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Southampton Hospital Officially Merges With Stony Brook Medicine Patch.com Stony Brook University welcomed Southampton Hospital, which will now be known as Stony Brook Southampton Hospital, as a member of the Stony Brook Medicine health system, Samuel L. Stanley Jr., MD, president, and Ken Kaushansky, MD, senior vice ... Southampton Hospital Merger With Stony Brook Medicine Is Made Official On Tuesday27east.com Southampton Hospital officially joins Stony Brook MedicineNewsday all 4 news articles »

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Physicians arent likely to be replaced by algorithms, at least not right away, but their skill sets might have to change. Photo: iStock

In handling some life-or-death medical judgements, computers have already surpassed the abilities of doctors. Were looking at the promise of self-driving cars, according to Zak Kohane, a doctor and researcher at Harvard Medical School. On the roads, replacing drivers with computers could save lives that would otherwise be lost to human error. In medicine, replacing intuition with machine intelligence might save patients from drug side effects or otherwise incurable cancers.

Consider precision medicine, which involves tailoring drugs to individual patients. And to understand its promise, look to Shirley Pepke, a physicist who migrated into computational biology. When she developed a deadly cancer, she responded like a scientist and fought it using Big Data. And she is winning. She shared her story at a recent conference organized by Kohane.

In 2013, Pepke was diagnosed with advanced ovarian cancer. She was 46, and her children were nine and three years old. It was just two months after her annual gynaecological exam. She had symptoms, which the doctors brushed off, until her bloating got so bad she insisted on an ultrasound. She was carrying six litres of fluid caused by the cancer, which had metastasized.

She did what most people do in her position. She agreed to a course of chemotherapy. She also did something most people wouldnt know how to doshe started looking for useful data. After all, tumours are full of data. They carry DNA with various abnormalities, some of which make them malignant or resistant to certain drugs. Armed with that information, doctors design more effective, individualized treatments. Already, breast cancers are treated differently depending on whether they have a mutation in a gene called HER2. So far, scientists have found no such genetic divisions for ovarian cancers.

But there was some data. Years earlier, scientists had started a data bank called the Cancer Genome Atlas. There were genetic sequences on about 400 ovarian tumours. To help her extract information, she turned to Greg ver Steeg, a professor at the University of Southern California, who was working on an automated pattern-recognition technique called correlation explanation (CorEx). It had not been used to evaluate cancer, but she and Ver Steeg thought it might work. She also got genetic sequencing done on her tumour.

In the meantime, she found out she was not one of the lucky patients cured by chemotherapy. The cancer came back.

But CorEx had turned up a clue. Her tumour had something common with those of the luckier women who responded to the chemotherapyan off-the-charts signal for an immune system product called cytokines. She reasoned that in those luckier patients, the immune system was helping kill the cancer, but in her case, there was something blocking it.

Eventually she concluded that her one shot at survival would be to take a drug called a checkpoint inhibitor, which is geared to break down cancer cells defences against the immune system. At the same time, she went in for another round of chemotherapy.

The checkpoint inhibitor destroyed her thyroid gland, she said, and the chemotherapy was damaging her kidneys. She stopped, not knowing whether her cancer was still there or not. To the surprise of her doctors, she started to get better. Her cancer became undetectable. Still healthy today, she works on ways to allow other cancer patients to benefit from Big Data the way she did.

Kohane, the Harvard Medical School researcher, said similar data-driven efforts might help find side effects of approved drugs. Clinical trials are often not big enough or long-running enough to pick up even deadly side effects that show up when a drug is released to millions of people. Thousands died from heart attacks associated with the painkiller Vioxx before it was taken off the market.

Last month, an analysis by another health site suggested a connection between the rheumatoid arthritis drug Actemra and heart attack deaths, though the drug had been sold to doctors and their patients without warning of any added risk of death. Kohane suspects there could be many other unnecessary deaths from drugs whose side effects didnt show up in testing.

So whats holding this technology back? Others are putting big money into Big Data with the aim of selling things and influencing votes. Why not use it to save lives?

First theres the barrier of tradition, said Kohane, whose academic specialty is bioinformatics, a combination of math, medicine and computer science. Medicine does not understand itself as an information-processing discipline, he said. It still sees itself as a combination of intuitive leaps and hard science. And doctors arent collecting the right kinds of data. Were investing in information technology thats not optimized to do anything medically interesting, he said. Its there to maximize income but not to make us better doctors.

Physicians arent likely to be replaced by algorithms, at least not right away, but their skill sets might have to change. Already, machines have proven themselves better than humans in the ability to read scans and evaluate skin lesions. Pepke ended her talk by saying that in the future, doctors may have to think less statistically and more scientifically. Her doctors made decisions based on rote statistical information about what would benefit the average patientbut Pepke was not the average patient. The status quo is an advance over guessing or tradition, but medicine has the potential to do so much better. Bloomberg View

Faye Flam is a Bloomberg View columnist.

Comments are welcome at views@livemint.com

First Published: Tue, Aug 01 2017. 02 03 AM IST

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Big Data shows big promise in medicine - Livemint

Liberian Daily Observer

Chinese Traditional Medicine Highlighted Liberian Daily Observer Dr. Wang Tao, a Chinese medical doctor assigned at the John F. Kennedy (JFK) Medical Center in Monrovia, has underscored the importance of his country's traditional medicine as compared to orthodox treatments. Dr. Wang was speaking over the weekend ...

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Chinese Traditional Medicine Highlighted - Liberian Daily Observer

Health & Wellness By Roseanna Garza | 10 hours ago

Scott Ball / Rivard Report

Maria Ahmad embraces her aunt Dr. Asma Ahmad following the presentation of her white coat during the ceremony.

Updated 10 hours ago

On Monday, 162 first-year medical students filed into theUniversity of the Incarnate Word School of Osteopathic Medicine with hopes of being part of its first graduating class.They received their white coats Sunday in a traditional rite-of-passage ceremony welcoming them into the medical profession that takes a holistic approach,helping people gain a deeper understanding of how lifestyle and environment impact health, rather than just treating symptoms.

It is vitally important that you become active in our vibrant society so that you will be able to chart the course of healthcare in your future,said Dr. Adam Ratner, vice president of the Bexar County Medical Society, welcoming new students to the family of physicians during the white coat ceremony Sunday.Its up to you [to] be ready to do whatever it takes to become the most caring, effective, and happy physicians that you can be.

The osteopathic medical school is located in District 3 on San Antonios Southside, where the population has the highest risk for health complications.

