Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Interview with Casey Babbitt, MS4 WSU BSOM

We discussed the career and interests of Katherine Marian "Casey" Babbitt, MS4 at Wright State University Boonshoft Schol of Medicine during the first hour of the Dr Synonymous Show on 9/22/15.  Click on the link to listen to the show on BlogTalk Radio.  The general line of questions folows:

How is medical school going?
What is the most fun in med school?
Where do you go next?
What do you notice about the culture of medical practice during these years of transition?
What are med students saying about their careers these days?
Etc.
Let's talk a bit about the people with hypermobility and Ehlers Danlos Syndrome since you did a special project about the when you had your Family Medicine clinical rotation with me.
What is Ehlers Danlos Syndrome?
What did your project entail?
How has it impacted what you've done since the project?
I have used the form several times with patients and in speaking to the Dayton Zebras last week.
Etc., Etc.
What's next for you through WSU BSOM?
etc.?

Interview with Casey Babbitt, MS4

The last 20 minutes of the show reviewed and discussed my blog post about vaccines:
Leadership and Vaccines: From Presidential Candidates to American Families

What do you think?

Sunday, September 20, 2015

Leadership and Vaccines: From Presidential Candidates to American Families

I watched the Republican Presidential Candidates Debate on CNN Wednesday night (September 16th) and noted when the vaccine fuse was lit by asking Donald Trump about how he would relate to the CDC on the issue of vaccines.  I knew his response would light up Twitter, the CDC, Public Health professionals and 99% of Primary Care Pediatricians.  He answered like a concerned first time parent dressed up in a Donald Trump costume with a Donald Trump attitude.  He said they stretched out the immunizations for his children and "it worked out".  He referenced the child of one of his employees who had a horrible reaction to an immunization.  Ben Carson, MD showed his Neurosurgeon stripes by responding meekly on the subject and generally agreeing that there are too many injections and they might be spaced differently.  Rand Paul, MD (Ophthalmologist) expressed his support of vaccines AND, on the other hand, his love of freedom (of choice on immunizations).  It was polite commentary.  The medical community response wasn't.

I reviewed a few Twitter streams and blogs which spewed anger and disparaging comments about Mr. Trump primarily.  The name calling and insults were aimed also at the Republican Party. Evidenced-Based civility was lacking.

Vaccine discussions seem to melt into name calling, in general, after one or two shared comments - all over the internet.  One group attests to the safety of immunizations, strongly implying that there are no studies stating otherwise.  The other group attests to the dangers of vaccines and the harm that many children have suffered from one immunization or another.  Passion abounds.  They all care deeply.  They are doing the best they can based on what they believe.
Candidates Guide
I appreciate Chad Hayes, MD - the pediatrician who wrote "The Presidential Candidates Guide to Vaccines".  Notice the 114 comments including the types I mention above.

These comments cover the opposing opinions pretty well.  The world of either/or covers a lot of territory.  The gray world, where the Family Physician and individual Families often live can be more challenging and confusing.
Have vaccines saved lives?  Yes. They are safe for most persons and helpful for our entire society.
Did anyone ever have a reaction to a vaccine that resulted in permanent injury?  Yes.  Death?  Yes (everything we prescribe has the potential to have a fatal reaction, but with vaccines, it's extremely rare.) But we're not supposed to let you read such a comment because it may cloud your judgement.
Other problems from vaccines?  Look at VAERS, the government site where physicians report serious reactions to immunizations:   Serious reactions from date of injection

We know that the percentage of serious reactions is tiny compared to those with the usual reactions like local pain, fussiness, fever, etc.  And tiny compared with the benefits for individuals and society as a whole.

Is there some information in the CDC site that we should hide from you?  Should we be like the old time GP who kept the secrets and just "had to be trusted"?  Are many parents angry about not knowing about the VAERS or the huge amount of information about vaccines and vaccine preventable diseases on the CDC web site?

A lot of medical practice revolves around the concept of "normal".  What is normal?  From Ian McWhinney's A Textbook of Family Medicine:
"To identify individuals at high risk requires an understanding of the meaning of normal.  In the history of medicine, few errors have led to so much harm as the failure to be precise about the meaning of the term.  Although present when the physician is assessing and treating illness, the risk of harm is especially great in preventive medicine, for here the physician is identifying abnormalities in patients who have not come for treatment of symptoms or who have come with symptoms that bear no relation to the identified abnormality.  Identification of the abnormality may then lead to treatment that has risks and costs.  At the very least the patient will have an anxiety he or she did not have before.
To think clearly about normality, the physician must have an appreciation of human variability.... individual variation (and)...variation between individuals,...partly genetic but also partly the result of adaptation of individuals to different environments."

