The advice of a doctor

The article I read this week was written by a doctor, Peter A. Ubel. In this article he discusses the role of the doctor in the decision making of their patients. "Medical decisions these days are increasingly recognized as being more than simply medical, with the right choice depending in part on the patient's preferences...According to this new paradigm of preference-sensitive decision-making, doctors like me shouldn't tell patients what to do, but rather should educate our patients about the risks and benefits of their options." He goes on to describe an instance in which he disregarded his role as unbiased educator and gave his own personal advice, telling a patient with cancer that he should keep smoking because the cancer is incurable and it will help with the stress. Also, explaining to the patient and his wife that being with each other and the rest of their family is the most important thing for him. 

I believe it is important for a doctor to play the role of educator and let the patient decide. There are so many options available these days that it would difficult for a doctor to determine exactly what works best for each individual. It would be a heavy burden on the doctor if they picked the one that ended up having terrible effects, so it is best to let the patient weigh out there options. I also feel that a doctor can and should step out of this role and offer advice every once in a while. When people have diagnoses that are hard to deal with sometimes a doctor has to be that mediating guide, instead of a medical dictionary. The hard part is knowing when it is right to do so.

Electronic Health Records

In this article in the New York Times the author Walecia Konrad brings up the fact that Obama has put forth a plan to spend 19 billion dollars on electronic medical records. The appeal of having electronic medical records is seamless communication, which would "improve the quality of health care and help reduce dangerous medical errors. And by improving the efficiency of medicine, it might also help curb the nations skyrocketing health care costs." The article states that the intentions are all good, but it will be a while before this idea is able to be fully integrated. If your medical care provider doesn't already provide you with an electronic medical record of yourself, which chances are they don't since only 9% of hospitals, then you are on your own in making it. The author says when he tested out four online health record medical files, Google Health Records, Microsoft Healthvault, RevolutionHealth Health Record, and WebMd Personal Health Record, it proved to be challenging. In order to complete it you would have to do a lot of research and digging in your physicians filing cabinet. Later in the article it also states that personal files done by the patient can be dangerous for doctors to use because their could be errors and omissions. 

With news of the presidents plan, Google and Microsoft have been working on becoming the leaders in the technology, "but progress is being slowed by incompatible technologies, privacy concerns and resistance by many health care providers to installing expensive electronic systems.

I feel that the principles behind the technology are all good and I definitely see the large potential benefit, but in order for this to work properly it will require full cooperation on the part of the patient and medical facilities. It would definitely be great if they could just type in some ones name in the system and get all their past medical history, especially if the person is unconscious or unable to give the proper information needed. For me though, I will sit back and wait until my medical providers take the initiative. 

Real Age

After doing the questionnaire it calculated my real age to be -2.6 which makes my age drop from 20.1 to 17.5. I found this to be a pretty interesting survey. I agree with many of the questions they used to judge age, but I also feel that they need more questions to get a basis. Many of the questions seem like they are designed to find problems, which they can find a prescription for, as the New York Times article suggests. I can't say that I agree with them allowing  pharmaceutical companies use the results as a marketing tool, but overall I feel it is a valuable site. It makes the person taking the survey take inventory of their everyday activities and health choices, and then when it gives the results it informs the individual on what they may be doing incorrectly. It provides them with simple solutions to problems that they may not have noticed, or that they thought were okay. It never hurts to be aware. As far as pharmaceutical companies go, I think the site should protect the members. If an individual is clearly at risk for certain problems, inform the of this and give them the option of receiving the advertisements of pills which could help them. I feel it should be a choice though, not something people are duped  into.