Perspective Discusses Health Care Cost Containment; Kaiser Family Foundation President, CEO Discusses Prospects for Health Reform

• "Money and the Changing Culture of Medicine," New England Journal of Medicine: In the perspective, Pamela Hartzband, an endocrinologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, and Jerome Groopman, a hematologist-oncologist at the medical center and a professor of medicine at Harvard, examine how the economic recession and new presidential administration mean "even more attention will be focused on containing costs in the health care system." The authors discuss several studies that illustrate the unintended consequences of "applying a business mindset to medicine," as well as ways to "restore the balance between communal and market exchange in medicine" (Hartzband/Groopman, NEJM, 1/8).
  
  
• "Window of Opportunity?" Kaiser Family Foundation: In the essay, Kaiser Family Foundation President and CEO Drew Altman examines whether current economic conditions combined with other key factors have presented an opportunity for successful passage of health care reform, but cautions that based on a review of history, policymakers may have to move quickly or the "window of opportunity" could close. The essay is the latest installment of a Foundation series titled "Pulling It Together ... from Drew Altman" (Kaiser Family Foundation release, 1/7).