A Harvard Medical School study finds out what patients really think about generic medications.

The individual healthcare experience is comprised of a series of procedures.  Each procedure begins with the first visit to a healthcare provider for a given condition, and ends with fulfillment of the condition's treatment.  An annual physical is relatively simple, and typically involves only one step.  More complicated conditions requiring surgery or other intensive treatments consist of multiple steps from beginning to end.  Whether the treatment requires just one step, or many, the entire process is considered one procedure.

Whether it’s for better health, control of cholesterol, diabetes or weight loss people commonly ask –What diet should I be on???  One only needs to browse the diet book aisles of their favorite book store or search this topic online to be inundated with thousands of books and articles touting the newest and BEST diet.  If you pause to think about it, if there really WAS a BEST diet, wouldn’t there be only ONE book that we all would follow? Unfortunately the latest fads tend to catch on because they promise fast results with little sacrifice.  As anyone who has tried these diets can tell you, the promise usually goes unfulfilled and the results are typically disappointing and short lived.

The use of evidence-based medicine (EBM) by physicians improves the quality of patient care and assists in determining the “right”care at the “right” time in the “right” amount for the “right” person. It also helps to reduce disparities in the type of care being given throughout the country, meaning geographic location or socioeconomic status will not affect the quality of care a patient receives.

A 57-year-old low risk healthcare worker went into his physician office recently for a completely routine check-up.  He had no complaints and the internist proceeded to probing the chronic problem list with questions.  The blood pressure was under excellent control on Lisinopril.  A 2008 lipid profile showed the cholesterol under excellent control with Simvastatin.  The last hearing evaluation was from 2006 and the patient had no sense of worsening high frequency hearing loss.  The sleep apnea appeared under good control and there had been no weight gain since a CPAP machine was started in 2006.  A colonoscopy done in 2000, at age 47, for occasional blood noted on the toilet tissue, was negative. There were no new GI symptoms and the hemocult exam was negative.  A review of past immunizations disclosed the absence of a hepatitis A or B vaccine. The physical was normal except for a small mole on the back that was “probably normal.