Out-of-body experiences linked to neural instability and biases in body representation

From a 11 July 2011 Science Daily article

Although out-of-body experiences (OBEs) are typically associated with migraine, epilepsy and psychopathology, they are quite common in healthy and psychologically normal individuals as well. However, they are poorly understood. A new study, published in the July 2011 issue of Elsevier’s Cortex, has linked these experiences to neural instabilities in the brain’s temporal lobes and to errors in the body’s sense of itself — even in non clinical populations…..

University Of Dayton Study Overturns 250-Year-Old Belief About Effects Of Age, Repeated Injury On Tissue Regeneratio

From the 19 July 2011 Medical News Today article

Scientists have been wrong for 250 years about a fundamental aspect of tissue regeneration, according to a University of Dayton biologist who says his recent discovery is good news for humans.

In research published in Nature Communications this month, Panagiotis Tsonis concludes repeated regeneration, even at old age, does not alter the capacity of newts to regenerate tissue. His findings overturn long-accepted theories proposed by regeneration scientists that age and repeated amputation negatively affect regeneration….

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Unrealistic Expectations By The Public Of Personalized Medicine

From the 19 July 2011 Medical News Today article

“Despite a few successes, patients would be foolhardy to expect anything more than a small number of additional tailored interventions,” write Dr. George Browman, University of British Columbia and member of CMAJ’s editorial board, and Dr. Paul Hébert, Editor-in-Chief, CMAJ, with the editorial advisory team. “They should not expect the cures for all common diseases.”

The authors write that a simple, targeted solution is unrealistic because of the complex interplay between genes, proteins, cell metabolism and environmental influences. Also, there is a significant time lag in getting new therapies into practice.

“For the public at large, the term ‘personalized medicine’ does not spark images of abstract science and technology,” they state. “The image it creates is just the opposite: most people would conceive personalized medicine to be what’s commonly called patient-centred or person-centred care – a more humane, empathetic approach to care focused on individuals and shaped by their needs and circumstances, rather than cell-level scientific manipulations.”

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Patients worse off with more-experienced docs?

From a 15 July 2011 Reuters health article

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – In a study that flies in the face of common sense, sicker patients turned out to fare worse under the care of seasoned doctors than when newcomers to medicine looked after them.

According to findings in the American Journal of Medicine, patients whose doctors had practiced for at least 20 years stayed longer in the hospital and were more likely to die compared to those whose doctors got their medical license in the past five years.

The results highlight “issues that we have as a medical profession in keeping up to date” with the latest medical knowledge, said Dr. Niteesh Choudhry of Harvard Medical School, who was not involved in the new study. It is “a quality of care problem that has been recognized for five to 10 years,” he told Reuters Health….

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New Brief Outlines Strategies to Put Patients at the Center of Primary Care

From the press release

AHRQ has released a new brief, The Patient-Centered Medical Home: Strategies to Put Patients at the Center of Primary Care, highlighting opportunities to improve patient engagement in primary care.  The brief focuses on involvement at three levels: the engagement of patients and families in their own care, in quality improvement activities in the primary care practice, and in the development and implementation of policy and research related to the patient-centered medical home (PCMH).  Strategies to Put Patients at the Center of Primary Care provides a clear and concise definition of the patient-centered medical home and outlines six strategies that can be used to support primary care practices in their efforts to engage patients and families.  This brief and other resources, including white papers and a searchable database of PCMH-related articles, is available from AHRQ’s online PCMH Resource Center at PCMH_Patients at the Center of Primary Care (PDF File, PDF Help).

Related articles

• Health-care model improves diabetes outcomes, health (eurekalert.org)
• More On The Synergies Between the Patient Centered Medical Home (PCMH) and Remote Telephonic Disease Management (diseasemanagementcareblog.blogspot.com)