AMA President Says New York Needs More Primary Care Physicians

The president of the American Medical Association, Dr. Nancy Nielsen, was already quite busy before taking on her new role: The Buffalo, New York, native is a mother of five, a practicing physician, and a medical school dean. Elected president last month, Dr. Nielsen is charged with articulating the positions of the AMA, which has more than 240,000 physician members. Among the association’s most recent efforts was a successful battle to urge Congress to halt a 10.6% reduction in Medicare fees for physicians. She also believes that there is a crisis situation regarding physician shortages nationwide. “One of the big problems is not unique to New York. We have a tremendous need for primary care physicians. It’s because of the way that reimbursement is structured, because primary care is not reimbursed adequately for what is being done. In my own location of Buffalo, we’ve just been through a wrenching situation because of the hospital closings and mergers that were ordered. It has not been easy, but the right things have been done.”

Please click on the link below to read the New York Sun article:

http://www.nysun.com/health-fitness/ama-president-says-ny-needs-more-primary-care/81803/

For more information on defending medical malpractice and nursing home matters in Florida contact Howard Citron at The Citron Law Firm, P.A. – www.citronlegal.com.

Problems Persist With Red Cross Blood Services

For 15 years, the American Red Crosss has been under a federal court order to improve the way it collects and processes blood. Yet, despite $21 million in fines since 2003 and repeated promises to follow procedures intended to ensure the safety of the nation’s blood supply, it continues to fall short. The situation has proved so frustrating that in January the commissioner of food and drugs attended a Red Cross board meeting — a first for a commissioner — and warned members that they could face criminal charges for their continued failure to bring about compliance, according to three Red Cross officials who attended the meeting and requested anonymity because Red Cross policy prohibits public discussion of its meetings with regulators. “If fear is a motivator, we’re happy to help out in that way,” said Eric M. Blumberg, deputy general counsel at the Food and Drug Administration, though he declined to confirm what the commissioner, Andrew C. von Eschenbach, said at the meeting. Some critics, including former Red Cross executives, have even suggested breaking off the blood services operations from the rest of the organization, as the Canadian Red Cross did a decade ago. The problems, described in more than a dozen publicly available F.D.A. reports — some of which cite hundreds of lapses — include shortcomings in screening donors for possible exposure to diseases; failures to spend enough time swabbing arms before inserting needles; failures to test for syphilis; and failures to discard deficient blood. In some cases, the lapses have put the recipients of blood at risk for diseases like hepatitis, malaria and syphilis. But according to the food and drug agency, the Red Cross has repeatedly failed to investigate the results of its mistakes, meaning there is no reliable record of whether recipients were harmed by the blood it collected.

Please click on the link below to read the New York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/17/us/17cross.html?ref=health

For more information on defending medical malpractice and nursing home matters in Florida contact Howard Citron at The Citron Law Firm, P.A. – www.citronlegal.com.