New Practice Introduction Video by Phyzoom!

By JGoff on January 12, 2012

Congratulations to Dr. Anthony DeSalvo and the staff of OBGYN Associates of Warren for their use of social media to connect with their patients. www.warren-obgyn.com

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Healthcare Professionals Using Social Media More, Survey Finds

By admin on September 14, 2011

Erik Sass, Sep 13, 2011 06:28 PM (The Social Graf)

Healthcare professionals, including doctors, nurses, administrators and I.T. managers for hospitals, are using social media for both personal and professional purposes, according to a survey carried out in April and May of this year by Frost & Sullivan in conjunction with QuantiaMD and the Institute for Health Technology Transformation. The new study based on the survey confirms social media’s applicability to the healthcare industry, but also highlights major obstacles to further adoption, including privacy, liability, and regulatory concerns. Continue reading “Healthcare Professionals Using Social Media More, Survey Finds”

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What is Phyzoom?

By JGoff on September 7, 2011

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Study: Doctors More Likely To Drop Private Insurance Than Medicare

By admin on June 29, 2011

There’s a lot of chatter about how public policy can influence doctors’ decisions about which new patients to see and which to turn away.

One big question: Does the squeeze on Medicare that has limited the program’s pay increases to doctors lead them to see fewer of those patients?

Some researchers decided to look at recent data for clues. And they found a slight drop — a little less than 3 percent in the proportion of doctors taking new Medicare patients between 2005 and 2008.

But that drop, which still left 93 percent of docs taking new Medicare patients, wasn’t much compared with the hit for patients with typical private insurance.

For those people, there was a 5.5 percentage point drop, leaving about 88 percent of physicians who would add them as new patients.

The greater decline in doctors accepting private insurance was “unexpected,” the researchers write in the latest issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, where the findings appear.

What’s going on? I asked lead author Dr. Tara Bishop, an internist and assistant professor of public health at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York. She said there are a couple of possible reasons. Some doctors may be bucking the administrative hassles of private insurance, she said.

Medicare may not always pay top dollar, but it’s pretty reliable. And, she said, Medicare is still the largest payer, so it’s hard for doctors not to accept those patients.

For her part, Bishop sees patients with all kinds of insurance. But she said the findings are worrisome. “If these trends continue we may have problems getting care to patients in the ambulatory setting,” she said. “It’s possible patients might have health insurance but not be able to see a doctor.” [Copyright 2011 National Public Radio] by Scott Hensley June 27, 2011

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Pediatricians jump in on Junk Food Advertising

By JGoff on June 28, 2011

Pediatricians Recommend A Media Diet For Kids To Fight Obesity
by Scott Hensley
- June 27, 2011

A quick stroll around the mall is all the reminder you need that an epidemic of childhood obesity is all around us. And the media, defined very broadly, is a big part of the big problem, according to a leading group of pediatricians. Kids don’t burn many calories sitting and watching TV or messing around on the computer or game console.

So the American Academy of Pediatrics is prescribing some changes to help kids stave off excess weight in a policy statement just published in the journal Pediatrics.

First, at each well-child visit, pediatricians should ask these two questions:
How much time are you spending in front of a screen each day?
Is there a TV or device with an Internet connection in your bedroom?
The answers can help guide a recommendation for health, including more active pursuits. Kids, the pediatricians say, shouldn’t spend more than 2 hours a day plopped down in front of the computer, TV or other glowing device. The littlest kids — those 2 and under — shouldn’t watch any TV at all.

A little extra time staring at a screen can add up to big weight gains before you know it. It’s also the case, the pediatricians say, that consuming media can mean consuming advertising messages for junky foods, another factor in the weight-gain formula. So another part of the prescription is neutralizing those ads. Parents should talk to kids about bad food ads and good nutritional habits.
And pediatricians should get active themselves when it comes to media policy, the policy statement says:
Ask Congress, the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission to implement a ban on junk-food advertising during programing that is viewed predominantly by young children.

Among the other things families can do to curb childhood obesity: eat meals together more regularly and make sure everyone gets enough sleep. [Copyright 2011 National Public Radio]

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