Commentary by David Ecker MD PGY-1 

Faculty  Peer Reviewed

Excitement permeated medical centers throughout the country last Thursday as interns realized a new wave of reinforcements had been named. At Match Day, graduating medical students learned which of the 22,427 first-year residency positions (187 more than last year) they would fill. One-fifth of positions were offered in internal medicine, while family medicine applicants found 101 fewer positions than last year. The National Resident Match Program reported dermatology, neurosurgery, orthopedic surgery, and otolaryngology…

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Commentary by Ami Jhaveri MD, PGY-1

Faculty Peer Reviewed

Spring is approaching, but the buzz in the journals is about this winter’s drug-resistant influenza virus. Oseltamivir, used for treatment and prophylaxis of influenza A, had until recently low rates of resistance (<1%) against the virus. Now, surveillance data from 2008-2009 estimates resistance to be >90%. A retrospective study in JAMA compared risk factors, underlying medical illnesses, and clinical outcomes of patients infected with oseltamivir-resistant influenza A during the 2007-2008 influenza season to…

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Commentary by Sarah Moore MD, PGY-2 

Faculty Peer Reviewed

It has been a difficult week for the stock market and perhaps for some physicians. Most doctors can describe a handful of frustrating patient encounters that prompt eye-rolling and exacerbated sighs. The characteristics of these “difficult patients” are well described in the literature but in last week’s Archives of Internal Medicine Dr. Perry An, et.al took a closer look at those providers identified as having a high frequency of difficult patient encounters. A survey of…

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Commentary by Michael Tanner MD, Section Editor, Clinical Correlations

Michael Pollan wrote last year in In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto, “…the history of modern nutritionism has been a history of macronutrients at war: proteins against carbs; carbs against proteins, and then fats; fats against carbs.” This week’s New England Journal features an attempt at a fair fight: a trial that randomized 811 adults with BMIs from 25 to 40 to one of four reduced-calorie diets with the following percentages of macronutrients:…

Commentary by Ryan Farley MD, PGY-3

Faculty Peer Reviewed

Hot off the press from the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) this week is an original article comparing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) with coronary artery bypass graft surgery (CABG) for severe coronary artery disease. This study, also known as the Synergy between PCI with Taxus and Cardiac Surgery (SYNTAX) trial, was a prospective clinical trial conducted at 85 sites in 17 countries in Europe and the United States that randomly assigned 1800 patients with…

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Commentary by Josh Remick MD, NYU Senior Chief Resident 

It was quite the week in Medicine, spanning from politics to plagiarism, pregnancy to pain, steroids to statins and artificial limbs to A-Roid.  And that’s not even getting into Octomom or Michael Phelps and the physiology of bong smoking.

The news only seems to be getting better for statins.  In a recent trial published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, consistent use of statins improved mortality in patients with coronary artery disease (this…

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Commentary by Michael Poles MD, Associate Editor, Clinical Correlations 

Welcome to this week’s primecuts. Let’s slice right in and take a big bite out of last week’s medical news, starting with a little political news. On Wednesday February 4th, the Obama administration expanded SCHIP. SCHIP is a children’s health insurance program, and its passage will allow about 7 million children to continue to receive healthcare coverage and will allow an additional 4 million children to sign up. This appears to be an important step…

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Commentary by Sherley Abraham MD PGY-3

Faculty Peer Reviewed

This week we reflect on the interplay in life which is showcased by two football teams. In medicine, it plays out between two drugs, newer markers and standard guidelines, or lifestyle and disease. Each ailment calls for its own chicken soup, which it turns out, actually does work for the common cold. Of course, in football, one team emerges as victor….go Steelers and the NFL…but onto BNP.

The search continues for a…

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Commentary by Michael Tees MD, MPH , PGY-1

The journals this week were not where the eyes of the nation or the world were fixed. All were focused upon a turning point, a new beginning, a change. The inauguration of America’s first African-American president and what that represented was where our attention was fixed. Policies before or after a leadership change can always be debated. But what happened on this special day in American history can be considered a birth of a new…

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Commentary  by Aleksandar Adzic MD, PGY-3

Faculty Peer Reviewed

Have you ever been annoyed that the computer systems at the three hospitals you work at are completely different?  Have you ever had trouble piecing together a patient’s medical history who is at your hospital for the first time?  Well President (elect until ~12:00 noon on Tuesday) Obama understands how you feel.  It is no surprise that our “first wired president” (1) has made a bold plan to standardize electronic health records in the next 5 years…

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Commentary by Paul Fenyves MD, PGY-3 

Faculty Peer Reviewed

Macrovascular Control: In the New England Journal of Medicine, a new study re-addresses the question of whether tight glycemic control in diabetes prevents macrovascular complications. “Glucose Control and Vascular Complications in Veterans with Type 2 Diabetes” was an open-label study, which randomized 1791 diabetic veteran to either intensive or standard glucose control. The subjects were mostly men with a mean age of 60.4 and carried the diagnosis of type 2 diabetes for a mean…

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Commentary by Ramani Balu MD, PGY 1

Faculty Peer Reviewed

The beginning of the New Year is a time to reflect on our progress and look forward to developments yet to come. Here are a few articles from last week that highlight innovative approaches to old problems and force us to think in new ways about issues we face every day. Judging by these selections, it should be an exciting new year indeed for medical research.
 

New reasons to…

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