watchdog Transparency International. Albert Fisher, M.D., comments on the sources of corruption and proposed remedies in the winter issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Fisher, a family physician […]
An entry in the National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB) can end a doctor’s career permanently. It is critical for doctors to understand how this works, and patients ought to know what it means. In the winter 2018 issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons, Lawrence Huntoon, M.D., Ph.D, summarizes the key points in […]
Promoted as simply a way to help the elderly pay their medical bills, Medicare has led to the federal government controlling the practice of medicine, writes Marilyn Singleton, M.D., J.D., in the fall issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. “Federal interference has only served to increase medical costs, herd patients into managed […]
More Democrats are lining up behind “Medicare for All” as the midterm elections approach, but the idea under different names has been proposed repeatedly since 1942, as shown in the timeline outlined in the fall issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons by Jeremy Snavely. “The last 75 years have seen exponential growth […]
Americans may be more worried about the costs of a major illness than about the illness itself, writes Jeanne Pinder in the summer issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Prices for various procedures can vary by a factor of 20 or more. Pinder describes an award-winning project, ClearHealthCosts.com, that she and fellow […]