I just got word that Ray Tye, one of the most generous people I have ever met, has died. He was generous in the way Maimonides would have liked: He gave without fanfare and with no wish for recognition.
Every now and then, he would hear of a patient, either local or international, who [...]

During the pre-exam pathology review session at my medical school, one of the students asked about the relative incidence of metastases to the CNS versus primary CNS neoplasms. I answered that metastases are ten times more common than primary tumors. After the presentation, a colleague in the audience pointed out to me that the current [...]

I admire the President and really hope a health care bill is passed by Congress, but I wonder if his overstatement of what the bill does might ultimately cause him to fail. Here’s the latest, as reported in today’s New York Times:
Boiling down his proposal to a few sentences, Mr. Obama asked, “How many [...]

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The Rx-360 Consortium announced the start of a pilot plan to allow pharmaceutical manufacturers to share audits of suppliers. The first part of the pilot is intended to gauge the value of sharing the existing body of supplier audit information that already exists within consortium member companies.  The consortium has an Audit Standards Working Group with 27 [...]

What happens next in Massachusetts with insurance reimbursement rates now that many of the facts and figures have been made public?
Here’s what I see. The dominant parties in the state on whose watch the disparities in the marketplace have taken place — Blue Cross Blue Shield and Partners Healthcare System — face financial and [...]

US Senator John Kerry joined a BIDMC event last night in Florida to provide an update to members of our community on recent events in Washington regarding the progress of a national health care bill. We were impressed with the extent of the Senator’s knowledge on the subject and his commitment to thoughtful legislation, [...]

Several months ago, I wrote about the futility of banning social media in a hospital. I argued that it was counterproductive and a waste of resources. This point of view has been supported in other forums.
Now, I learn that the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics organization is banning Facebook and other such [...]

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I was originally disappointed when I first scanned this Medical News Today article, Resveratrol May Replace Aspirin As Heart Protector; Longevinex® First Branded Resveratrol Pill Successfully Tested During Heart Attack.
As a red wine lover, my disappointment turned to joy when I read this:
The amount of resveratrol in 3 to 5 glasses of red [...]

I really enjoy sharing what we have learned about enhancing quality and safety, transparency, and process improvement with health care providers and insurers around the country. But sometimes you just can’t arrange to be there in person.
Today, I was invited to talk with board members and senior staff at HealthSpring, a large Medicare Advantage [...]

I recently did a brain autopsy on a 70-year-old woman who died from an intraparenchymal brain hemorrhage after a seven-year history of progressive dementia. The gross photograph (provided by Chad Jeffers, Memorial Medical Center, Springfield, IL)  follows:

I know what you’re thinking: an amyloid angiopathic bleed, or perhaps a hypertensive bleed, in a patient with Alzheimer [...]