Scott Ball / Rivard Report

Director of Health and Research Dr. Anil Mangla.

Dr. Anil Mangla, director of public health and research at thenew school, toldtheRivard Reportthat the new schools purpose is to make a difference in the community.

Our first priority is public health, and we have clearly identified that [District 3] has a high amount of disparities, Mangla said. We plan to really try to make a significant difference in the disparity of health outcomes in South San Antonio.

Student doctors will be set up with families in District 3 as part of the universitys adopt-a-medical student campaign, where physicians work with patients and families on an ongoing basis to address social, cultural, biological, and environmental factors that contribute to wellness.

Instead of treating a disease, osteopathic medicine aims to delve deeper, looking into family culture, background, living circumstances, and work to set the patient up for health through education and behavior change.

Many are drawn to the field for this more personal, hands-on approach and its emphasis on community medicine and preventive care. There are pragmatic reasons as well. Medical schools are failing to keep pace with the patient population, and competition for careers in medicine is growing. More students see osteopathy as a sensible alternative to conventional medical school, a way to get a medical education with MCAT scores that may not make the cut for traditional medical schools.

According to the AmericanAssociationof Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine,students enteringosteopathic schools in 2015 scored, on average, 27, compared to 31 forM.D. matriculants.

Many osteopathic schools have an added mission: to dispatch doctors to poorer neighborhoods and towns most in need of medical care.

Mangla said that a main educational focus for the school is on community, social, and health engagement. Through integrated curriculum, students will be assigned families and exposed to cases immediately. They will learn to evaluate what a disease is, but also how to address social determinants of health along with implementing biomedical science to improve patient outcomes one of the cornerstones of osteopathic medicine.

Texas ranks 47th in the country when it comes to the number of physicians per population, and San Antonio is continuing to grow rapidly with no signs of slowing down. According to Mangla, the number of graduates that are being produced by Texas medical schools is not effective for the [community] demand.

There is a shortage of primary care physicians and family physicians in Texas, especially in South Texas. Primary care and family physicians often work long, grueling hours, compared to their counterparts who choose a more lucrative, and often less time-consuming, path toward a medical specialization.

I think the greater community will be excited when they see what we are doing, and by the quality of the first 162 students we graduate. Were already getting so many applications and were very enthused by that, said Dr. Blandine Bustamante Helfrich, vice-chair of clinical and applied science educationat the school. [Family practice] is really where the need is in this country right now, and since that is our focus I think that will fuel growth for the future.

Allison Ogle is part of the medical schools inaugural class. She told theRivard Reportthat even without a medical specialization, a doctors salary is still more money than [she] has ever seen.

I think being a physician is a very comfortable living no matter where you are, Ogle said. So I would rather be somewhere where there is need rather than being somewhere just to make money.

The school received more than 3,000 applications and completed 700 interviews. Admission officials looked for candidates who were interested in community and population health with plans to go into family practice. Seventy-five percent of the current student population are Texas residents, which Mangla explained was because the school want[s] people to graduate and stay here.

Twenty-three percent of the students accepted were from Bexar County.

Ogle, who is from Boerne, said that her decision to pursue osteopathic medicine was because of its focus on the patient-doctor relationship, where much of the work involves longitudinal time spent with the patient, with an emphasis on the relationship and treating people like they are human.

Osteopathic medicine, for me, is looking at the person as a whole, not just prescribing medicine and getting people out of the office, Ogle said.

It can be difficult for doctors who are in good health and financial standing to connect to and build empathy for the social determinants of health that may contribute to a patients chronic illness, Ogle said. You look at a population like San Antonio and say these people are plagued by diabetes and the attitude here is toward [preventing] people from becoming victim to a disease.

Ogle believes the holistic approach of osteopathic medicine makes for more compassionate doctors.

Mangla told the Rivard Report that in Texas, the rate of individuals diagnosed with diabetes per 100,000 is 23.4%. In Bexar County that number increases to 26.8%. In District 3, the number of individuals diagnosed with diabetes is a staggering 67.8%.

The same pattern continues when addressing diabetic amputations. In Texas, the rate is 30.8%. In Bexar County it is 42.3%. In District 3 the rate is 45%, which Mangla describes as a significant difference.

Lauren Hatherall, a student from San Antonio, told theRivard Reportthat she was drawn to the university because of its mission to serve the community.

[I am] here to serve the underprivileged, and that is a mindset that I share with my classmates, Hatherall said.

Scott Ball / Rivard Report

The inaugural class of the Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine program at the University of the Incarnate Word.

As part of their orientation week, the student doctors visited Haven for Hope to complete service projects throughout the campus, which included folding and tagging clothes for sale, painting, and organizing games of bingo for the residents. Hatherall described the experience as both powerful and humbling, and something that got her excited to serve these groups of people.

At the end of the four-year medical program, graduates will receive a Doctor of Osteopathy (D.O.) degree, which differs fromallopathic medicine (M.D.) due to a focus on holistic wellness,and the interrelationship of the various systems of the body to maintain health, and to prevent illness and disease.

Osteopathic physicians also receive additional training in the musculoskeletal system, the bodys interconnected system of nerves, muscles, and bones, and perform osteopathic manipulative treatment using their hands to treat muscles and joints to relieve pain, promote healing, and increase overall mobility.

Osteopathic skills were first introduced by a 19th-century frontier physician, Andrew Taylor Still, who opposed the overuse of arsenic, castor oil, opium and elixirs and believed that many diseases had roots in a distressed musculoskeletal system that could be treated hands on.

Some critics regard the techniques as pseudoscience, though the medical establishment has come to accept the approach. Osteopathic schools offer the same academic subjects as traditional medical schools and the same two years of clinical rotations.

In 1980, there were just 14 schools across the country and 4,940 students. There are now 33accredited osteopathic medical schools offering education in 48 locations across the United States.

Today, osteopathic schools turn out about 22% of the nations medical school graduates.

Scott Ball / Rivard Report

A student carries her white coat as she arrives to the ceremony.

The school of osteopathic medicine was on of three universities in Texas to receive a Hogg Foundation for Mental Health grant to develop a program that works to address social determinants of health. Mangla will be the principle investigator for the $407,000 award, and will work to train medical students and other helping professionals such as counselors and teachers who may refer families or individual patients to the school for services.

Another focus will be on reducing the stigma around mental health through appropriate education for both the medical professionals and the patients about the effects that poor mental health can have on physical well-being, Mangla said.

This has been one of the best opportunities Ive had, Mangla said. I have the ability to bring up this new generation of physicians who will think very different. We cant teach an old dog new tricks, but we can teach these learners how to implement correct ways of practicing medicine.