So when recommending immunizations, individual variability should be considered.  Who is at risk for what?  What is the context of their current health situation?  What might be their genetic predispositions relative to vaccine preventable diseases?  What sensitivities might they have to specific vaccines?  Is the CDC recommended schedule right for them?  Do they need a consideration for an adjustment to the usual schedule?  Look at the schedule for infants, adolescents and adults and note the variations for persons with chronic conditions, etc. Immunization Schedules

These are simple and complex schedules.  Vaccines are a complex issue and decisions about vaccine preventable diseases are complex.  It is a challenge for parents to be informed about the diseases and the vaccines.  The CDC web site is informative and overwhelming, but important.  The information form about each immunization is both summarized and deep depending on where you look in the site.
CDC Vaccines

Your physician is also very helpful, but short on time for in depth teaching about immunizations. Families generally have to work together whenever there is a new infant in the home.  Later immunizations require updates about vaccines to make the most informed decisions.

I believe that each individual family will have to make their own informed decisions about vaccines. We Family Physicians can provide a lot of information and show them the recommended and required (for Ohio schools) vaccines and they have to make what they consider to be their best decision.  Parents have many sources of information and should be able to consider the context of their child's life and theirs as they think of all the ways that vaccines may help.  They will also think of ways they may be harmful.
Enter the Principles of Medical Ethics:
1.  Respect for Persons/Autonomy: Acknowledge a person’s right to make choices, to hold views, and to take actions based on personal values and beliefs
2.  Justice: Treat others equitably, distribute benefits/burdens fairly.
3.  Nonmaleficence (do no harm): Obligation not to inflict harm intentionally; In medical ethics, the physician’s guiding maxim is “First, do no harm.”
4.  Beneficence (do good): Provide benefits to persons and contribute to their welfare. Refers to an action done for the benefit of others.

These considerations should be continuously in the mind of the physician.  Yes- the patient has the right to make choices about immunizations.  For several years most parents in my practice opted not to get the chicken pox immunization, assuming their child could get it like they did- from an infected friend or classmate, until they realized that no one seemed to get the chicken pox anymore.  Times change.

Some parents opt for no immunizations or to delay until the child is an age to be determined (two seems to be the age they pick).  About five families in my practice were "fired" by pediatricians for refusing one or all immunizations.  Four of them were shocked at the anger/ rage of the pediatrician at their desire to alter the immunization schedule for their infant (including having no immunizations)  I believe they own their children and they have an obligation to make informed decisions relative to their health, in the context of their lives (including their community).  Objections to them having the freedom to choose are well argued in the comments to the Presidential Candidate Guide above.

A tiny group of individuals and families are genetically predisposed to have adverse reactions to certain immunizations.  The PBS special about immunizations mentioned one such mutation.  Many families with autism are concerned about methylation mutations such as MTHFR or BH4 or CBS mutations leading to vaccine reactions in some.  Our Human Genome Project was supposed to give us more tools to discern those risks, but those options are not at the front line yet.  With IT and EMR's they are closer.

I love immunizations.  They have saved lives.  I enjoy gray, too.  Each patient is uniquely one of a kind.  Their biological variability is important and worthy of consideration, curiosity and respect, as are their values, goals and dreams.  Knowing and honoring that is the essence of being a Family Physician.




Tuesday, September 15, 2015

Family Medicine: Humans Want Meaning- Even Physicians

As a FamiIy Physician, I'm encouraged every day by being a part of people's lives.  Our relationship is a force that seeks a creative tension to help us grow-- and it often happens.  It's about meaning. People want meaning.  In Family Medicine, we want to help people find meaning.   And we want meaning in our lives, too.  It's like the historical physician who comforted patients, while learning from them.

We are still doing it.  BUT. Sinister forces are driving the practice of medicine into mechanistic strategies to overemphasize guidelines and treat everyone as if we are 100% certain that they are all the same.  The Electronic Medical Record is being used as a weapon to enforce the denial of biological variability and give bonuses to doctors who agree that everyone is the same.  This generates a lot of moral distress in physicians, nurses and patients.

AND, it thwarts the quest for meaning.  It's a de-humanizing approach to money management, not health or disease management.  Physicians are being de-humanized, too.  I see it in my colleagues frequently.  I read about it in their writings on the internet.  I hear it when I converse with them. They used to enjoy what they get to do.  That enjoyment is disappearing.  Yours might be disappearing, too when you are somewhere in the healthcare system.

