Running Out Of Money
Pills Are Everywhere
Thanks, Governor
Young Drinkers
Placebo Journal Update
What A Croc Of....
Insanity vs. Genius
PSA Test Goes To The Dogs
1. Running Out Of Money
It seems that Great Britain is in a little bit of a pickle with their
health care system as it relates to cancer patients. For all those who want to
mimic their system, take
notice of this. The government has a certain amount of allotted cash that
they put into a cancer fund. With the advent of newer, better and more costly
cancer drugs, this fund is quickly running out of money. The battle lines are
being drawn as patients are demanding these costly drugs while the National
Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) is trying to keep the system fiscally
sound. There really is no easy answer here. Like our system, there is only so
much money to go around. If you spend more money on cancer drugs then you have
less money to treat other diseases. You can call it rationing and you can make
it look terrible to the media by claiming you are neglecting a cancer patient
his or her meds but, in the long run, is extending the life of a cancer patient
three or four months worth bankrupting the system? Expect these same arguments
over and over again in this country in the near future.
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2. Pills Are Everywhere
Here is some scary information: one
in five teens in high school have taken a prescription medication they didn’t
get from a doctor. This means narcotics or stimulants for you newbies out
there and they are getting it from their friends or from the streets. The CDC
survey of 16,000 students found that it was the 12th graders abusing it the most
and whites abused these pills more than blacks and hispanics. I cannot tell you
how much narcotic abuse I am seeing nowadays. It has made me so suspicious. I
recently have seen a few different patients who I would have never suspected of
“using” but they fessed up and it shot me for a loop. This is bad stuff but we
physicians need to be very prudent in our prescriptions of these drugs. Get
narcotic agreements. Urine test your pain medication patients regularly. We
don’t want to deny people who really need these meds but this stuff is leaking
into our community like a sieve.
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3. Thanks, Governor
What if you were a teenager and decided to save some money for higher
education after high school. You were working jobs after school and on weekends
and by your senior year you had some nice little nest egg for yourself for
college. Your parents, who really always wanted to get a pool, decided that you
have a surplus in your account and basically confiscate the money. You get
pissed but your parents say they were within their granted powers due to their
own financial crisis. Sounds ridiculous? Well, check out what the Governor did in
Pennsylvania. Physicians and other health care professionals contribute
annually to Mcare,
the Medical Care Availability and Reduction of Error Fund, which subsidizes half
of the $1 million in insurance coverage doctors are required to carry. This
money was set aside to cover any outstanding liability claims and bring down the
costs of malpractice. This is a state, by the way, that doctors were leaving in
droves due to that high malpractice insurance coverage. Last October, Governor
Rendell and his
cronies approved a transfer of what they call excessive funds in this liability
pool to finance other areas of the state's needs. They feel they can
"appropriate" state money as they see fit. In other words, what's yours is mine.
Luckily, the doctors sued and the state court rejected Rendell'sappealing. The funny
thing about this is that I bet that this money is all gone now and in order to
get it back the Governor will need to tax someone......like these same doctors.
It would be like the teenager above having to sue his parents in order to get
his money back for college only for them to demand he pay his rent for the past
18 years.
4. Young Drinkers
You think kids are drinking too young here in America? Well, the Welsh are
trying to get the word out to their people that maybe kids under age 15
shouldn't be imbibing so much of the stuff. The Welsh Assembly Government quotes
research which shows that 40% of Welsh 15-year-olds drink alcohol on a weekly
basis, with 20% having been drunk for the first time at 13 or under. Drinking
among 11-15 year-olds has doubled in the last 20 years The article about this is
pretty funny because the government is trying to be so politically correct.
From what I can gather it's not like they are trying to enforce a law because
there doesn't seem to be one. In fact, they have a fear of being too preachy
when issuing this "guidance". It's almost like they know they have no shot of
changing behavior but they need to play the game anyway. I can almost guarantee
the people who created this campaign were brainstorming their ideas at the local
pub as they downed some dark ale. Actually sounds like a dream job to me. 5. Placebo Journal Update
 The June issue should be in your mailbox shortly. Now it is time for the August issue. If you have any stories you want to share then this is the time to send them in. If you did something in the past and it wasn't used then it probably didn't make the cut. Sorry. That doesn't mean other anecdotes you are holding onto wouldn't work. Send them all in here:
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6. What A Croc Of.....
A 3-year-old boy was in a swimming pool changing room with his mom when he
picked up a faulty hair dryer. That's when a blue
bolt of electricity ran down his arm and shot out his side, charring his
clothes and burning him in the process. What saved his life? He was wearing
Crocs. "Doctors believe his plastic shoes acted as insulators and saved his life
by stopping the electricity from passing into the ground. " Maybe the Crocs
company needs to promote this new advantage of its shoe? They could target
people who play with toasters while in the bath or people who like to golf when
there is thunder and lightening going on. That may be the only way to
resuscitate this dying company. BTW, the little boy is going to be fine but his
sense of fashion could not be saved.
FOLLOW this link to comment on this story 7. Insanity vs. Genius 
Scientists studying brain scans
have seen a similarity between those that are schizophrenic and those that
are considered a genius. It seems that both groups lack important receptors used
to filter and direct thought which allows the creative people to "think outside
the box" but others to go crazy. Creativity is known to be associated with an
increased risk of depression, schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. How many
famous creative people end up killing themselves (Hemingway, Hunter S. Thompson,
etc.)? The scientists think that the dopamine receptors in the thalamus, which
helps filter information, is much less in these groups. This leads to uncensored
information flying through the brain and may explain"why highly creative people
manage to see unusual connections in problem-solving situations that other
people miss". The schizophrenics, which may have similar brain patterns, tend to
have disturbing and bizarre thoughts. I don't think this is really new
information. Some great men have said similar things in the past:
"There is no great genius without a mixture of
madness." - Aristotle
"The distance between insanity and genius is measured
only by success." - James Bond in Tomorrow Never Dies
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Doug Farrago MD King of Medicine
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