Medicine – Living Well While Surviving Cancer

Doctors’ Roles and Responsibilities

See what doctors’ jobs encompass. With video.

Earlier this month, I gave a presentation to about 65 residents and other doctors at the Queens Hospital Center in Jamaica, New York. The topic? “Roles in Patient-Doctor Relationships: Seeing Both Sides”

Over the next several posts, various aspects of that talk will be highlighted:

- - Doctors’ Roles and Responsibilities (including doctor morale)
  - Patients’ Roles and Responsibilities (and what doctors wish patients knew)
  - Stages of Patient Frustration and Satisfaction
  - Doctor Actions Improving Patient Relationships
  - Patient Actions Improving Doctor Relationships
  - We’re Not There Yet on Doctor-Patient Relationships

Doctors typically have the roles and responsibilities highlighted in this image. How do YOU rate each of your doctors across these roles and responsibilities?

As patients, it is also vital for us to understand the factors that may affect our doctors’ performance. This video shows a few such factors.

Be Careful with OTC Drugs

OTC drugs are not risk-free!

For many people, there is a misconception that over-the-counter (OTC) drugs are always safer than prescription drugs. And that simply is not true.

Consider these observations from AARP:

“If the good news is that over-the-counter pain killers such as acetaminophen, ibuprofen, and naproxen won’t put you at risk for addiction issues like prescription opioids or narcotics can, the less good news is that no pain pill comes without the potential for problems, says Nitin Sekhri, medical director of pain management at Westchester Medical Center in Valhalla, N.Y.”

“Acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol, is considered the safest option by many, and yet, Sekhri notes, it’s still to blame for about 50 percent of acute liver failures in the U.S. Acetaminophen also is the leading reason behind calls to poison control and to blame for more than 50,000 emergency room visits a year.”

“Often problems arise from people not realizing they’ve taken as much acetaminophen as they have. The over-the-counter painkiller isn’t just in Tylenol: It shows up in remedies meant to fight allergies, colds, flu, coughs, and sleeplessness. It’s also an ingredient in prescription painkillers such as Vicodin and Percocet.”

Click the image to read a lot more.

Cancer Research Institute Conference Video

In June, the Cancer Research Institute held its annual cancer awareness conference. Complete with an excellent video, which is shown below.

As it notes at YouTube:

“Our panel of immunotherapy experts discusses the latest cancer immunotherapy advances featured at the world’s largest oncology conference—the 2018 annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO)—with topics including combination immunotherapy, biomarker development, CAR T cell therapies, and new approaches to immune-based cancer treatment.”

“Panelists include Charles G. Drake, M.D., Ph.D., of New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center, and Catherine Diefenbach, M.D., and Jeffrey S. Weber, M.D., of the Perlmutter Cancer Center at NYU Langone Health. Jill O’Donnell-Tormey, Ph.D., of the Cancer Research Institute, moderates.”

“We present this video as part of the Answer to Cancer patient and caregiver education program of the Cancer Research Institute, and feature it as part of our sixth annual global awareness campaign, Cancer Immunotherapy Month, in June.”

New Cancer Drug Approved

Those of us battling with cancer often feel research is not moving fast enough.

Yet, researchers are working quite hard. And billions of dollars are being spent.

Quite recently, the FDA approved a new and VERY expensive cancer drug. As CNN reports:

“Vitrakvi is the first medication developed specifically to target tumors based on gene mutations, not their location in the body.”

AI Aids Drug Operations

We know that technology has had a tremendous on the medical field. And artificial intelligence (AI) is coming on strong. Today, we look at how AI aids drug operations.

As William Soliman, President, Accreditation Council for Medical Affairs, notes:

“Recently, two AI drug design companies, Insilico Medicine and A2A Pharmaceuticals joined forces to bring to market a possible treatment for Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD) and other rare orphan diseases. Using AI to more rapidly discover optimal pre-clinical candidates may revolutionize the drug development process in the life sciences.”

“What AI can bring to the table is the ability to rapidly and accurately sort through massive amounts of data. This may very well revolutionize how competitive intelligence, drug discovery and stakeholder engagement take place as we know it. Among many functions that medical affairs is tasked with, an important one is stakeholder engagement with External Experts (EE) (formerly known as KOLs or Key Opinion Leaders). For Medical Science Liaisons (MSLs), who are the primary function engaging external stakeholders, there will likely be several changes.”

Click the image to read a lot more.

AI Aids Drug Operations — Medical Affairs and Artificial Intelligence in the Life Sciences

Best Practices to Improve Reporting of Patient Safety Concerns

University of Cambridge and Johns Hopkins Medicine looked at what prevented employees from raising patient safety concerns.

Too often, patient safety concerns about their care in medical facilities has gone unreported or under-reported. In response, there is new research about how to fix this.

As Johns Hopkins reports:

“In a case study published online last week in Academic Medicine, an international team of researchers led by the University of Cambridge and Johns Hopkins Medicine looked at what prevented employees from raising concerns. The study identifies measures to help health care organizations encourage their employees to speak up and recommends a systematic approach to promoting employee voice that appears to have already made a positive impact at Johns Hopkins.”

“It’s not enough just to say you’re committed to employee voice. Health care staff must genuinely feel comfortable speaking up if organizations are going to provide safe, high-quality care,” says Mary Dixon-Woods, D.Phil., M.Sc., a professor at the University of Cambridge, director of THIS Institute (The Healthcare Improvement Studies Institute) and the study’s lead author. “Even when reporting mechanisms are in place, employees may not report disruptive behaviors if they don’t feel safe in doing so and don’t think their concerns will be addressed.”

“Because health-care workers often are reluctant to raise concerns about co-workers and unsafe behaviors, leadership at Johns Hopkins Medicine sought to encourage employee voice in the organization by first identifying barriers. To address the issues raised in these interviews, Johns Hopkins leaders developed, implemented, and in some cases expanded a series of interventions from fall 2014 through summer 2016. These interventions included clear definitions of acceptable and unacceptable behavior, well-coordinated reporting mechanisms, leadership training on having difficult conversations, and consistent consequences for disruptive behaviors.”

Click the image to read more.

Best Practices to Improve Reporting of Patient Concerns — **Credit: iStock**

Would You Buy Your Prescriptions at Amazon?

Until now drugstore chains, independent pharmacies, mail-order delivery from prescription suppliers, and in-store pharmacies in retail stores have been the major ways that we buy prescription drugs.

Now, Amazon intends to change this — as it has so many other business segments. So, would you buy your prescriptions at Amazon?

According to Business Insider Intelligence:

“More than half of U.S. consumers say they would ditch their current pharmacy for Amazon. And Amazon’s $1 billion deal to acquire online pharmacy startup PillPack is bad news for CVS, Rite Aid, Walgreens, and other pharmacies. The majority of respondents (57%) in an exclusive Business Insider Intelligence survey said they would use a pharmacy service offered by Amazon over their current pharmacy.”

“Amazon’s strengths are price, product selection, and delivery speed — all of which could be applied to retail pharmaceuticals. While it’s unclear how Amazon aims to use PillPack, we think consumers anticipate lower prices and convenience.”

“Amazon still has a number of hurdles to overcome before offering a full-fledged pharmacy service. For instance, Amazon could have trouble forging relationships with pharmacy benefits managers who could see Amazon’s entry into the pharmaceutical market as a direct threat.”