Physician Leaders
Every day, hospital clinicians witness the devastating effects of the opioid epidemic on the patients, families and communities they serve. Prescription opioids can be a safe and necessary element of pain management, but they also carry significant risk for misuse, addiction, overdose and…
When Alexander Gamble, M.D., was hired to develop a palliative medicine program at Phelps County Regional Medical Center in south-central Missouri, he expected it would take some time to persuade physicians to make referrals.
But on the second day of orientation, Gamble received his first…
In the early 1990s, Jack McConnell, M.D., was struck by the number of poor individuals who had no access to health care on Hilton Head Island, S.C., where he had retired.
One in three of those who live in the coastal town don’t have health insurance, a level about twice the…
Hospital radiologists and pathologists are on the receiving end of orders for scans and tests. But they can’t do their work alone.
With that in mind, they are building relationships with ordering physicians and working with them to ensure that patients get the right tests at the right…
After years of fanfare and a few false starts, the era of genomic medicine has finally arrived.
Across the country, thousands of patients are being treated, or having their treatment changed, based on information gleaned from their genome. It’s a revolution that has been promised since the…
When Cleveland Clinic launched an initiative to control drug costs, Jeff Rosner, senior director of pharmacy contracting and purchasing, was skeptical. Knowing the pharmaceutical marketplace as he did, he was uncertain whether the academic medical center could significantly reduce its…
Trustee talking points
An estimated 43.4 million U.S. adults had a behavioral health issue in 2014.
People with chronic medical conditions have an increased risk of depression and vice versa.
Worldwide, the lifespan of patients with severe mental disorders is 10 to 25 year…
When the independent primary care group that served Rusk County Memorial Hospital started referring patients to a competing facility in another community, the critical access hospital in Ladysmith, Wis., faced a crisis. The hospital’s market share fell from 43 percent to 21 percent from 2011…
For a long time, behavioral health patients have been marginalized in the nation’s health care system. This has been due in part to lack of insurance coverage and the low priority placed on caring for these patients. Closure of many inpatient psychiatric units, reduction in…