The Best of the Health Care Blogs

Health Wonk Review, a compendium of some of the best health care blog posts of the past two weeks, is up at The Health Care Blog. This week’s host, Brian Klepper, has done a superb job of picking out 20 stellar posts. Here are just a few that caught my eye:

“Over at Health Populi,” Klepper writes, “the ever-reliable (and charming) Jane Sarasohn-Kahn reviews new health consumerism data from the Employee Benefits Research Institute/Commonwealth Fund. Enrollment in Consumer Directed Health Plans (CDHPs) is slight but growing, from a mere 1 percent of people with private coverage in 2006, to 2 percent in 2007…Contrary to the hopes and rants of the ideologues on the right, it turns out that the enrollees in these plans tend not to be born-again uninsureds, but the healthy and wealthy.”

“On the Health 2.0 Blog, the always-entertaining veteran health care commentator and Quality Grand Poo-Bah Michael Millenson takes us on a ride that forces some introspection. In the extremely complex world of evolving health information on the Web, do we health observers drink our own Kool-Aid? ‘Are we open to objective data about what we do, or do we prefer to publicize only affirming anecdotes?’ It’s an uncomfortably reasonable question, and a fair warning.”

“On Health Care Renewal, Roy Poses MD does another one of his wonderfully in-depth exposes on the financial conflict that pervades nearly all health care, this time pulling together a wide variety of sources surrounding the lung cancer screening research scandal that involved academic researchers, a prominent university, a foundation that was a front for tobacco money, and a major medical journal. The amazing thing here is that nearly everyone involved keep insisting there's no, or nearly no, impropriety.”

“At Colorado Health Insurance Insider, Louise, an (unlikely) fan of single-payer national health coverage, reviews data showing that a high percentage (59%) of American physicians support this approach. (Has anyone told the AMA?) The numbers are even higher among Emergency Physicians (69%), who treat an unending, unfiltered flow of humanity in their daily work, and Psychiatrists (83%), who as all Republicans know, are crazy anyway.”

“Dov Michaeli MD PhD is, without question, hands-down, the best science writer I'm aware of. A biotechnology basic researcher by day, he writes column after column over at The Doctor Weighs In, explaining the marvelous intricacies of nature and discovery in a captivating style. (Which is unnerving. English isn't his first language.) Take a look at his post describing how new insights into the long-known drugs aspirin and DEET have uncovered tremendous new possibilities. This is the stuff that got so many of us interested in science in the first place.”

“Writing at Brass and Ivory, MS patient Lisa Emrich brings together an impressive array of information to show that the Biotech Industry Organization’s efforts to block bio-generics, with arguments backed by Congressional contributions, has paid off for them at the expense of affordable solutions for patients. It’s yet another excruciating demonstration that American health care’s first focus is on long term protection of enterprise, rather than a balance between innovation and patient interests. (Bravo, Lisa!)”

“In a typically thoughtful piece on GoozNews, Merrill Goozner hits one out of the park describing how reform schemes that would base their savings purely on better pricing are doomed to failure, and how meaningful reform will require changes to the ways health care is supplied and delivered. The point, he concludes, is that it’s price AND volume.”

But all 20 look like they are well worth reading. Check them out here.

Comments

[Ilchi Lee]

Very nice post. Good work!!

[Αβραμοπουλος]

Hi

I think it is a great and amazing work on this site and it is also informatically post.

[Avramopoulos]

Hi

It is a very nice and great post on this site and I like it.

[Θεμις Μαντζαβινος]

Hi

It is a very nice post.

[DrSteveB]

There are several good health bloggers on Daily Kos, among then nyceve and your truly DrSteveB:

http://www.dailykos.com/search?offset=0&old_count=50&string=author%3Dnyceve+tag%3Dhealth&type=diary&sortby=time&search=Search&count=50&wayback=1576800&wayfront=0

http://www.dailykos.com/search?offset=0&old_count=30&string=author%3Ddrsteveb+tag%3Dhealth&type=diary&sortby=impact&search=Search&count=50&wayback=1576800&wayfront=0

Peace & Health

[Maggie Mahar]

NS--
Thanks very much!

[ns]

I've been reading usenet, websites, chats, groups and blogs for a couple years for conflict of interest, direct to consumer advertising, physician/pharma collusion, clincial trial data withholding, ghost writing, consumer advocacy etc and I vote WELL, Tara Parker Pope's NYTimes blog and your blog the best by far.

No contest.