Every single day, all across the globe, extraordinarily creative and talented students sit in our classrooms bored out of their minds. These budding innovators may differ drastically in what particular domain captivates their attention, whether it’s science and engineering, architecture and design, arts, music and entertainment, business and finance, law, or health care. Nevertheless, as Richard Florida [...]

Thanks in no small part to the invitation of the fantastic Doctor Zen, I was honored this past week to be a participant in the PACE 3rd Annual Biomedical Ethics Conference. The conference brought together an eclectic mix of people who care about bioethics: nurses, counselors, physicians, physicians’ assistants, lawyers, philosophers, scientists, students, professors, and [...]

As a journalist and a health advocate, I have a professional interest in health care reform. But as the Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act this week, I had a personal interest as well. Last fall, after three decades as a salaried employee with health benefits, I became a self-employed consultant with none. And [...]

Four years ago the Obama administration offered up $19 billion in stimulus funds to help get health care IT (including electronic health records, or EHRs) in the pink—or at least in the black. Better information technology throughout the health care system would save money, improve care and bring the health care industry into the 21st [...]

When I was growing up in the 1980s and ’90s with two younger brothers, the antibiotic amoxicillin was a frequent guest in our house. Strep throat, sinus infections, sore throats, coughs; we all remember that thick, pink, bubble gum-flavored liquid perhaps a little too well. But this popular drug, like many antibiotics, is overprescribed—often given [...]

Medicaid provides benefits to more than 60 million Americans, including millions of children, who might not otherwise be able to afford medical care. This sizable government program has been sheltered from large federal cuts but is now vulnerable because of the ongoing talks in Washington to close the budget gap and avoid the fiscal cliff. [...]

Genetic sequences of drug-resistant bacteria have helped scientists better understand how these dastardly infections evolve—and elude treatment. But these superbugs are still claiming lives of many who acquire them in hospitals, clinics and nursing homes. And recent outbreaks of these hard-to-treat infections can spread easily in healthcare settings. Researchers might soon be able to track [...]

In the U.S. it can be difficult to avoid getting an MRI, laboratory analysis or at least an X-ray in any given year. But in poor areas, medical technologies—from expensive screening machines to simple devices—are often as rare as specialists who know how to work them. So, in an effort to improve health the world [...]

Since last August, I’ve been counting down the days until my 30th birthday this Wednesday. You see, I’ve got money coming my way—not just in the form of birthday checks from my grandmother and aunts—but an even larger chunk of change, spread out over the entire year. Starting August 1, I, along with millions of [...]

Some people can’t wait for the U.S. Supreme Court announcement of its ruling on the Obama Administration’s Affordable Care Act (aka health care reform law), so they are betting on the outcome. Intrade, a popular online trading exchange, provides a platform for people to wager on whether or not future events will happen. More than [...]

More and more physicians are investing in their own imaging equipment. But when a doctor stands to make money on each MRI he or she orders, it doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out that they might be inclined to order too many scans. Patients with back problems whose orthopedic surgeons referred them for [...]

In the prevailing more-is-better culture, patients often jump at or at least surrender to the latest and greatest medical test. New imaging technology is gaining crispness with each passing year, and advances in the past several years has enabled doctors to peer inside the body to detect tiny tumors or the beginning of a blocked [...]

In 2009 California took in $839 million in taxes from the sale of cigarettes. And with its—and many other states’—budget in dire straights, it is hard to turn down any extra income. But that’s just what the state has been doing, with overall cigarette sales dropping year after year thanks to anti-smoking efforts. And these [...]