Latest Articles
- Vertebroplasty, evidence, and health care reform: What is quality care?
Two recent trials found that a popular procedure for fixing vertebral fractures lacks efficacy. Like it or not, in the future, such evidence is going to affect whether insurers pay for care.
- Influenza in long-term care facilities: Preventable, detectable, treatable
Vaccination is the most important preventive measure. Early detection, infection control measures, prompt treatment, and preventive treatment of contacts can also help curtail an outbreak.
- Pregabalin for fibromyalgia (April 2009)
Readers comment on an article on the use of pregabalin in fibromyalgia (April 2009).
- A 35-year-old Asian man with jaundice and markedly high aminotransferase levels
The patient acquired hepatitis B virus at birth and was never treated for it. What is his present infection status?
- What’s new in prostate cancer screening and prevention?
Two large trials of screening with prostate-specific antigen measurements came to seemingly opposite conclusions. Furthermore, a large trial of selenium and vitamin E found that neither has value in preventing prostate cancer.
- The internist, alphabet soup, and the hepatologist
Given the widening spectrum of viral hepatitis types and clinical syndromes, prompt referral to and consultation with a hepatologist are in our patients’ best interests.
- Does measuring natriuretic peptides have a role in patients with chronic kidney disease?
Measuring them can help diagnose decompensated heart failure and predict the risk of death and hospitalization, but whether it helps in chronic kidney disease is unclear.
- The new data on prostate cancer screening: What should we do now?
Does screening have a benefit? We have new data, but do we have the answer?