Tom Bugg contributed to this report.

Roseanna is a native San Antonian who has spent the last 10 years working in community mental health. She holds an undergraduate degree in English literature and composition and a master's degree in clinical mental health counseling. She joined the Rivard Report as community public health reporter in May 2017.

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UIW's New School of Osteopathic Medicine Emphasizes Social Accountability - Rivard Report

Monday, July 31, 2017

BELOITBeloit Health System and the new Stateline Family YMCA Ironworks branch have partnered to create a sports medicine and physical therapy facility that will become operational with the formal opening of the YMCA on Aug. 18.

The Beloit Health System Sports Medicine YMCA will be located within the new YMCA facility, according to a news release.

The sports medicine and physical therapy facility will provide treatment for sports related injuries. This will include injuries to tactical athletes who require specialized and intense treatment from working in job positions such as police officers, firefighters, members of the military and construction workers, according to a news release.

Referral from a physician is required before a patient can receive sports medicine and physical therapy treatment, according to the news release.

The YMCA sports medicine and physical therapy services will be an addition to Beloit Health System's current comprehensive physical medicine and rehabilitation services.

Those looking for more information or to schedule appointments can call 608-364-5173 and specify visiting the YMCA Ironworks location.

2017 GazetteXtra, a division of Bliss Communications, Inc.

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Beloit Health System and YMCA partner for sports medicine facility - Gazettextra

An opinion piece was recently published in JAMA Internal Medicine with the provocative title: No wonder no one trusts us. The writer, a doctor, imagines a dialogue with a patient Mr. Jones based on the shifting recommendations of the US Preventive Services Task Force about prostate cancer screening.

Mr. Jones, receiving updated advice from his doctor that differs from the updated advice he received last time, grows predictably exasperated. (In case you are wondering, the current task force position on prostate cancer screening is: Grade C. This means there is a close balance between potential benefits and harms, and clinicians should discuss prostate cancer screening with patients, and reach individualized decisions together.)

The writer is not so much complaining about the task force as about the challenges of turning the evolving state of medical evidence into guidance patients can both understand and trust. The piece is tongue-in-cheek in any case. But still, there is a complaint being lodged, and fundamentally, its about the nature of science and the publics relationship with it.

Science evolves. And maybe thats a particular problem for Mr. Jones and Mrs. Smith and their countless counterparts in our culture because we so blithely, selectively dismiss science and replace it with GOOP as the spirit moves us. Maybe we cant disparage, dismiss and deny the science of climate change, immunization, nutrition and evolution, for that matter and appreciate the evolution of science.

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Science is something of an in for a penny, in for a pound proposition. What I mean is, you either accept the value of the scientific method, and the voluminous evidence that it works, and thus pay attention to it even when you dont like what it has to say or you really should disavow the voluminous evidence that it works. Lets be clear about that choice: disavowal means no planes, or trains or automobiles; products of science, all. It means no antibiotics or microwaves; it means no radio, television or internet. It means, quite simply, that it should not be possible for you to be reading this now.

Science works, and we all know it because we are beneficiaries of its effectiveness every day. You really cant beam well-behaved electrons through cyberspace and throw shade at science while doing it. Pick one! How easy, though, to embrace the products of science we like and renounce the conclusions we dont.

In a display of serendipity, a deadly serious opinion piece in the Annals of Internal Medicine followed the facetious one in JAMA Internal Medicine by a mere day. This one was entitled Statin Denial: An Internet-Driven Cult With Deadly Consequences, and was about the deadly consequences of statin denial. Statins are the most popular drugs for lowering LDL cholesterol, are highly effective and when used appropriately, decisively reduce mortality. In other words, they save lives.

As the commentary suggests, there are all sorts of alternative realities online, raising doubts about the benefits of statins, the value of lowering LDL, and the relevance of elevated LDL to heart disease risk.

One readily finds debate about the cholesterol hypothesis online but finds virtually no such debate among cardiologists. These alternative realities are alternatives to reality, and the commentator is right to point this out as an urgent matter of life and death. As a lifestyle medicine expert, I hasten to note that diet and lifestyle can do the job that statins do, and there are strong arguments for a lifestyle approach but thats a topic for another day. The effectiveness of lifestyle in preventing and treating heart disease does not obviate the corresponding effectiveness of statins.

That more Americans believe in angels than evolution may seem a matter of inner philosophical convictions, disconnected from real world consequences. But that is not so. Selective disrespect for science poisons the well of it, and proves toxic in surprising and intimate ways; as intimate as ones heart, prostate or uterus.

Medicine is ineluctably a bit of art, but is or should be a whole lot of science. There is no way for patients to participate as they must as key partners in the stewardship of their own health if they dont understand the basis for important decisions.

Its bad, in other words, that people dont know or respect the incontrovertible science of evolution. But that problem tends to be at least somewhat remote. Its arguably worse that people dont know or respect the incontrovertible fact that science evolves and that the evolution of science will cause medical practice and advice to drift and shift over time. Doubt and discomfort born of that is consequential up close, quite personally, and in our most intimate parts.

Dr. David L. Katz;www.davidkatzmd.com; founder, True Health Initiative

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Dr. David Katz, Preventive Medicine: Trust the evolution of science - New Haven Register

After 12 years of growth at Volunteers in Medicine on Hilton Head, one thing remains the same Island Packet NBC Nightly News will be coming back to Hilton Head Island to visit an organization they featured 12 years ago. In 2005, Volunteers in Medicine was featured in a feel-good piece that was focused on Dr. Jack McConnell, the organization's founder. This ...

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After 12 years of growth at Volunteers in Medicine on Hilton Head, one thing remains the same - Island Packet

A second and revised edition of the comprehensive encyclopedia on medicine in Kannada, compiled and edited by medical teacher and physician P.S. Shankar, has been released by the Kannada University in Hampi, Ballari district.

The first edition of the encyclopedia, titled Vaidya Vishwakosha, was first published by the university in 1995 when Jnanpith award winner Chandrasekhars Kambar was Vice-Chancellor. Dr. Kambar, who had taken it up as a challenge initiative to publish the first ever encyclopedia on medicine in Kannada, requested Dr. Shankar, who played a pivotal role in popularising Kannada books on medicine by penning several books for the layman, to take up the responsibility of compiling and editing the book.

Dr. Shankar compiled many aspects of medicine, including known and rare diseases, diagnostic facilities, and treatment methods, over 479 pages.

