This week [June 2022], CMS handed down their first penalties to two hospitals in Georgia for failing to comply with the price transparency law that went into effect Jan. 1, 2021.
Northside Hospital Atlanta in Sandy Springs and Northside Hospital Cherokee in Canton were both fined for a lack of readily available standard charges for hospital services online, despite warnings.
The fines were on the order of $200,000 and $900,000.
If you find a hospital breaking the law, report ’em to CMS.
Posted onOctober 24, 2022|Comments Off on Chronic Stress Linked to Arthritis Onset
Knees are the most common joint affected by osteoarthritis. Photo credit: Steven Paul Parker II
A MedPage Today article indicates that chronic stress may precipitate or aggravate arthritis. Even childhood stress. The link is not as strong for rheumatoid arthritis as it is for more common types of arthritis. Most for the reviewed studies “categorized stress as stemming from adverse life events … or adverse childhood experiences …. Most studies … suggested a relationship between exposure to chronic stressors and arthritis development.”
Would stress reduction improve the quality of life of arthritis patients? The study at hand doesn’t address that but I’d wager that it does.
Posted onOctober 21, 2022|Comments Off on Massive Literature Review: Which Way of Eating Is Best?
“We’re not gonna worry about that right now.”
A couple of dietitians did an massive literature review looking for evidence that diet has an effect on major health conditions such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. Sounds interesting, and similar to my own obsessive review done between 1995 and 2005. It bothers me that “hypertension” is misspelled in the abstract. What other mistakes were made?
For the researchers’ conclusions, you have to pay $27.95 USD.
Appropriate diet can prevent, manage, or reverse noncommunicable health conditions such as obesity, cardiovascular disease, and diabetes. Consequently, the public’s interest in diet and nutrition has fueled the multi-billion-dollar weight loss industry and elevated its standing on social media and the internet. Although many dietary approaches are popular, their universal effectiveness and risks across overall populations are not clear. The objective of this scoping review was to identify and characterize systematic reviews (SRs) examining diet or fasting (intermittent energy restriction [IER]) interventions among adults who are healthy or may have chronic disease. An in-depth literature search of six databases was conducted for SRs published between January 2010 and February 2020. A total of 22,385 SRs were retrieved, and 1,017 full-text articles were screened for eligibility. Of these, 92 SRs met inclusion criteria. Covered diets were organized into 12 categories: high/restricted carbohydrate (n = 30), Mediterranean, Nordic, and Tibetan (n = 19), restricted or modified fat (n = 17), various vegetarian diets (n = 16), glycemic index (n = 13), high protein (n = 12), IER (n = 11), meal replacements (n = 11), paleolithic (n = 8), Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypretension (DASH; n = 6), Atkins, South Beach, and Zone (n = 5), and eight other brand diets (n = 4). Intermediate outcomes, such as body weight or composition and cardiometabolic, were commonly reported. Abundant evidence was found exploring dietary approaches in the general population. However, heterogeneity of diet definitions, focus on single macronutrients, and infrequent macronutrient subanalyses were observed. Based on this scoping review, the Evidence Analysis Center prioritized the need to collate evidence related to macronutrient modification, specifically restricted carbohydrate diets.
Posted onOctober 20, 2022|Comments Off on Movie: The Real Anthony Fauci
Early in the pandemic, Fauci said masks didn’t work. Soon thereafter he changed his tune. Misinformation? Disinformation?
You can see the new movie about Fauci’s role in the pandemic response at therealanthonyfaucimovie.com. It’s only free for another seven days, so don’t delay unless you wanna pay. It’s the movie version of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s book, The Real Anthony Fauci. The movie runs 1 hr and 50 minutes. Don’t bother to watch it if your mind is closed to alternatives to the government’s orthodox explanations of the pandemic.
The movie is excellent and I recommend it. I can’t endorse all ideas it discusses simply because I haven’t researched them all.
It reminded me of the early days of the AIDS epidemic, in which Fauci was also involved as head of NIAID starting ~1984. NIAID = Nat’l Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. I was working at a hospital in Pensacola, FL, when I was the victim of an needle stick injury involving an AIDS patient under my care. This was in the early 1990s when AIDS was still considered a death sentence. We didn’t have the effective AIDS drugs that we have now. Fauci was a promoter of the early AIDS drug called AZT. IIRC, I was prescribed a course of AZT for 2-6 weeks to keep me from getting infected with HIV from the needle stick. Whether the AZT worked or not, I didn’t get infected. Good times.
Steve Parker, M.D.
PS: In case you’re wondering, most young adults going into healthcare do no expect to be killed by infections we acquire from patients under our care. Consider the highly-infectious Ebola virus in Africa with a ~40% death rate if infected. Few of us were volunteering to go there and provide care. Many of us, if it showed up in the U.S., would not have shown up for work if it came to our hospitals. At the time of the original Ebola scare (10 years ago?) there were only ~12 hospital beds in the entire country with adequate infection control and decontamination procedures.
I have a particular interest in preventing age-related macular degeneration (ARMD) since it runs in my family. It’s the leading cause of vision loss in adults over 50.
Question What were the long-term findings of Age-Related Eye Disease Study 2 (AREDS2) supplements regarding development of lung cancer or progression to late age-related macular degeneration (AMD)?
Findings In this epidemiologic follow-up study of the AREDS2 cohort of 3882 participants and 6351 eyes, 10-year follow-up results showed that development of lung cancer nearly doubled in participants assigned to beta carotene among former smokers but not those assigned to lutein/zeaxanthin. Lutein/zeaxanthin was associated with a reduction in the risk of progression to late AMD when compared with beta carotene.
Meaning These findings suggest that the AREDS2 supplement with lutein/zeaxanthin instead of beta carotene was safe, with no association with developing lung cancer and a potential beneficial association with further reduction in progression to late AMD.
These are the ones I take. In the U.S., your best price may be at Costco or Sam’s Club.
…. 10-year weight gain is substantially greater in US women compared to men. On average (±SE), women gained 5.4 ± 0.3 kg and 9.2 ± 0.4 percent of their initial weight over the previous 10 years, whereas men gained 2.6 ± 0.2 kg and 3.8 ± 0.3 percent of their initial weight. In general, compared to US men, women gained about twice as much weight (kg) and 2.4 times more weight expressed as a percent of initial weight, over the previous 10 years. Fourth, 10-year weight gain is significantly higher in Non-Hispanic Blacks than in other racial groups, especially NH [non-Hispanic] Black women. Moreover, 10-year weight gain is significantly lower in Non-Hispanic Asians compared to other racial categories.
If you think in pounds instead of kilograms, like me, note that 1 kg = 2.2 lb.
Since 2000, U.S. obesity in adults has increased from 30% to 42% of the population. This doesn’t even include suspected pandemic-related weight gain.
Mean 10-year weight gain was 4.2 ± 0.2 kg or 6.6 ± 0.2% of initial body weight within the United States.
The incidence of severe obesity had increased from 5% in 2000 to almost 10% now. (The article likely defines “severe obesity” but I didn’t catch it in my quick scan.)
Not enough Americans are reading and implementing my Advanced Mediterranean Diet!
Advanced Mediterranean Diet 