November 2010 – Page 2 – Medical Lessons

Considering Evidence for a New Drug for Immune Thrombocytopenia Purpura

November 12, 2010March 17, 2011 Elaine Schattner, MD

I’ve been wondering, lately, why so many of the medical blogs cover the same topics, like last week’s lung cancer detection trial, which are often the exact same studies as are reported by conventional news outlets. I’ve been trying, here, to sometimes consider new published articles that seem important to me but, for whatever reasons, don’t get so much attention.

Here’s one:

Yesterday’s NEJM includes an article Romiplostim or Standard of Care in Patients with Immune Thrombocytopenia.* It’s about a drug, manufactured and sold by Amgen as NPlate, that received FDA approval for treatment of chronic immune thrombocytopenia purpura (ITP) in August, 2008. Some consider ITP a rare disease, and

Posted in Diagnosis, Hematology (blood), Under the RadarTagged chronic immune thrombocytopenic purpura, eltrombopag, evidence-based medicine, ITP, NPlate, Promacta, romiplostimLeave a Comment

A Play About the Life and Work of Dr. Rosalind Franklin

November 11, 2010March 28, 2019 Elaine Schattner, MD

Franklin’s story starts like this: She was born in 1920 to a Jewish family in London. She excelled in math and science. She studied physical chemistry at Cambridge, where she received her undergraduate degree in 1941. After performing research in photochemistry in the following year on scholarship, she joined the British Coal Utilisation Research Association (BCURA) and carried out basic investigations on the micro-structure of coal and carbon compounds, and so earned a Ph.D. from Cambridge University. She was a polyglot, and next found herself in Paris at the Laboratoire Central des Services Chimique de l’Etat, where she picked up some fine skills in x-ray crystallography.

You get the picture: she was smart, well-educated and totally immersed in physical chemistry before, during and after WWII. Single-minded and focused, you might say –

Posted in Essential Lessons, Medical History, Occupational health, Reviews, Science, Theater, Women's HealthTagged crystallography, DNA, double helix, history of medicine, medical research, Photograph 51, review, Rosalind Franklin, theater, women in science1 Comment

Doctors Singing On YouTube

November 10, 2010May 25, 2012 Elaine Schattner, MD

A few weeks ago I found some doctors singing on YouTube. They made me laugh and perhaps, even, feel better. Doctors in Cyberspace I contacted the singing doctors to check, among other things, that they’re still in business. It turns out that Drs. Barry Levy and Greg LaGana both graduated from Cornell University Medical College […]

Posted in Music, Wednesday Web SightingTagged Damaged Care, singing doctors, YouTube1 Comment

Noting the Death of Jill Clayburgh Who Lived For 21 Years With a Chronic Form of Leukemia

November 7, 2010November 29, 2014 Elaine Schattner, MD

I was saddened yesterday to learn of the death of Jill Clayburgh. The 66 year old actress died on Friday in her Connecticut home. According to ABC news and the LA Times among other reports, she’d had chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) for 21 years. This means she lived with CLL for nearly a third of […]

Posted in Hematology (blood), Medical News, Oncology (cancer), Public IllnessTagged blood cancers, chronic illness, chronic lymphocytic leukemia, CLL, indolent tumors, Jill Clayburgh4 Comments

A Story About A Doctor and His Neighbors

November 4, 2010January 31, 2011 Elaine Schattner, MD

In recent years, some physician authors have wrestled with why doctors might want to think twice before “friending” their patients on Facebook. The usual reasons are to protect the physician’s professional image – that the public might see their weirder, or not-so-polished-as-while-working side and, also, to maintain a certain “distance” – lest doctors become so […]

Posted in Communication, Patient-Doctor Relationship, Reviews, ShortsTagged community doctors, patient-doctor relationship, portraits of physicians, professionalism, relationships, T. C. Boyle, What Separates Us From the AnimalsLeave a Comment

What Not to Wear In the Hospital While Recovering From a Stroke

November 2, 2010August 31, 2011 Elaine Schattner, MD

Today’s Annals of Internal Medicine includes new results for the CLOTS (Clots in Legs Or sTockings after Stroke) Trial. Not-quite acronyms aside, it’s an interesting study with implications for many patients at risk for deep venous thrombosis (DVT). This U.K.-based study, involving 3114 patients in 112 hospitals in 9 countries, used ultrasound to evaluate possible […]

Posted in Hematology (blood), Medical News, Neurology, Under the RadarTagged compression stockings, deep venous thrombosis, DVT, hypercoaguable state, prevention, thrombosis2 Comments

No Quick Fix

November 1, 2010May 25, 2012 Elaine Schattner, MD

“If it’s chafed, put some lotion on it.”

– some practical advice, offered by the character portraying Andrew Jackson, speaking toward the audience in the last scene of Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, a play written and directed by Alex Timbers

Posted in health care delivery, Life in NYC, Medical History, Reviews, TheaterTagged Andrew Jackson, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, cholera, Illness as Metaphor, Music, populism, review, Susan Sontag, theater2 Comments

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