Dr. Shankar said that although the field of medicine has witnessed many changes and developments, for long no effort was made to update or revise the encyclopedia about new treatment facilities and advanced research activities in medicine.

Despite repeated pleas to the university to revise the encyclopedia with all these details, it was only after exactly two decades that the then Vice-Chancellor, Boralingaiah, decided to approve a second edition. Dr. Shankar was again chosen as the chief editor.

More colourful

I have completed the task of updating all the missing aspects and new developments in the field of medicine, treatment and diagnosis, including emerging new diseases such as the Zika virus, how AIDS has become a manageable disease, the danger of drug-resistant TB, and other diseases. The book, now 635 pages long, is packed with colour pictures and illustrations of various diseases and treatment methods, Dr. Shankar said.

He added that Kannada was the only language in the country which had a comprehensive encyclopedia on medicine. Although there are many books published on various aspects of medicine and treatment in other languages, particularly Sanskrit, Hindi and Tamil, comprehensive coverage is rare, he said.

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New edition of medicine encyclopedia launched - The Hindu

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) When you think of robots many think of science fiction but this morning Dr. Matthew Lopresti stopped by our studio to talk about the strides robotics are making in the medical field.

Some questions Dr. Lopresti answers in the above video are:

1) Theres been an uptick with automation/robotics in the medical field and this is expected to continue. Why?

2) The pictures shown are robotics that aid in hair transplantation. What exactly does this do?

3) As a surgeon, what do you look for when something comes into the market? Does it replace the surgeon or how much should it aid?

4) How does the patient benefit exactly?

For more information on Dr. Lopresti head to HairDr.com

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Patients in long-term care facilities face an elevated risk of C. difficile infection, a life-threatening disease that could be managed more effectively with a precision medicine treatment plan.

To discover new treatments for this life-threatening intestinal condition, researchers at theBiocomplexity Institute of Virginia Techhave employed a combination of algorithms, simulations, and machine learning. These novel research techniques allowed scientiststo make significant progress toward new precision medicine treatment options for patients suffering fromC. difficileinfections (CDI).

TheNutritional Immunology and Molecular Medicine Laboratory(NIMML), a leading lab at the Biocomplexity Institute, has developed a computational pipeline to test and predict the efficacy of existing and novel treatments for infectious and immune-mediated diseases. The pipeline incorporates mechanistic ordinary differential equation-based models with stochastic simulation and advanced machine-learning methods.

Researchers built upon an existinginteraction modelto develop the pipeline, which can now translate preclinical results in animal models to clinical outcomes, identify effective treatments, examine dosage effects, and predict patient reactions to combination therapies. The research study, recently published inArtificial Intelligence in Medicine,illustrates the development of a computational pipeline to test and predict the efficacy of existing and novel treatments for CDI.

The convergence of advanced data analytics, modeling, and artificial intelligence systems with high resolution, large-scale patient data creates an opportunity to fundamentally transform how medicine will be practiced, said Josep Bassaganya-Riera, director of NIMML and CEO ofBioTherapeutics, Inc. In this study and in our continuing efforts, we aim to be a leader in this developing field of precision, personalized medicine in infectious and autoimmune diseases.

Modeling systems, such as this one, have the potential to revolutionize the design of treatment regimes away from the one-size-fits-all therapeutic approaches into a golden age of personalized disease treatment. Integration of patient characteristics from large-scale electronic health records can create virtual avatars to test new therapies and for predictive analytics to identify new molecular biomarkers capable of accurately predicting a patients response to treatment.

The ability to predict progression of disease and response to treatment is of particular importance in CDI. The majority of health care costs and mortality resulting from CDI are caused by high rates of recurrence that can exceed 50 percent of patients, depending on the treatment.

Antibiotics are currently the standard form of treatment for CDI, which run the risk of perpetuating drug-resistant bacterial strains, ultimately worsening the disease. Virginia Tech researchers say their new study points to a promising alternative treatment for CDI: a protein called lanthionine synthetase c-like or LANCL2.

Our modeling shows that we do not need to remove the pathogen nor directly influence inflammation in the case of CDI to have an effective treatment, said Andrew Leber, scientific director at BioTherapeutics. Simply restoring immune tolerance in the gut through an LANCL2, or similar immunoregulatory pathway, or boosting the gut microbiome to allow it to naturally outcompete pathogenicC. difficilestrains is effective in the absence of antibiotics.

This study serves as a critical first step toward demonstrating the feasibility of constructing precision medicine tools that can optimize treatment design on a patient-by-patient basis. The application of these methods to personalized treatment of human diseases can potentially minimize undesirable side effects and maximize efficacy of treatment in response toC. difficileand other infectious and immune mediated diseases.

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New precision medicine approach could save patients grappling with life-threatening intestinal infections - Augusta Free Press

Doctor, will my child be normal?

As a pediatric cardiologist and a developmental pediatrician, this question is part of daily conversations for us. The words or silence we provide in those initial moments shape a before and after moment in parents lives. We consider and reconsider what parents need to process and to decide what is best for their children. Sometimes we are able to perceive what parents need and sometimes we make mistakes in understanding how to respond to them. Yet those moments are why we entered medicine in the first place, and they take time.

Time is a scarce resource in our current medical system. Doctors know what they need to do for their patients but often do not have the time or resources to do it. As a result, many are frustrated and leaving the profession, despite the calling they felt when they decided to become doctors in the first place. This is also the climate where new physicians are trained.

The uncertain future of the U.S. health care system underscores the deeper uncertainties physicians face in their daily conversations with concerned patients and families. In 2014 essayist and poet Meghan ORourke wrote, Ours is a technologically proficient but emotionally deficient and inconsistent medical system that is best at treating acute, not chronic, problems. As our technology has advanced, we are able to care for more individuals with chronic medical conditions. Many of the issues that are dealt with in these visits involve time and effective communication. And it is well established that patient outcomes are related to effective communication with their doctors.

Communication matters in other ways. Writer Ursula K. Le Guin has written: Words are events, they do things, change things. Her words are particularly poignant as we consider our current society where Pres. Donald Trumps tweets become daily news headlines, including his perspective on Charlie Gard, an 11-month-old child in the U.K. with a rare neurologic disease who was ordered moved to a hospice last week, where life support was to be withdrawn.

His parents had advocated that he should receive treatment for a rare mitochondrial disease in the U.S. whereas his physicians opposed further intervention. This case brought to light many issues and questions, including the best interest of the patient, financial considerations and scientific validity of a treatment. It has also highlighted the consequences from the breakdown of patient-family-physician communication. This is not a new situation but one that deserves to be revisited with attempts to understand how to make it better.

