Literature Potpourri

Here are a smattering of interesting articles on my desk I’ve wanted to blog about, but haven’t had time to work into full posts.  Writing about them here briefly doesn’t preclude anyone (you?) from posting about these stories in greater detail later!

• The February issue of the Journal of General Internal Medicine, or JGIM, should be subtitled “The GeriPal Issue.”  Lots of great articles on social media, geriatrics, and palliative care topics, including:
• An article by Matthew DeCamp on social media and conflicts of interest.  Did you know that 65% of patients trust information about cancer obtained from the internet?  (for comparison, 93% trusted information from a physician).  Lot’s of nefarious potential here for big pharma  and docs in their pay to steer patients to their products without adequate disclosure.
• This study by Amy Kelley on of out-of-pocket costs during the last five years of life.  Amy is on a roll, see this postabout her recent Health Affairs article. Did you know that one quarter of older adults spend down their assets to nothing in the last five years of life? In the accompanying editorial, Michael McWilliams asks, how much should society protect people against going broke before they die?
• Elizabeth Eckstrom wrote a terrific thought piece about challenges in cancer screening in older adults. She laments that, “There is little research to guide busy primary care providers and practices in effectively performing cancer screening.”  Amen to that.  I like the way she asks the tough questions, like, “Can older adults understand screening complexities in the context of multi-morbid illness?”
• Deb Barnes presents a prognostic index for recovery of function, persistent dependence, or death following a hospital acquired disability.  Older adults don’t just care about whether they will live or not, they also care about what state they will be living in.  Functional ability, or the ability to provide basic daily care for oneself is a part of that. The article features cool multicolored triangles that visualize this three part outcome.
• A paper by Yoko Tarumi in the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management adds to the weight of evidencethat docusate adds nothing to senna based laxatives for opioid related constipation.  
• AAHPM decided to keep the “H” (for hospice), as reported by Tim Quill in the fall AAHPM quarterly (online for members only).  See this previous postintroducing the controversy. The process of deciding about the “H” was thoughtfully done, including focus groups and a member survey.  Only 11% of members responded (guilty as charged) but 87% of those who responded felt the current name describes “who we are and what we do.”

by: Alex Smith