Bernstein, Silberner awarded Carter Fellowships
AHCJ members Elizabeth Bernstein and Joanne Silberner have been awarded Rosalynn Carter Fellowships for Mental Health Journalism for 2009-10.
Bernstein, of The Wall Street Journal, will examine the impact of the economic recession on people with mental illnesses while Silberner, of National Public Radio, will produce radio stories about the treatment of mental illnesses in developing countries.
In its press release, the Carter Center says it received a record number of applicants for the fellowships this year. The fellowships allow journalists to pursuing topic - from their own newsroom - that may not otherwise be brought to the public’s attention. Fellows in the United States receive a stipend of $10,000 to study and report on a particular issue within the field for one year and receives training on covering mental health issues from leading experts.
Projects that past fellows have done have been recognized by Mental Health America, the American Psychological Association, Amnesty International and AHCJ, as well as Emmy and Pulitzer Prize nominations.
Doctors face obstacles in transition to costly EMRs
Filed under: Government, Health care reform, Hot Health Headline
In his American Journey blog, the Wall Street Journal’s Andy Jordan considered the impact of stimulus funds on the health-care system’s expensive and time-consuming transition to electronic medical records in terms of physicians he encountered in his cross-country travels.
In rural Alabama, Dr. Regina Benjamin switched to EMRs after losing paper records to a combination of hurricanes and fires.
“When a patient or pharmacy calls at night or on a weekend, I do not have to rely on memory. I can access the chart from any computer, at home, from the hospital, from my hotel room when traveling.
This prevents errors and I can give better care. I can also quickly look at trends and patterns, pick up things earlier than if I had to look thru paper charts.” She was able to fund her conversion through donations and foundation support.
In Cambridge, Ohio Jordan met Dr. Patrick Goggin, who he said spent about $300,000 to convert to electronic medical records five years ago. Jordan recorded a four-and-a-half minute video showing the Dr. Goggin’s system in action. Jordan also spoke with Dr. Goggin’s colleague, Dr. David Ray.
“Advantages are not quite there as far as outweighing the costs,” (Dr. Ray) says.
“The technology is probably just not quite there yet for most solo practitioners and small practices to implement such a system.”
In the Minneapolis Star-Tribune Kate Levinson reports on growing demand for centers to store this medical data and on a study that found mid-size Midwestern cities to be among the most attractive to the medical data storage industry.
Steve Lohr of The New York Times reports that the obstacles to a transition to electronic medical records are daunting. Experts say that how local organizations help doctors in small offices adopt electronic records will be crucial to success. Lohr explains “regional health I.T. extension centers,” called for in Obama’s budget proposal that has been submitted to Congress.
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Analysis shows pitfalls of observational studies
Filed under: Europe, Health journalism, Hot Health Headline, Studies
How much of a chance are you willing to take on a chance finding? That’s the question raised in a British scientific journal after a study published last year suggested that the breakfast cereal eaten by 740 pregnant moms somehow determined the gender of their babies.
As it turned out, 56 percent of the women who consumed the most calories before conception gave birth to boys, compared with 45 percent of those who consumed the least. Of 132 individual foods tracked, breakfast cereal was the most significantly linked with baby boys. Snap, crackle, pop, right?
Not so fast, points out Melinda Beck in a health column in The Wall Street Journal. She rightly notes this was an observational study and the cereal findings are symptomatic of serial conclusions that such studies somehow offer consistently reliable and insightful evidence of a trend.
“Behind the cereal squabble lies a deep divide between statisticians and epidemiologists about the nature of chance in observational studies,” Beck writes. “Statisticians say random associations are rampant in such studies, which is why so many have contradictory findings [ ... and that] only strict clinical trials with a control group and a test group and one variable can truly prove a cause-and-effect association. [But] epidemiologists argue that … controlled clinical trials are costly, time-consuming and sometimes unethical.”
At issue, of course, is the extent to which such studies should be believed and reported before repeated findings offer something more conclusive. What do you think, though? Should observational studies of this sort make headlines or are they a cheap way to attract an audience?
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