The Treatment Trap: Hazards Seen in Medical OverUse (cross-posted from Modern Healthcare.com)

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Hazards Seen in Medical OverUse (cross-posted from Modern Healthcare.com)

Hazards seen in medical overuse

By Joe Carlson
Posted: March 24, 2011 - 4:15 pm ET
ModernHealthcare.com

"...A study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine two years ago concluded that as many as 29,000 cancers a year could be caused by the radiation from diagnostic imaging, and as many as 15,000 people actually die from cancers caused by it."

“Our minds have been marinated to believe more is better,” said Rosemary Gibson, an author of books on medical overuse and a section editor with the journal that published the study who spoke about the dangers of overutilization during a session on the last day of the American College of Healthcare Executives' annual Congress on Healthcare Leadership in Chicago.

“In many contexts, the mantra is volume, volume, volume. That certainly can drive overuse,” she said, highlighting a 2008 statement from the National Priorities Partnership that named four prime areas of medical overuse: medications such as antibiotics, C-sections, laboratory testing and diagnostic procedures.

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Rosemary Gibson

Rosemary Gibson is the author of The Treatment Trap, which puts a human face on the overuse of unnecessary medical treatment. For policymakers in the White House and Congress who are reforming health care, it offers a ten-step recovery plan to pay for health care reform wil also improving care and reducing harm from overuse. For consumers, it offers twenty smart steps to avoid overuse.

As Senior Program Officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton, New Jersey for sixteen years, Rosemary was chief architect of its $200 million national strategy to establish palliative care in the mainstream of the U.S. health care system. Now, more than 1400 hospitals have palliative care programs, an increase from about 10 in the 1990s. She was honored as the recipient of the 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.

Gibson worked with Bill Moyers and Public Affairs Television on the PBS documentary, "On Our Own Terms," which showed to more than 20 million viewers how the U.S. health care system can better care for seriously ill patients and their families. She supported the work of nurse and physician leaders who launched faculty development programs in palliative care, revised medical and nursing textbooks to include the care of dying patients, expanded palliative care content on medical and nursing licensing exams, and initiated a series in the Journal of the American Medicinal Association, "Perspectives on Care at the Close of Life."

She has made her mark as a national leader in patient safety. She is the author of the critically acclaimed book, Wall of Silence, which contains narratives of patient experience with medical errors. The book tells the human story behind the Institute of Medicine report, To Err is Human. Wall of Silence was reviewed in the Journal of the American Medical Association and Health Affairs, referenced in proceedings of the U.S. Senate, mentioned in Congressional testimony, noted in The Wall Street Journal and the Boston Globe, and highlighted in the anniversary issue of O Magazine.

Rosemary has given keynote presentations to health care professionals that provide the perspective from the other side of the bedrails, of patients and families, on the urgency of patient safety. In academic settings, she has been a guest lecturer at the University of Michigan Graduate School of Health Administration, Loyola University School of Law, the Dartmouth Clinical Microsystem Symposium, and Georgetown University and the National Board of Medical Examiners, among others.

Earlier in her career, Gibson served as Senior Research Associate at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based public policy organization; as Vice President of the Economic and Social Research Institute, a policy think tank; and as consultant to the Medical College of Virginia and the Virginia state legislature's Commission on Health Care. She also served as a volunteer and Board member at a free medical clinic in Washington, D.C.

She is a graduate of Georgetown University and has a master’s degree from The London School of Economics.

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Thursday, March 24, 2011

Hazards Seen in Medical OverUse (cross-posted from Modern Healthcare.com)

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