As we close out 2008, here is a look back at the Health Affairs Blog posts that attracted the most readers this year. Analysis of health reform plans from the presidential candidates and a look ahead to policy options under an Obama Administration garnered the most attention. If you missed any of these posts, happy [...]

Sporting a stethoscope and a uniform, the Surgeon General has functioned as the nation’s doctor since 1871. Many have been exemplary. In the 1970s, after Dr. Julius Richmond kicked off Head Start, he launched a series of reports on the health of the nation. (Healthy People 2010, our next report card, will tell us how [...]

By the fourth sentence of the preface to The Silent World of Doctor and Patient, Jay Katz has quietly issued a startling challenge to a fundamental principle of the doctor-patient relationship. He writes:
It took time before I appreciated fully the oddity of physicians’ insistence that patients follow doctors’ orders. During my socialization as a physician [...]

Ever since an 18-year-old New York woman died tragically in 1984 under the care of medical residents who—in the view of her family—were overworked and undersupervised, the subject of the duty hours of physician trainees has simmered in the academic medical community and, on occasion, among public policymakers. Now, as the consequence of a new [...]

When Tom Daschle, President-elect Barack Obama’s designate for Secretary of Health and Human Services, published a book earlier this year titled Critical: What We Can Do about the Healthcare Crisis, I saw the favorable reviews and made a mental note to buy and read it. After Obama’s announced choice of Daschle for HHS secretary, this [...]

Yesterday President-elect Barack Obama nominated Sen. Tom Daschle (D-SD) as his choice for Secretary of Health and Human Services. Additionally, Obama asked Sen. Daschle to lead a new White House Office of Health Reform and nominated Jeanne Lambrew, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, as the deputy director of the office. Lambrew [...]

A new edition of the Health Wonk Review posted this week highlights a round-up of health policy bloggers on prospects for reform in an Obama administration, the intersection of health care and the economy, and more. Vince Kuraitis of e-CareManagement Blog, offers a Dragnet-style “just the facts” spin for his turn at hosting the biweekly [...]

I visited Cuba last week for an international conference entitled “Medical Education for the 21st Century: Teaching Health for Equity.” Havana is beautiful, dilapidated, and lively. Rickety, vintage Buicks and three-wheeled “coco taxis” ply the streets. Spectacular and decrepit 19th century buildings are being lovingly refurbished by workmen using block and tackle to haul concrete [...]

Just after the historic inauguration of President Barack Obama, join health policy makers in Washington, D.C. for the 2009 National Health Policy Conference, co-sponsored by Health Affairs and AcademyHealth.  The event takes place February 2-3, 2009 and will feature senior officials from the Obama Administration and Congress. Other confirmed panels include:

The impact of health care [...]

If you listen to National Public Radio’s (NPR) “All Things Considered” on Saturday afternoons, recently you heard the voice of Narrative Matters author Nataly Kelly. Her on-air commentary about being a medical interpreter was excerpted from her Narrative Matters essay in the November/December 2008 issue of Health Affairs. For a story of a medical tragedy [...]

Health reform ideas and policy proposals for President-elect Barack Obama to consider topped the most-read list on Health Affairs Blog in November. Jeff Goldsmith lays out three options for how health reform might proceed. John Iglehart looks at the policy process an Obama administration might take. And John Goodman’s recent post has generated heated commenting. [...]