Pharmacogenomics - One size doesn’t fit all | Vector →

Nancy Fliesler writing on Boston Children’s Vector blog:

…Manzi and colleagues hope to build a repository and database in order to develop and validate prescribing guidelines that tailor treatments to patients’ genetic makeup. Few such guidelines now exist.

Pharmacogenomics is the future of medicine. I personally can’t wait for the day when I know what the starting dose for a given drug absolutely should be for the particular patient in front of me. Unfortunately, it seems like we have a long road ahead. As I’ve tried to highlight with the quote above, just because we know that a certain gene may increase a patient’s metabolism of a specific drug and we know the patient has that gene, doesn’t mean we know how to adjust the dose accordingly. Educated guesses can be made, but we need much more data on how to incorporate genetic information into actual dosing.

Philadelphia Children's Hospital Bars Herbs And Supplements | NPR →

Elana Gordon writing for The Salt blog on NPR:

Under CHOP’s old policy, dietary supplements were treated as home medications. If a family brought them in, an attending doctor or nurse was obliged to evaluate them as best they could and administer them along with hospital-sanctioned meds during the patient’s admission. If the supplements ran out, the provider would order more through the hospital pharmacy. Now, families are entirely responsible–they have to obtain and administer the unapproved supplements themselves, notify a doctor when that happens, and sign a waiver form. The hospital is also distributing additional explainers to families.

CHOP [1] was one of the first hospitals in the country to begin requiring flu vaccines for its workers. In light of the recent revelations about adulterated supplements and the poor state of supplement oversight, CHOP seems to be at the forefront again.

  1. Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia  ↩

Code Blue | Baylor's Progress Notes →

Donna Huang--a 4th year med student at Baylor--describes learning about ACLS (Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support) and then witnessing it in action. I thought this was a great piece talking about the emotions of responding to a code and the inherent violence of resuscitation.

Can Genomics Blow Up the Clinical Trial? | MIT Tech Review →

Details of what I will call a 'shotgun' approach to incorporating genetics into clinical trials. The work being done here is definitely not 'blowing up the clinical trial' but rather doing a clinical trial on a larger, coordinated scale. The real power of genetics and drug design when we reach the reality of using tumor genetic results to reverse engineer therapies.

Greatly improved new statin guidelines - with one exception | MedRants →

Great summary and commentary from Dr Robert Centor. I didn’t know what to make of the new statin guidelines; it’s not a particular area I’m interested in or have extensive education. However, given its prominence in the news and relevance to family members, I need to know something about it. I think this post from Dr Centor is the best place to start.

Four things we learned at EHI Live | MedCrunch →

Interesting thoughts from MedCrunch on EHI Live–the UK’s national event for health IT. I find point #3–Interoperability is this year’s magic word–particularly interesting. I wonder if we will ever have true interoperability in health care. If we do have true interoperability, will it be as easy for me to change EMRs as it is for me to switch between Chrome, Safari, Firefox, and Opera? That is the EMR future I am looking forward to.

Letting Medical Students Run the Clinic | The Atlantic →

Great examination of the student-run clinic. However, this article makes it seem like the students are running wild with only the distant oversight from the supervising physicians. In all of my experiences [1], there is strict oversight with the supervising physician always going in after the medical student to visit with the patient and conduct their own relevant exam. I am biased (of course) but I believe student-run clinics provide a valuable service to the community and benefit the medical students who participate in them, both in terms of clinical learning and exposure to health disparities.

  1. For anyone interested, the University of Kansas medical students run the JayDoc Free Clinic.  ↩

Graduating Pharmacy Students’ Perspectives on E-Professionalism and Social Media | Am J Pharm Educ →

Conclusion from the abstract:

Many graduating pharmacy students use social media; however, there appears to be a growing awareness of the importance of presenting a more professional image online as they near graduation and begin seeking employment as pharmacists.

Anecdotally, I can say the same for medical students. The vast majority of my classmates seem to change their Facebook name to some weird alias when residency interview season rolls around. However, as someone who has worked hard to cultivate a positive online presence and never been asked about it in an interview, I truly wonder how many programs are looking at candidates online.

Medical School at $278,000 Means Even Bernanke Son Has Debt | Bloomberg →

Janet Lorin writing for Bloomberg:

The median education debt for 2012 medical-school graduates was $170,000, including loans taken out for undergraduate studies and excluding interest. That compares with an average $13,469 in 1978…[or] about $48,000 in today’s dollars.

Educational debt, where med school debt is but one type, is a problem we need to face now. This year, due to the sequestration, all subsidized loans (i.e.—the government pays the interest while in school) for graduate students was cut. This means that medical students in their first year are being charged interest from the day the loan is dispersed. Should medical students start taking part-time jobs or work-study assistance?

We (medical students) understand loans are part of the deal, but the deal has gotten so bad that it is becoming untenable.