Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
Longer Looks: When A Patient Kills A Doctor; The Ebola Czar; Medicare's Role In Costs
Forbes: When Patients Kill Doctors: The Horrifying Murder Of Michael Davidson
It’s incredibly rare to see a doctor die at a patient’s hands. Which is why Michael Davidson’s murder on Tuesday was so inexplicable, and so tragic. Davidson, on paper and by reputation, was a star. Degrees from Princeton and Yale, a residency at Duke, all leading up to a staff position at the Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston, one of the nation’s finest medical institutions. A 44-year-old cardiovascular surgeon known for “saving lives and improving the quality of life for every patient he cared for,” the hospital said in a statement on Tuesday. (Dan Diamond, 1/21)
The Atlantic: How Patient Suicide Affects Psychiatrists
The stigma of suicide is so strong that it’s often an issue left unspoken, even by doctors. Many psychiatrists refuse to treat chronically suicidal patients, not only because of the stigma that surrounds it even in their profession, but because suicide is the number-one cause of lawsuits brought against mental-health treatment providers. (Sulome Anderson, 1/20)
Politico Magazine: How A ‘Czar’ Fights A Disease
The Ebola panic has subsided, and so has the mockery of [Ebola czar Ron] Klain, who will depart the White House next month and return to his regular job at the venture capital firm Revolution. Klain spoke with Politico Magazine senior writer Michael Grunwald about what went right, what he learned about public health, what the public gets wrong about government … and “Obamaphones.” (Michael Grunwald, 1/19)
Vox: An MRI Costs $1,145 In America And $138 In Switzerland. But Medicare Could Change That.
The prices different Americans pay vary wildly depending on where they are, who they are, whether they're insured, who they're insured by, and which hospital the ambulance took them to. Cruelly, the uninsured are often charged the highest prices, because if you're too poor to afford insurance, you're also too poor to fight back against price gouging. None of this makes even a little bit of sense. But Medicare could help fix it. (Ezra Klein, 1/19)
The New England Journal Of Medicine: On The Death Of A Colleague
One morning, out of the blue, my close friend, colleague, and mentor has chest pain and collapses on his way to the hospital to begin rounds. A large team of doctors, our friends and colleagues, work desperately for many hours trying to save him, but it is not to be. He dies young. (Ranjana Srivastava, 1/15)