Many diagnoses such as a throat infection or pneumonia can have relatively simple treatment and follow-up care accompanied by a predictable pathway of medical management and prognosis. When the diagnosis is complex and associated with other comorbidities as often is the case for children with congenital heart disease and developmental differences, however, uncertainty can become the focus of the conversation. The future may involve multiple surgeries, therapies, educational supports, developmental delays, genetic disorders and the potential for long-term careand the conversation cannot occur in convenient time allotments. It has to allow for families to process information and revisit the questions over and over again. Most importantly, patients and families need to understand that although circumstances are difficult, there is also room for hope.

Patients, families, and physicians come to these encounters with their own expectations and lenses through which they understand communication. Culture influences these encounters, and it can quickly lead to misunderstandings and consequences, such as those manifested in Anne Fadimans 1997 book, The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down. In addition, physicians own emotions shape these encounters, as described in Danielle Ofris 2017 book, What Doctors Feel.

Fadimans book marks a more idealistic time in our own development as physicians, where we could not imagine we would ever make those mistakes and we would make sure we spent time with patients and families so it did not happen. Ofris most recent book resonates as we reflect on how our own resolved and unresolved emotions shape our interactions with patients and families. And this can result in the breakdown of communication.

When asked about the most trying part of being a physician, our colleagues and our own responses may include the following: to cure, to heal, to fixwhile not making mistakes. This may be what is expected of us, yet the most difficult part may be not in the technical aspects but in the art of doctorpatient communication, the act of delivering difficult news. Especially if the results cannot be fixed or healed. And if this is the case, then time is one aspect that allows patients and families to be at the center of the healing relationship.

A diagnosis has meaning. It gives a name to the struggles and pain that individuals and families experience. It matters how it is delivered and who delivers it, especially when there is uncertainty and not a clear path. These conversations should provide a pathway to relieve struggles, provide support and alleviate suffering.

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Meaningful Conversation Is a Crucial Part of Medicine - Scientific American (blog)

COLUMBIA The MU School of Medicine welcomed both a new building and new class of students Friday, marking the most diverse class in the school's history, Dean of Medicine Patrick Delafontaine said.

The school has been facing pressing issues about the lack of diversity in their student population. In 2015,only 5 percent of the medical school students were underrepresented minorities, according to previous Missourian reporting. This year, 9 percent of the class are underrepresented minorities, meaning black, Latino and Native American students, an MU Health Care spokesperson said.

Melanie Bryan, a fourth-year student at the school of medicine, said at the dedication of the new building that she was proud of not only the new structure but also the diversity of this year's class.

"(This is) a student population as diverse as our patient population," Bryan said.

In recent years, the school had to send the Liaison Committee on Medical Education, which accredits medical schools, a plan to improve its diversity issues by December 2016. If the committee had decided that there hadn't been enough improvement, the school could have been put on probation, according to previous Missourian reporting.

The school of medicine's class of 2021, welcomed Friday morning at the annual white coat ceremony, consists of 128 students. This is an increase of 32 students from last year, according to a news release.

Also, 32 percent of the incoming class are ethnic minorities, including black, Asian, Latino, Native American and Pacific Islander students. That is in addition to the 9 percent of the class who are underrepresented minorities.

This is an increase from last year, where 27 percent of the class were minorities and 8 percent were underrepresented minorities, Diamond Dixon, an MU Health Care spokesperson, said.

The Patient-Centered Care Learning Center, a new, $42.5 million medical education building, was dedicated Friday afternoon after ten years of brainstorming and construction. It was the result of a partnership between the school of medicine and two hospitals in Springfield, CoxHealth and Mercy. The Chambers of Commerce in Columbia and Springfield, as well as the state legislature, also supported the project, said Weldon Webb, the MU associate dean for Springfield Clinical Campus Implementation.

"The return on investment of this expansion is tenfold," Barbe said at the dedication ceremony. "This activity that looks like a big investment will reach broadly for many years to come."

The expansion is expected to generate jobs in the medical field that will help alleviate the shortage, he said.

"By giving students more options for clinical training in other hospitals and physician practices, we are educating them on the diverse health needs of our state and increasing the odds of putting more physicians in Springfield and southwest Missouri," Steve Edwards, president and CEO of CoxHealth, said in a statement.

Through the partnership with the two hospitals, MU's school of medicine was able to create an additional medical campus in Springfield in 2016, according to a news release. In February,nine third-year students were in Springfieldand 32 additional medical students were expected to be admitted each year as a result of the expansion.

Supervising editor is Sky Chadde.

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MU School of Medicine welcomed its most diverse class Friday ... - Columbia Missourian

Insilico Medicine has a new agreement with a British investors biotech company that will result in the companys platform being used to develop new compounds for use in drugs that treat aging and age-related diseases.

The startup, which is based at ETCs Eastern campus, signed a deal with Juvenescence AI,according to a press release. As a result, the two companies have a drug development agreement under the title Juvenescence AI Limited. Along with the deal, Juvenescence made an investment into Insilico Medicine. The amount was not disclosed.

Insilico applies machine learning to the process of drug discovery. As founderAlex Zhavoronkov told Technical.ly Baltimore, the companys platform is designed to use deep learning techniques to analyze how a compound will affect cells. This process is currently determined through trials.

We are excited by the potential for AI to streamline the longest and most costly portions of the drug development cycle: clinical trials, Juvenescence Chairman Jim Mellon said in a statement. With Insilico Medicines help, we hope Juvenescence AI will both develop therapeutics that treat the diseases that plague all of us as we age and eventually treat the aging process itself.

With the deal, Juvenescence AI will license several compound families from Insilico.

Stephen Babcock is Market Editor for Technical.ly Baltimore and Technical.ly DC. A graduate of Northeastern University, he moved to Baltimore following stints in New Orleans and Rio Arriba County, New Mexico. His work has appeared in The New York Times, Baltimore Fishbowl, NOLA Defender, NOLA.com/The Times-Picayune and the Rio Grande Sun.

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Insilico Medicine signs deal to advance use of AI in discovering new drugs - Technical.ly Baltimore

And interestingly, that same day, the Times also ran a story with this headline: Climate-Altering Gases Spiked in 2016, Federal Scientists Report. Citing the recently released National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Annual Greenhouse Gas Index, the story reported global emissions of greenhouse gases that lead to warming, primarily driven by the burning of fossil fuels and other human activity, increased 40 percent between 1990 and 2016.

Sometimes, the importance of genetically modified organisms (GMOs) just hits you over the headif you only connect the dots.

