22
Who was at fault here? Those who modified the fall height parameters, those who designed the decision support system such that it could override life threatening problems based on a single parameter, endusers, their managers, or all?
21
Here we go again. The latest settlement in the parade was made by the Alpharma subsidiary of King Pharmaceuticals, as reported by Reuters:
Read the rest of this entry »
20
New England Sinai Hospital has closed its doors to new patients at the suggestion of the state inspectors. Overall patients stated the hospital offered good care and 
service. The one man interviewed stated that he thought the staff was stretched too thin, and he may just have a very good point as we read about more hospital layoffs quite frequently in the news and over 50% of the hospitals operate in the red today.
19
We hear a lot about Medicare fraud and how much is fraudulently billed. I talk a lot about technology being an answer but in this case where the criminals are outdoing the doctors and hospitals in coding and doing a better job with filling out forms, the Medicare slot machine is paying off pretty big.
19
In a stunning display of academic arrogance, MIT economics professor Jonathan Gruber, who promoted and defended the administration’s health care policies before the U.S. Senate Committee on Finance as well as the Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee, while collecting $400,000 from HHS for his services, literally blew off a letter of inquiry from Senators Grassley and Enzi regarding possible conflicts of interest. (See this Google search on the terms “jonathan gruber conflict of interest HHS“.)
19
Healthcare is on everyones mind this week to see what we end up coming up with out of the blender. That is just about what we have left to see what the outcome will be. In New York, it is the same story that is happening everywhere else. Pennsylvania was also in the news this week with big premium increases. It appears we do not have a large enough data base of individuals to spread the cost over, as thats what insurance is all about, or should be about. 
18
In a remarkable development, the American Medical Association and nearly one hundred other physician specialty societies submitted a letter to CMS on Mar. 15 (in PDF at http://www.ama-assn.org/ama1/pub/upload/mm/399/meaningful-use-comments-15mar2010.pdf).
17
The numbers are growing rapidly while we still wait around and discuss and talk about healthcare reform. One thing for sure this year in Congress should certainly go down in history as one of the most out of touch years with a Representatives so bent on telling the American public what to do, and yet themselves are far 
from being any type of participant. Even the children are affected with less than half getting coverage from Mom or Dad.
17
A couple of weeks ago I did the master cleanse. I did it for 10 days. It wasn’t that difficult. Sometimes it was more of wanting to eat than needing to eat. Below is the diary of how I was feeling while I completed it:
17
It is shocking to hear, but resident on resident assaults in long term care facilities (nursing homes, assisted living facilities, independent living) are frequent occurrences.