Diet and Nutrition. Natural Health, and Healthy Living

Perhaps it is true that the medical spa aesthetic industry is beginning to bounce back, as indicated by the post on Allergan's increase last quarter.

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Cosmetic surgeons are asking for patient help to fight the Botox Botax. Here's what the ASDS (American Society for Dermatologic Surgery) is giving it's members to solicit the support of Botox consumers: Here's the form.
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The Obama health team at HHS and ONC are gradually establishing the rules that will determine how approximately $34 billion in ARRA/HITECH funds are spent on health IT over the next several years. But there is a "missing link" in these deliberations that, so far, has not been addressed by Congress or the Administration: how the patient's voice can be "meaningfully used" in health IT.

After all, we, the taxpayers, will pay for all this hardware, software, and associated training. There are many more consumers of health care than doctors or health care professionals. Shouldn't we have a say in what matters - in what is meaningful - to us?
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Posted by Jacqueline Colclough

According to a new survey from the American Hospital Association (AHA), six out of ten hospitals in the United States are seeing a greater proportion of patients without health insurance coming through their emergency departments, while nearly half of hospitals reported that they have reduced staff. In fact, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics has released information confirming that hospital employment is no longer growing and that the number of mass layoffs for hospitals reported in February 2009 was more than double what it was a year ago.

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As part of the recently enacted stimulus bill the federal government is spending $19 billion to promote the adoption of electronic medical records by physicians. Yet, with all the focus on doctors, lawmakers have forgotten the most critical piece of the puzzle -- patients.

Take the case of Joe (not his real name), a patient who came to see one of us recently. Joe is a thirty-something year-old with type 1 diabetes. After a rebellious few decades that included dozens of hospitalizations, he was finally re-engaged in his care. His most recent request -- to access his electronic medical record. Joe wanted to track his hemoglobin A1c, an important marker of his diabetes, follow his blood pressure and take a closer look at his cholesterol. After all, it is his information in the clinic's commercially available electronic medical record. Sadly, his request couldn't be honored. Patient-access features simply hadn't been built in.

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According to a recent editorial in the NY

First, if you're not blogging for your medical spa,

First, if you're not blogging for your medical spa,

 By Catherine D. Bertram, Esquire and Salvatore J. Zambri, Esquire

A recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine, reports that despite “a consensus that the use of health information technology should lead to more efficient, safer, and higher-quality care” , less than 2% of U.S. Hospitals have invested in a comprehensive electronic medical record system. The research was funded by the Department of Health and Human Services and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.  This study did not include Veterans Affairs (“VA”) Hospitals, which have been using computerized medical records for more than a decade. 

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It's no longer the case that teens are the ones flooding Facebook and Twitter. (You can follow Medical Spa MD on both Medspa MD on Facebook and Medical Spa MDs Twitter feed.)

The chat below shows the details of the Baby Boomers rush to embrace social networks. In the last week at least three people have told me of a parent that has 'discoverd Facebook'. It's no longer the case that you can just have a web site and sit back to be found. The web is maturing and big business. The rush of Baby Boomers to embrace Facbook, Twitter and social networking in general is indicative of this move.

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