The first story reported that the Food and Drug Administration appears poised to open an exciting new front in the war against cancer by approving the first gene therapy to enter the [U.S.] market. The therapy requires removing millions of a patients T-cells a type of white blood cell often called soldiers of the immune system and genetically engineering them to kill cancer cellsthe altered T-cells are then dripped back into the patients veins, where they multiply and start fighting the cancer.

Miraculous results have already been achieved with leukemia patients with hopeless cases, the story reported. Now scientists are preparing to use it against other cancers, including multiple myeloma and an aggressive form of brain tumor.

In the second article, there was no mention of GMOs yet, in my opinion, theyre very much a part of the story (and could even be a bigger part in the future if we let them).

As the global climate changes, farmers are already feeling the impacts all over the world. The prospect is for those impacts only to grow. More heat, more drought, more floods, more and different insects and other pests, more salinized water all these are barreling down on us, according to the scientific consensus.

GMOs are one of the best tools we have to fight back. Theyve already given us crops that are more drought- and pest-resistant. Now in the pipeline are GM crops that can do an even better job of withstanding the harsher conditions that Nature seems prepared to offer us while increasing the amount of food farmers produce on each acre of land. And as the global population continues its rapid increase to nearly 10 billion by 2050 the case for fully deploying these tools becomes even more compelling.

Its also important to note that in addition to increasing production yields, GM crops are actually helping to reduce agricultures impact on the environment. Between 1996 and 2015, productivity gains through biotechnology saved 430 million acres of land from plowing and cultivation. By reducing the need to till the soil, GMOs over the past 20 years have reduced carbon dioxide emissions from farm operations by 26.7 billion kilogramsan amount equivalent to taking about 12 million cars off the road for one year. GM crops also reduced the spraying of crop protection products by 619 million kilograms, a global reduction of 8.1%.

But will we continue to deploy new GMO crop technology? Or will the use of GMOs in agriculture continue to be demonized by some so that government regulators or the public themselves will reject them? In the United States today, the gap between how scientists perceive the safety of GMO crops (88 percent believe safe) and how the public perceives that safety (37 percent believe safe) is the largest opinion difference between the public and scientists on any scientific issue that the Pew Research Center measures.

Yet surprisingly when it comes to making medicines, concerns about GMOs never really took root, and efforts by critics to fan fears just havent worked. Consider again the Times story about the advent of gene therapy. A single paragraph refers to the challenges of maintaining quality control and consistency as the therapy is scaled up. Otherwise the role of genetic engineering is treated in such a matter-of-fact way that a reader could easily overlook it.

And thats consistent with the track record for GMOs in medicine. For example, the insulin used to treat millions suffering from the near-epidemic disease of diabetes has been produced with genetically modified organisms for 40 years. How many people know that or would care if they did? A few years ago, GMO critics did try to make them worry but fortunately the effort flopped. The public seems to understand that genetic modification is a safe, effective and much-needed technology for developing new medical treatments. I find it ironic that several outspoken celebrities who criticize GMO crops have had their lives significantly improved by GMO insulin.

GMOs are used in many other kinds of medicines too, as well as in vaccines and vitamins, largely without notice or concern (although vaccines face plenty of opposition on other scientifically baseless grounds). And their role in other areas of our lives will continue to grow as well. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), for instance, scientists are using genetically engineered viruses to produce more environmentally friendly lithium batteries. These GM batteries are made without the solvents needed to produce the current technology and have the potential to one day power hybrid cars.

Environmental bioremediation is another area showing promise. Some day in the not-too-distant future, well likely see various kinds of waste being eaten by genetically engineered bacteria.

There are many more examples, but the point should be clear. GMOs, despite having been vilified in agriculture, have already emerged as hugely positive tools for us and our planet in the 21st century. It doesnt make sense for us to accept the technology as safe in some areas, but not in others. As global warming increases, lets hope we finally resolve the contradictions in our attitudes toward genetic modification and embrace this technologys possibilities for feeding the world and helping the environment too.

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From Medicine to Modern Ag, GMOs Continue to Improve Our World - HuffPost

Here are five takeaways:

1. The concussion care program is overseen by a multidisciplinary team of neurology, neurosurgery, neuroscience, ENT, physical therapy and neuropsychology specialists.

2. The Dolphins will provide high school athletes with protocols in concussions and reinforce health and safety standards.

3. In all, the program will impact more than 15,000 high school athletes per year.

4. The University of Miami Countywide Concussion Care High School Program was established in 2012.

5. The Miami Dolphins have sponsored a high school training program at Miami-based Norland High School for the last two years and partnered with USA Football to cover the cost oftraining for all coaches

that take part in Player Safety Coach certifications.

More articles on sports medicine: Dr. Robert LaPrade receives AOSSM award: 5 things to know Dr. Tom Carter diagnoses torn ACL in Phoenix Suns' Brandon Knight 4 insights Dr. Neal EIAttrache No. 45 of 50 Most Powerful in Southern California Sports list: 5 highlights

Read the rest here:

Miami Dolphins partner with University of Miami Sports Medicine Institute: 5 takeaways - Becker's Orthopedic & Spine

Nebraska Medicine plans to start construction this month on a new 12,000-square-foot primary care clinic in the Elkhorn area.

The new clinic is part of Nebraska Medicines expansion of primary care services to west Omaha. The health system will open Nebraska Medicine-Chalco on the southwest corner of 168th Street and Giles Road in mid-September.

The Elkhorn clinic will open in April at 204th Street and Blue Sage Parkway. Like the Chalco clinic, it also will offer urgent care services, which Nebraska Medicine calls immediate care, in the evening and on weekends and holidays for minor illnesses and injuries, sore throats and earaches and minor cuts and sprains. The urgent care location will be Nebraska Medicines fifth in the metro area and its first in the Elkhorn area.

The construction of new primary care clinics across the metro demonstrates how committed we are to providing access to our services closer to where our patients live, Dr. Dan DeBehnke, Nebraska Medicines chief executive officer, said in a statement.

The new clinic will feature 15 exam rooms, five consultation rooms, a procedure room and radiology services.

julie.anderson@owh.com, 402-444-1066

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Nebraska Medicine plans new clinic in Elkorn area - Omaha World-Herald

Eric Wiley @EWileySJ

The eight incoming University of Kansas School of Medicine-Salina students on Wednesday got a lesson in volunteerism.

Students went to the Rebecca A. Morrison House to vacuum vents, scrub floors and doors, wipe down ceiling fans and perform a lot of the deep cleaning of the house that needs to be done on a semiannual basis, said Lisa Hoffman, manager of the Morrison House.

