ACP InternistSM - February 2010
Featured Articles
Evidence-based Medicine
Calmer talk needed about mammography
Controversy about implementing new mammography guidelines shouldn’t cloud talks between doctors and the women they counsel. Clarify what the guidelines really say, and share the decision-making with patients, experts counsel.
Medical Education
Med schools promoting care for underserved
To encourage primary care careers, medical schools are offering students shortened specialty rotations in favor of fast-track graduation, half-tuition forgiveness and having students follow patients wherever they go in the health system. Different teaching models emphasize continuity of care over snapshots of diagnoses, and place students in the clinics where they can fulfill the nation’s need for rural care.
Infectious Diseases
Army physicians on the front line of infectious disease research
Walter Reed’s infectious disease unit travels the globe to identify and combat the world’s deadliest infectious diseases. Driven to find vaccines that protect troops stationed overseas, the work quickly benefits civilian populations, too.
Perspectives
Filling in the GAPPs will strengthen evidence-based medicine
Little data supports the use of genomic testing for subjects such as warfarin dosing. Paradoxically, that lack of evidence leaves open the potential for the misuse of direct-to-consumer genomics tests for fun, or for their premature adoption by clinicians.
President’s Message
Best patient care gets lost amid the health care delivery system
A primary care doctor measures the benefits that he can provide to his patients: continuity of care and a complete “story” to tell about each one.
Letters to the Editor
Supporting supplements, and a new look at fasting
A reader offer support for the evidence base for nutritional supplements, while another cites anecdotal evidence on the benefits of fasting.
Editor’s Note
What’s next for breast cancer screening?
Mammography screening guidelines by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force set off a firestorm of controversy. But now that the flames have subsided, doctors need to know what to tell their patients.
Washington Perspective
Even with new legislation, health care reform would evolve
Every Congress has made its mark on Medicare since the program’s inception in 1965. Success or failure for health care reform isn’t the end of the journey, but another milestone.
Practice Management
Quality Improvement
Practice uses ACP survey for peer review, quality improvement
True North Health Center in Maine surveyed every patient who came through their doors from March through May last year to let each if its 28 practitioners know outcomes for each provider. Proprietary surveys are expensive, so they turned to ACP’s tools. The results helped those performing best to teach their peers about best practices.
Practice Rx
Making sense of CMS’ new policy on consultation billing
CMS stopped recognizing CPT consultation codes and issued instructions to physicians only a few days before the new policy took effect. ACP’s practice management staff digest what internists need to know to stay atop of billing for 2009, documentation, the “3-year rule” and cross-walks for services previously billed as consultations.
CPII Tips
Moving toward patient-centered care
Practice not currently considering the patient-centered medical home model can still position themselves for an eventual transition if and when the idea comes of age.
College News
Obituaries
Obituaries
Notes on John J. Hoesing, FACP, and Stephen M. Ayres, FACP.
Internist Archives Quick Links
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