You are getting to experience it when you see your physicians.  What do you think?

Thursday, September 10, 2015

@apjonas Twenty Doctors to Follow on Twitter List?

20 Doctors You should be Following on Twitter

Being the humble servant of the human condition that I am, I get confused when I'm named one of the top twenty this or that to follow on Twitter.  I admit that I love it when it happens.  It's reassuring that the "Social Media Geezer" has made some sort of impact.  On Twitter I'm @apjonas.
Here, I'm Dr. Synonymous- likewise on my BlogTalk Radio Show "The Dr Synonymous Show"
www.blogtalkradio.com/DrSynonymous and a Google account get you into the show.

The Dr Synonymous publishing is about Family Medicine and the human condition.  I love my medical specialty and enjoy doing Family Medicine and being a Family Physician.  It's worthy of sharing.  So I do.  I learn so much about life and medicine from interactions with patients.  The social media gives me the opportunity to reflect on those learnings (but not a freedom to write anything about specific patients)>

You are reading my blog.  And, I'm on LinkedIn for professional connections.

I have a personal Facebook page and one for my medical practice-Family Health Connections, Inc. and one for my high school graduating class and one for my high school alumni association.  I run another Facebook page for The Center for Innovation in Family and Community Health.

So... I love the social media and the enhanced ability to connect in various aspects of my life.  It's a nice shortcut, too.  I peruse fifty to 100 tweets daily and about fifty Faceebook entries.  I review blogs and tweets on my BlogTalk Radio show.  It's fun and rewarding.

Wednesday, September 9, 2015

Dr. Synonymous: A Wild Time in Family Medicine

Dr. Synonymous Show

Dr Jonas your host for the Dr. Synonymous Show will give the usual disclaimer about not practicing medicine on the show and wade into the intense energy focused on October 1, 2015.  The blog and tweet review will reflect on numerous other authors. Click above to listen to the show.

Dr Jonas, your host for the Dr. Synonymous Show, will give the usual disclaimer about not practicing medicine on the show and wade into the intense energy focused on October 1, 2015.  The blog and tweet review will reflect on numerous other authors.

The Ehlers Danlos support group, the Dayton Zebras, will have a presentation by Dr. Jonas next Thursday night September 17th about methylation, MTHFR- from the Genome to the Garden to the Health Food Store.  He presents about "Getting a NAC for Health" next Wednesday morning at the BellHOP Cafe in Bellbrook at 9 AM (the public is invited).
  
How do we survive the next wave of change in health care?  Direct Primary Care will be mentioned as one part of the solution.
A mention of Liberty Health Share and Liberty Direct and Civic Health will be included as they are interesting companies with timely products.  Dr. J gets no money to mention them, by the way.
The Dr Synonymous Blog will be reviewed somewhere in the show.  We'll have fun.  But starting late for several reasons.
He will mention the dilemma about board certification decisions by near retirement physicians and others. 
Your comments are welcome.

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

Loose, Floating Energy in Health Care

3 Trillion dolllars in Health Care.  Everyone wants some of it.  Who gets it?
I'm getting one contact per week from someone who wants a piece of the pie.  "I have a piece of software that should get me a piece of the pie.  Can I show it to you?," they say.

Yes, I'll look.  I'm curious.  A Scholar of Family Medicine.  A Warrior for Family Medicine.  A Visionary for Family Medicine.  A Teacher of Family Medicine.  What do you have?

What I want to hear/see is Human Centered and Neighborly.  NOT patient centered or Evidence Based, which have become empty, self-serving and often phony AND superficial.

"Human Centered"  --- We all matter.  Neighborly- we're not trying to sell you something you don't need.  And we respect you.

Come on, Folks.  Let's get more Human Centered and Neighborly.

Just my opinion.  What do you think?

Wednesday, September 2, 2015

End of Summer in Family Medicine: A Reflection



Dr Synonymous InternetRadio Show: Summer's End in Family Medicine

Getting back to the roots of Family Medicine, Dr Jonas- the host of the Dr Synonymous Show, will expound on end of summer activities in one Family Medicine office.  Families in transition is a  common theme.  Teaching a Medical Student or a Family Nurse Practice student is another common office happening.  Listen in and we'll also go over a few of our usual blogs and tweets.

I love Family Medicine.  Immunizations, how's and why's also discussed in this end of summer reflection.  I love immunizations and the science behind them, while worrying about the profit motive that clouds some of them at times.  College health, sports physicians, back to school physicals are part of this recording, too.  Families, Families, Families also come up a lot.