A litany of symptoms solved

If you are an avid reader of medical narratives, you may have come across Dr. Lisa Sanders’ invitation to participate in solving the diagnostic dilemma of a 76-year-old woman suffering from chronic weakness, fatigue and mood swings posted in yesterday’s New York Times.

Over 500 readers, both lay and medically trained, weighed in on the differential diagnosis over the course of the day.  I submitted my two cents as comment #358.

The resolution of the case appears in today’s Times at this link.

You can read my final thoughts about the clinical case presentation here.

Hats off to Dr. Lisa Sanders and Times columnist Tara Parker-Pope for putting together this thought-provoking diagnostic exercise!

Book shipping fees discounted

For the remainder of the month of April, 2011, readers interested in purchasing a print copy of Patients Are a Virtue or Village Voices may take advantage of free mail shipping by using this online coupon at checkout.

• Patients Are a Virtue
• Village Voices
• Free mail shipping coupon

Author joins editorial board of Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine

Author and practicing physician assistant Brian T. Maurer has been named to the editorial advisory board of the Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine.

Maurer, a long-time contributor to YJHM through his monthly Notes from a Healer column, was welcomed to the position by Dr. Howard Spiro, M.D., founding editor of YJHM, on April 7, 2011.

Author to speak at 5th annual Cell2Soul retreat

Author Brian T. Maurer is slated to speak at the fifth annual Cell2Soul retreat the weekend of October 8th, 9th and 10th, 2010, on the island of Nantucket.

Maurer will deliver a presentation entitled “Melville’s Spirituality in Moby Dick,” on Sunday morning, October 10th, at the Nantucket Inn.

Additional topics at this year’s conference include medicine and the arts, music and healing, caring for the caregiver, and the power of stories.

Readers can access more information about the gathering here.

Polyblogs

Last month our editor initiated a rotating blog on the website of our national publication, the Journal of the American Academy of Physician Assistants.  Editorial board members were invited to send in pieces for posting to allow regular readers and subscribers a chance to glimpse the musings of a cross-section of those representing the Physician Assistant profession.

Today my contribution — Front Porch Reflections — has been posted.  Interested readers can access it here.

Over the years it’s been good discipline for me as a writer to generate weekly postings for my WordPress blog: challenging, stimulating and educational too.  One of the beauties of the internet is the ability to link information and ideas across the web.  Articles serving to clarify concepts become instantaneously accessible.  Blog entries can be linked as well.

Here I would like to put forward the concept of the polyblog.  Polyblogs — any number of blogs composed by a single author, or one particular blog with multiple contributors — are becoming ubiquitous across the web.

Like pollywogs in a vernal pool, polyblogs proliferate abundantly.  Some might grow into mature blogs, while others may fall by the wayside and perish — natural selection at work.

Author to speak at 2010 AAPA conference in Atlanta

Author and practicing Physician Assistant Brian T. Maurer will be co-presenting “What Charlotte’s Web Can Teach Us about Caring for Critically Ill Children” at the 2010 American Academy of Physician Assistants national conference in Atlanta, Georgia.

The workshop, to be held on Monday, May 31st, will explore lessons in humane medical practice that clinicians can draw from E. B. White’s classic children’s story about a pig and a spider.

For further information, click on the link below.

What Charlotte’s Web Can Teach Us about Caring for Critically Ill Children

“Ruminating on GERD” published in YJHM

Something happened to change the approach to treatment of infant spittyness over the past decade:  H2 blockers and PPIs were introduced into the pharmacological armamentarium of pediatric primary care.

I was chagrined to learn recently that 5% of infants are prescribed medication for GERD—gastroesophageal reflux disease, the latest diagnosis du jour in primary care pediatrics. >>more

Readers can now access my latest essay, Ruminating on GERD, newly published in the Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine.

“Medicine in the time of the EMR” posted in YJHM

The EMR, we are told, will help cut healthcare costs.  When medical records are converted into digital format, data will be instantaneously available to all providers caring for the patient.  Clinicians will have carte blanche access to previous laboratory and radiological studies, thus insuring that such investigations are not performed repeatedly or needlessly.  Data will be collated and scrutinized to insure that standards of care are met and that medical errors are eliminated.  Electronic billing will become the norm.  One day patients might even be able to schedule their own appointments online.  Somehow all this will serve to lower costs and improve the efficiency and quality of healthcare delivery.

Indeed it might.  But in my mind healthcare delivery is something different than the practice of medicine….>>more

My latest essay, Medicine in the time of the EMR, is now posted at the Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine blog, a companion blog for the Yale Journal for Humanities in Medicine.

Author to speak at 4th annual Cell2Soul retreat

Author Brian T. Maurer is slated to speak at this fall’s Cell2Soul gathering at Mason Hill in the Berkshire mountains of western Massachusetts on Saturday, October 3, 2009. Maurer will deliver a short presentation on Henry David Thoreau and the significance of his philosophic outlook for contemporary living.

Of the many observations that we could make about the man Thoreau—indeed, we could make many, because, like us, Thoreau was a complex human being with his own inconsistencies, pet peeves and private issues—today I will emphasize two:  the satisfaction he derived from working with his hands, and the cultivation of his spiritual awareness.  The two are not mutually exclusive.

For further information on this weekend retreat click here.

“Pediatric Primary Care Case Studies” published

Pediatric Primary Care Case Studies, a collection of pediatric case studies that addresses common health problems of well, acutely ill and chronically ill children, has been published by Jones and Bartlett Publishers, Sudbury, MA.

Author Brian T. Maurer contributed an original chapter on a toddler with language and social delays, in which he reviews the diagnostic criteria and current management of children with autism.

These case studies are designed to help students develop critical thinking and diagnostic reasoning skills as they work through common patient scenarios encountered in general pediatric practice.  Guidelines and evidence-based research support current care recommendations.

Maurer was one of three Physician Assistant contributors selected for their expertise and experience in caring for infants, children and adolescents by editors Catherine Burns, Beth Richardson and Margaret Brady.

Ordering information is available on the web here.