June 2009 - Posts

• A Health Policy Addict's Summer Reading List

  If you’ve been following health policy for a generation, as I have, these past few weeks have been the Olympics, the U.S. Open, the Super Bowl, and a Clarence Clemons sax solo during a Springsteen encore rolled into one. With the moment of change upon Read More... Posted Sat, Jun 20 2009 9:38 AM by Bob Wachter | 3 Comments Filed under: Efficiency, Diagnosis/Clinical Reasoning, Health Policy, Media/Press Coverage

• Budget Director Orszag Takes Gawande's Baton and Brings It Home

  Thanks to Brad Flansbaum for pointing me to Peter Orszag's blog on Atul Gawande's article (the subject of my previous post) on McAllen, Texas's staggering healthcare costs. I'm not sure what's more astonishing: the fact that Orszag read the Gawande New Read More... Posted Tue, Jun 09 2009 2:47 AM by Bob Wachter | 6 Comments Filed under: Transparency and Reporting, Efficiency, Health Policy, Media/Press Coverage

• Gawande Nails It on Healthcare Costs

  I just finished reading Atul Gawande’s June 1st New Yorker piece – it's the Talk of the Health Policy Town – on healthcare’s “Cost Conundrum.” Like most of Atul’s work, the article is lyrical, powerful, insightful, and correct.As you’ve probably heard, Read More... Posted Fri, Jun 05 2009 10:55 PM by Bob Wachter | 4 Comments Filed under: Quality Improvement, Hospital Care, Efficiency, Health Policy, Media/Press Coverage, Medical Ethics

• Is Hospital Peer Review a Sham? Well, Mostly Yes

  Dr. Sidney Wolfe, healthcare’s answer to Ralph Nader, spends most of his days unhappy with somebody. Pragmatic, see-both-sides types like me naturally recoil from Wolfe’s reflexive indictment of institutions ranging from the FDA to Medicare. But Wolfe’s Read More... Posted Mon, Jun 01 2009 4:25 AM by Bob Wachter | 16 Comments Filed under: Hospital Care, Transparency and Reporting, Patient Safety/Medical Errors, Health Policy, Media/Press Coverage, Medical Ethics