Each year, incoming medical students participate in a volunteer day during their orientation.

The students Ayodale Braimah, 22, of Liberal; Jorrie Dykes, 22, of Salina; Josh Bahr, 22, of Ellsworth; Josh Warner, 25, of Belleville; Maci Hicks, 22, of DeWitt, Neb.; Nate Grabill, 48, of Beloit; Nathan Finch, 30, of Lindsborg and Tyler Goeser, 22, Munich, N.D. have spent the week learning the schools new curriculum and resources available to them and getting to know each another.

Dykes said Wednesdays volunteer day gave students a glimpse of their future.

All of us are wanting to become physicians, so our duty is to serve, she said. This is a tangible way of doing that. Were serving family members of patients. This is kind of like a head start on whats to come. To be able to do it together is a plus.

Hicks referred to the experience as a great way to bond while helping others.

Its great to be able to serve in a rural community. Not only are we preparing to becoming health care professionals, but were serving a lot of people, she said. This class gets along really well. There is a sense of family. The support system is going to be phenomenal. Its an exciting time because weve been preparing for this moment."

Helping others

Since 1993, the Morrison House has served as a free hospitality house for families with loved ones who are patients at Salina Regional Health Center or Salina Surgical Hospital and for patients receiving treatment at Tammy Walker Cancer Center.

The house which averages about 95 guests a month has served families and patients from all 50 states and 18 foreign countries.

Hoffman said this week is National Hospitality House Week.

A lot of the work that is done here is done by volunteers. Thats what we rely on, she said. What the students are doing today is important for us. It allows us to keep money to continue to provide the service we do. Were pretty fortunate to have something (Morrison House) like this in our region.

Bahr said hes eager to help people who are in need.

For me, I decided to go into medicine and to pursue a life of service. I want to help people, especially those in need who cant help themselves, he said. The Salina campus (KU School of Medicine) is probably the most community-oriented campus. This is kind of a symbol of that. Were excited and ready to serve the community.

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Incoming KU School of Medicine students enjoy day of volunteerism - Salina Journal

The National Institutes of Health has selected the first four community partner awards to join the All of Us Research Program,

This initial group of awardees will receive a combined $1.7 million this fiscal year.

The awardees are charged with raising awareness about the program among seniors, Hispanics and Latinos, African Americans and the LGBTQ community.

[Also:NIH All of Us program gearing up for 'precision engagement,' Eric Dishman says]

The awardees are:

FiftyForward (formerly Senior Citizens, Inc.), based in Nashville, Tenn., will share information about All of Us at affiliated lifelong learning centers and through home-based services to reach urban and rural, economically disadvantaged and older adult populations. FiftyForward also will train peer ambassadors to inspire community members to join.

The National Alliance for Hispanic Health, based in Washington, D.C., will launch bilingual (English and Spanish) national and local initiatives to promote All of Us in Hispanic communities and work to overcome potential challenges to participation.

The Delta Research and Educational Foundation based in Washington, D.C., in collaboration with Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. and the National Council of Negro Women, will launch a national health initiative called Research Matters: Creating Possibilities to Achieve Health and Wellness for the All of Us Research Program.

The San Francisco General Hospital Foundation will form a national network to engage sexual and gender minorities across the country in All of Us. The team will provide input on enrollment materials and research plans, develop customized educational programs and study best practices in the dissemination of research results to support retention.

Twitter: @Bernie_HITN Email the writer: bernie.monegain@himssmedia.com

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NIH's 'All of Us' precision medicine initiative names four partners - Healthcare IT News

The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.

In a factory just outside San Francisco, theres an upright stainless steel vat the size of a small car, and its got something swirling inside.

The vat is studded with gauges, hoses and pipes. Inside, its hot just under 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Sugar and other nutrients are being pumped in because, inside this formidable container, there is life.

Scientists are growing cells in there. Those cells, in turn, are growing medicine. Every two weeks or so, the hot, soupy liquid inside gets strained and processed. The purified molecules that result will eventually be injected into patients with Stage IV cancer.

Drugs that are made this way inside living cells are called biologics. And theyre taking medicine by storm. By 2016, biologics had surged to make up 25 percent of the total pharmaceutical market, bringing in US$232 billion, with few signs their upward trend will slow.

Common medicines such as aspirin, antacids and statins are chemical in nature. Though many were initially discovered in the wild (aspirin is a cousin of a compound in willow bark, the first statin was found in a fungus), these drugs are now made nonbiologically.

Conventional medicines are stitched together by chemists in large factories using other chemicals as building blocks. Their molecular structures are well defined and relatively simple. Aspirin, for example, contains just 21 atoms (nine carbons, eight hydrogens and four oxygens) bonded together to form a particular shape. A single aspirin tablet even kid-sized contains trillions of copies of the drug molecule.

Biologic drugs are a different story. This class of medication is not synthesized chemically instead they are harvested directly from biology, as their name suggests. Most modern biologics are assembled inside vats or bioreactors that house genetically engineered microbes or mammalian cell cultures. Efforts are underway to make them in plants.

Biologic drugs can be whole cells, alive or dead. They can be the biomolecules produced by cells, like antibodies, which are normally secreted by our immune systems B cells. Or they can be some of the internal components of cells, like enzymes.

Biologics are typically much larger molecules than those found in conventional pharmaceuticals, and in many cases their exact composition is unknown (or even unknowable). Youre unlikely to find biologic drugs in tablet form they tend to be delicate molecules that are happiest in liquid solution.

While biologics are one of the fastest-growing drug categories in the U.S., they arent exactly new. The Biologics Control Act, passed in 1902, was the first law aimed at ensuring the safety of some of the earliest biologics vaccines. Congress was moved to pass the law after a contaminated batch of diphtheria shots left 13 children dead. Jim, the horse from which the diphtheria antitoxin had been extracted, had contracted tetanus.

Fortunately, scientists have dramatically improved the way they manufacture biologic drugs since then. For starters, the recombinant DNA revolution of the 1970s means that drug makers no longer have to extract many of the most important biologics from whole animals.

The gene that codes for human insulin, for example, can be pasted into a microbe which will happily churn out the drug in bulk. After a multi-million dollar purification process, the injectable insulin that results is indistinguishable from the version a healthy human body would produce. This is how some forms of insulin are made today.

Both conventional and biologic drugs work by interacting with our own biology. Most conventional drugs function as inhibitors theyre just the right size and shape to jam themselves into some molecular cog in our cells. Aspirins pain-reducing power comes from its ability to disrupt an enzyme in the body called cyclooxygenase, an important player in pain signaling.

