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The AMA reports that noncompliance with regard to prescription medication is the cause of excessive hospitalization, morbidity, mortality, and overall healthcare costs. The article fails to address those patients who suffer from adverse drug events and their related costs. They state that health costs go up about $300 billion annually because of drug noncompliance,...

Telemedicine through website doctor services has become much more available over the past decade. There are about 30 million US users of these services and about 30% of MDs are now participating in electronic communication with their patients. The demand is rapidly growing. Ease of access, convenience and lower cost are all factors driving this kind of service.  The...

  Defensive medicine leads to ordering too many tests that are often costly and potentially dangerous. It leads to skyrocketing insurance premiums but it tends to protect physicians from malpractice suits. What is needed is a more personal relationship between physicians and patients that includes patients in the decision-making process in assessment...

No one wants to suffer. Most of the time we go to our doctor because we don't feel well and we want something to make us feel better. In general we're not interested for the psychospiritual reasons for illness. However, in the day of the shaman, the concern was just the opposite. We don't ask for the meaning of our symptoms in the context of our whole...

An article published in the December 2014 supplement of Medical Care presented 14 original studies promoting the use of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) in the military to manage PTSD. They reported that CAM programs are now offered in 90% of VA hospitals today for chronic pain, anxiety, PTSD, and depression. They can do this because they are...

  Today's medicine gives the illusion that it is evidence-based. Self healing through placebo is subtracted from the effect of our treatments. Healing is a multifactorial process that is far more than using drugs, technology, and surgery. There are conflicts of interest, fabrication of data, fraudulent inclusion of popular names on papers that they...

Treating blood pressure strictly by the numbers is short-sighted because it does not take into account a person's overall health issues. Certainly it is far more important to aggressively treat someone who has advanced arteriosclerotic disease than someone who is otherwise healthy. Doesn't it make sense to be more aggressive in a person with a history...