Respondents
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Why your doctor examines you
The Art of Doctoring October 27, 2020
In the second question in our two-minute question series Dr. Moyez Jiwa, host of the Health Design podcast asks if the clinical examination is a crucial part of the experience when visiting a doctor.
The respondents have all been featured in our podcasts. You an hear the longer conversations here:
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Your doctor doesn’t know enough about you
The Art of Doctoring October 18, 2020
In a new series for the Journal of Health Design I had the pleasure of asking my guests a series of questions following our previous conversations. This is the first of those questions.
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Could the greatest hope for primary care be in a laboratory?
The Art of Doctoring May 14, 2020
Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a chronic autoimmune disease characterized by inflammation and damage of the joints affecting about 0.5% of the general population. Early treatment in RA is important as it can prevent disease progression and irreversible damage of the joints. Despite the high diagnostic value of anti-citrullinated protein antibodies (ACPA) and rheumatoid factor (RF), there is a strong demand for novel serological biomarkers to further improve the diagnosis of this abundant disease. During the last decades, several autoantigens have been described in RA including Ra33 (hnRNP A2), fibrinogen, fibronectin, alpha-enolase, type II collagen, immunoglobulin binding protein (BiP), annexins and viral citrullinated peptide (VCP) derived from Epstein Barr Virus-encoded protein (EBNA-2). More recent discoveries include antibodies to carbamylated antigens (anti-CarP), to peptidyl arginine deiminase type 4 (PAD4), to BRAF (v raf murine sarcoma viral oncogene homologue B1) and to 14 autoantigens identified by phage display technology. This review provides a current overview of novel biomarkers for RA and discusses their future potential to improve the diagnosis of the disease.
Trouw and Mahler
See also my podcast with Sam Mazin
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To what extent will telemedicine survive this pandemic?
The Art of Doctoring April 12, 2020
Advances in medicine during wars
Our research findings prior to the pandemic were guarded about the potential of video consults:
Background: There is unequal access to health care in Australia, particularly for the one-third of the population living in remote and rural areas. Video consultations delivered via the Internet present an opportunity to provide medical services to those who are underserviced, but this is not currently routine practice in Australia. There are advantages and shortcomings to using video consultations for diagnosis, and general practitioners (GPs) have varying opinions regarding their efficacy.
Objective: The aim of this Internet-based study was to explore the attitudes of Australian GPs toward video consultation by using a range of patient scenarios presenting different clinical problems.
Methods: Overall, 102 GPs were invited to view 6 video vignettes featuring patients presenting with acute and chronic illnesses. For each vignette, they were asked to offer a differential diagnosis and to complete a survey based on the theory of planned behavior documenting their views on the value of a video consultation.
Results: A total of 47 GPs participated in the study. The participants were younger than Australian GPs based on national data, and more likely to be working in a larger practice. Most participants (72%-100%) agreed on the differential diagnosis in all video scenarios. Approximately one-third of the study participants were positive about video consultations, one-third were ambivalent, and one-third were against them. In all, 91% opposed conducting a video consultation for the patient with symptoms of an acute myocardial infarction. Inability to examine the patient was most frequently cited as the reason for not conducting a video consultation. Australian GPs who were favorably inclined toward video consultations were more likely to work in larger practices, and were more established GPs, especially in rural areas. The survey results also suggest that the deployment of video technology will need to focus on follow-up consultations.
Conclusions: Patients with minor self-limiting illnesses and those with medical emergencies are unlikely to be offered access to a GP by video. The process of establishing video consultations as routine practice will need to be endorsed by senior members of the profession and funding organizations. Video consultation techniques will also need to be taught in medical schools.
Jiwa M, Meng X. Video Consultation Use by Australian General Practitioners: Video Vignette Study J Med Internet Res 2013;15(6):e117 DOI: 10.2196/jmir.2638 PMID: 23782753 PMCID: PMC3713911
The geography of large and relatively underpopulated countries like Australia makes it attractiveto use increasingly cheap information technology to improve access to general practitioners. People are already using the internet to access many other services. However, there are some moderating influences on the use of video-consultations in general practice. These include technical limitations, patient confidentiality concerns, regulatory issues as well as the willingness of general practitioners to consult patients other than face-to-face. Theories predict that a relatively small cadre of innovative doctors are those most likely to try video-consultations for routine consultations. However, much will depend on research that demonstrates that video-consultations are unlikely to harm patients or increase the risk of litigation; on the scope toincorporate diagnostic equipment on home computers; on the financial incentives offered to doctors and on the public proclamations of opinion leaders on the question of video-consultations.
Jiwa et al Quality in Primary care
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Your greatest value is your ability to solve problems
Lean Medicine March 26, 2019
As a healthcare professional you may face problems that require problem solving at the least and the generation of creative solutions ideally. How do you hone your creativity?
The results revealed that leadership clarity is associated with clear team objectives, high levels of participation, commitment to excellence, and support for innovation. Team processes consistently predicted team innovation across all three samples. Team leadership predicted innovation in the latter two samples, and there was some evidence that team processes partly mediated this relationship. The results imply the need for theory that incorporates clarity and not just style of leadership. For health care teams in particular, and teams in general, the results suggest a need to ensure leadership is clear in teams when innovation is a desirable team performance outcome. West et al
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Is normal too thin?
Lean Medicine March 18, 2019
Try this experiment. If you are tending to overweight ( Body Mass Index (BMI) 25 or over) then try to get to BMI 18.5 -24.9. If you succeed people will decide you have lost ‘too much weight’ even when your BMI is in the middle of the normal range. If normal was defined as ‘what is most common’ then to have a ‘normal’ BMI is unusual and we may have become blind to normal so that what we perceive as ‘normal’ is not ideal. Rates of overweight and obesity are now at 60-70%.
In an Australian study on the public perception of body size the authors report that:
Overweight participants were also most likely to incorrectly identify themselves as a healthy weight (67 per cent, p<0.001), compared to 12 per cent of obese participants . The majority (89 per cent) of normal weight participants accurately identified themselves as being a healthy weight. Flanagan et al
Therefore it is not surprising that when people are challenged about their weight in healthcare they are reluctant to identify the issue as a problem.
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Are the barriers to access in healthcare physical?
Lean Medicine March 14, 2019
Imagine you have back pain. Your doctor suggests you need special scan. You have to travel an hour across town to get to the hospital where you have an appointment at 9 am. You take the morning off but hope you might get to work in the afternoon. It’s peak hour traffic as you arrive at the hospital. The queue to get into the car park stretches down the street. You join the line of cars and realise it’s now 8.45am. The X-ray department is a long walk from the car park. Just as you get to the entrance to the parking lot the attendant indicates that it is full and you have to try and get a spot on a side street. The chap in the car behind you is getting frustrated- are you waiting in the queue or trying to back out? It’s a one way street you can’t turn the car here. It’s now 9 am you are going to be late- not sure how late. You toy with the idea of just going home.
In November 2011, an editorial in the Canadian Medical Association Journal called hospital parking fees a barrier to health care, saying the charges amount to “parking-centred health care,” and recommended hospitals stop charging patients for parking. The editorial stirred up a debate in the media. The Ontario Nurses’ Association, for one, agreed with the recommendation and noted that many of its members could tell stories about patients who had avoided seeking care or had cut appointments because of high parking costs. Canadian Nurse
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