Conventional drug discovery largely consists of finding new compounds that specifically disrupt only disease-associated processes. Because these drugs are quite small, and because the inside of any cell is a sea of other molecular components, finding a new small drug that blocks only problematic processes is tricky. Off-target interactions can produce side effects of all types.

The large size of biologic drugs can be an asset here. An antibody, for example, has lots of specific points of contact with its target. This enables therapeutic antibody drugs to bind with extreme precision only their target molecule should be an exact match. This binding can lead to inhibitory effects, much like a conventional drug might. In some cases, therapeutic antibodies can also stimulate the immune system in a problem area, like at a tumor, prompting the body to take it out.

Many biologics target molecular processes that no conventional drug can, and they can treat a growing list of diseases. Cancer treatments dominate the list, but since 2011 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved new protein-based biologics for the treatment of Lupus, Crohns disease, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, kidney failure, asthma and high cholesterol.

New types of biologic drugs continue to emerge as well. In late 2015, the FDA approved a first-of-its-kind treatment for patients with advanced melanoma: an engineered herpes virus. Researchers genetically programmed the virus, called T-VEC, to target only cancerous cells, and it can also prompt the immune system to start wiping out cancer. Additional virus-based therapies are currently working their way through the lengthy U.S. drug approval process.

Amgen, the company that produces T-VEC, estimates it will cost an average of $65,000 per patient and that doesnt come close to topping the list of priciest biologic medications. The most expensive drug ever made recently won approval by the FDA. Brineura, a biweekly enzyme replacement therapy produced by BioMarin Pharmaceutical, delays the loss of walking in individuals with a rare genetic disorder. Its price tag? $27,000 per injection, or more than $700,000 for a full years treatment.

The steep prices of biologic drugs are alarming to many patients, physicians and researchers. In an effort to drive costs down, provisions of the Obama administrations Affordable Care Act accelerated the approval process for new biologics intended to compete with already approved medicines. Like generic drugs, so-called biosimilars are designed to be interchangeable with the biologic they seek to replace.

Unlike generic versions of conventional drugs, however, biosimilar drugs are often only similar to not identical with their competition. This means these complex drugs still require lengthy and expensive trials of their own to make sure theyre effective and safe. Because of this, the Federal Trade Commission estimates that biosimilars may only produce an overall 10 to 30 percent discount for patients.

Cost-cutting innovations in the biologic production pipeline are desperately needed. The FDA has called on scientists and drug developers to invent biosimilars that resemble FDA-approved medicines and to develop the tools needed to quickly demonstrate their safety.

As this promising class of drugs continues to grow in number and popularity, their lifesaving power will be limited if costs make them inaccessible to patients who need them.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

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Biologics: The Pricey Drugs Transforming Medicine - Scientific American

July 26, 2017 Prize winners at a healthcare hackathon. Credit: MIT Hacking Medicine

Since 2010, MIT Hacking Medicine has grown from a one-time event to a global brand, with more than 80 healthcare hackathons being hosted this year, from Cambridge, Massachusetts, to Quito, Ecuador. The programs are open to everyone, but are particularly popular with 20- to 30-something engineers, doctors, researchers, and entrepreneurs who form teams under mentorship and identify healthcare issues to solve. At least 15 groups have started companies and raised more than $100 million in venture funding after meeting at a Hacking Medicine event. In a commentary published July 26 in the journal Cell Systems, the organizers describe how their model stands apart from typical hackathons.

"The short- and medium-term gains in healthcare are not going to be from one-off Thomas Edisons doing their own thing to invent the light bulb," says senior author Christopher Lee, a former engineer-turned-scientist at the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. "Everything is so multi-disciplinary now that you need to know where you run short of expertise and complement your skill sets through collaboration."

A healthcare hackathon follows a four-phase approach: identification, description, alteration, and implementation. At the start of the weekend, each group chooses to work on a pain point that one of the participants brings up from their day-to-day experience working in healthcare (e.g., patients are waiting over an hour to see their doctors, children are accidently pulling out wires next to their hospital bed). Once selected, the team interviews relevant people who are affected by the problem and researches existing solutions. They develop prototypes that solve problems they've identified and then compete for endorsement from mentors and judges.

Some of the ventures that have so far evolved from these meetings include PillPack(prescription adherence), CAKE (end-of-life care), Augmented Infant Resuscitator (improved bag-valve-mask for neonates), Perfect Latch (breast pump design), Arsenal Health (patient scheduling), and Podimetrics (diabetic foot ulcers). Other former participants go on to work on research or non-profit projects such as mobile diagnostics applications, ultrasound probes, and electronic health record automation tools.

Lee emphasizes the social and academic values of the hackathons, which help participants meet like-minded individuals and learn how to innovate. "Our goal isn't for our event to launch companies, it's to teach people to incorporate design thinking and user feedbackor how to conduct an interview so that you know what you're designing is hitting the right levers," he says. "We see ourselves as an education program that all the MIT Hacking Medicine community members have put a lot of love into."

MIT Hacking Medicine, which mostly covers the New England area, has been involved in about a quarter of the healthcare hackathon events that now take place around the world. In addition to university- and academic-sponsored events, the group also helps healthcare technology groups and institutions design accelerators and incubators and helps hospitals and pharmaceutical companies host internal hackathons.

MIT Hacking Medicine recently published a free handbook that serves as a resource for anyone looking to host these events in their community. Lee recommends hackathon planners raise money for space, prizes, food, and of course, coffee. Due to the popularity of the events, it sometimes is necessary to use an application system to screen for participants.

"Research is all about being out there and being totally new, and that's great, but at the same time, we have such a wealth of problems to solve today, right now," Lee says. "We are showing scientists and physicians that no matter what they are working on, they can be an entrepreneur and incorporate the design process without getting an MBA or being a consultant in a previous life. People come to our events and feel like they can do this."

Explore further: New collaboration platform to optimise antibiotic use

More information: Cell Systems, Gubin et al.: "A Systems Approach to Healthcare Innovation using The MIT Hacking Medicine Model" http://www.cell.com/cell-systems/fulltext/S2405-4712(17)30084-4 , DOI: 10.1016/j.cels.2017.02.012

Journal reference: Cell Systems

Provided by: Cell Press

Healthcare needs access to many different antibiotics, but some sorts are no longer profitable for pharmaceutical companies. PLATINEA, the new platform for collaboration, will help identify the gap between needs and available ...

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With new ventures to show, MIT Hacking Medicine shares its model for success - Medical Xpress