Author's posts
A surgeon mistakes a kidney for a tumor. How can this happen?
A number of media outlets recently featured a story about a Florida general surgeon who removed a normal kidney from a woman who was undergoing spine surgery. How could this have occurred? The 51-year-old patient who had been injured in a car crash was…
Patient satisfaction: Who is rating the ratings?
Everything is being rated these days. But who is rating the ratings? As a public service, I have been blogging about the shortcomings of various rating systems since 2010. Two recent papers on this topic are worthy of review. In a randomized controlled…
Antibiotics vs. surgery for appendicitis: what one surgeon thinks
Here are a few thoughts about the latest chapter in the never-ending debate about antibiotics vs. surgery for the treatment of uncomplicated appendicitis. You will recall the randomized controlled trial from Finland published in 2015 that found a 27% rate of failure of antibiotics within the first year. Now that the patients have now been followed for […]
Artificial intelligence in medicine: not ready for prime time
July was an interesting month for artificial intelligence in medicine. A study from MIT found when human doctors order tests on patients, they factor in something that artificial intelligence is not currently aware of. The authors analyzed charts of about 60,000 ICU patients admitted to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston. By looking at […]
Why medical errors can never be completely eliminated
A patient with progressive neurologic disorder had a gastrojejunal tube placed for feeding. In a nursing home, the tube fell out and was replaced with a Foley catheter. He was sent to the hospital for placement of a new tube. When he arrived in the interventional radiology suite, the Foley catheter was not visible. A […]
Why is trauma activation so expensive?
An 8-month-old baby fell 3 feet and hit his head on a carpeted floor in a San Francisco hotel room. He was crying and the parents, who were from South Korea, called an ambulance. By the time the child arrived at the hospital he was obviously fine. After a bottle, a nap, and a few […]
The risks of publically reported surgical outcomes
“Some data is better than no data at all.” Do you believe that? I heard it frequently when the infamous ProPublica’s Surgeon Scorecard first appeared three years ago. Back then I blogged about it saying “To me, bad data is worse than no data at all.” A recent study in BJU International confirmed my thoughts about this type of publicly posted […]
The risks of publically reported surgical outcomes
“Some data is better than no data at all.” Do you believe that? I heard it frequently when the infamous ProPublica’s Surgeon Scorecard first appeared three years ago. Back then I blogged about it saying “To me, bad data is worse than no data at all.” A recent study in BJU International confirmed my thoughts about this type of publicly posted […]
