Clinician's Roundtable

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Eric Holden Medical professionals across the world have joined together to help treat the injured survivors of Haiti's devastating earthquake. Physician assistants are also part of this global effort. PA Eric Holden, a volunteer with NYC Medics didn't know what to expect when he arrived in Haiti. Holden and the rest of his team have teamed up with...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Robert Tennant, MA Financial incentives to implement electronic health records are a welcome payment to the nation's physicians. But the proposed rules and regulations to implement this system under the economic stimulus are creating complexities and challenges physicians may face in the coming years. Physicians might want to first listen to words of advice from Robert Te...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Wright Pinson, MD Healthcare reform may bring more medical care services to patients, which means more and complex business for the nation's physicians. But are doctors prepared to be the best business people now and in the future for their patients? Dr. Wright Pinson, deputy vice chancellor for health affairs and CEO of the Hospitals and Clinics at Vanderbilt University...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Jack Lasoski, PA-C How do employees working in large facilities know it's safe to return to work after being injured on the job? More than likely they must get clearance from one of the 2000 physician assistants working in occupational medicine across the country. Jack Lasoski, director of health services for the United States Enrichment Corporatio...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Krystie Lennox, PA-C More than 10 million surgical and non surgical cosmetic procedures were performed in the United States in 2008. Many of those procedures were performed by physician assistants. Krystie Lennox, the co-founder of the Aesthetic Extender Symposium, talks with host Lisa Dandrea Lenell about the state-by-state rules related to PAs pe...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Roderick Hooker, PhD, PA-C How does a doctor know when it's the right time to add a physician assistant to the office staff? There are a lot of factors to take into consideration when making the decision to add new employees. Dr. Roderick Hooker, co-author of the book Physician Assistant Policy and Practice, 3rd Edition , joins host Lisa Dandrea Le...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Julian Bailes, MD The National Football League has placed its strictest rules yet on managing concussions. What is the medical profession to make of such a policy and what are its broader implications for players' long-term health and for future medical research? Dr. Julian Bailes is a founding member of the Brain Injury Research Institute, which is affiliated with the Bl...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Michael Ong, MD In the healthcare debate, we've heard a lot about the equation between improving quality and cutting costs. But new research takes the opposite view that sometimes increased spending leads to better outcomes. Host Bruce Japsen, who also writes about healthcare for the Chicago Tribune , talks with Dr. Michael Ong, assistant professor of medicine in residenc...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Phillip Begg, PhD The physician assistant program began in the United Kingdom in 2004 with five students. Today, four universities have a PA program, with more than 200 students expected to graduate by 2012. Dr. Phillip Begg, associate dean at the University of Wolverhampton in Wolverhampton, England, talks with host Lisa Dandrea Lenell about the s...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Bob Nease, PhD Why do Americans choose healthcare options that cost more but may not even do more or be in the best interest of their own health? Dr. Bob Nease, chief scientist at Express Scripts, tells host Bruce Japsen about what appears to be a troubling phenomena researchers are calling the behavioral economics of healthcare.

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Ruth Ballweg, PA-C The rate of dental disease in Alaska is the highest in the United States. In order to combat the problem, Medex has started a dental therapy program in the area called DENTEX. Ruth Ballweg, director of the MEDEX Northwest program, discusses with host Lisa Dandrea Lenell how Medex became involved with dental care, the progress of...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Kenneth Thorpe, PhD The medical home is a concept that it moving from the theoretical and becoming a reality. How has this model of team-based care been piloted in the United States, and how might it change patient care, as well as physician payment? Dr. Kenneth Thorpe, the Woodruff Professor and Chair of Health Policy and Management at Emory University's Rollins School o...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Kevin Chung, MD Guest: Charles Thompson, PA-C, RN The U.S. Army Burn Center at Brooke Army Medical Center, Ft. Sam Houston Texas, is one of the five busiest burn units in the country. These patients are out of the ordinary. They are military men and women who have been burned over at least 20 percent of their body while serving in Iraq and Afghanis...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Kevin Chung, MD Guest: Charles Thompson, PA-C, RN It takes a team of specialists, social workers, PAs, nurses and therapists to care for the burn patients at the US Army Burn Unit in Brooke Army Medical Center, Fort Sam Houston, Texas. Every day more than 30 medical professionals make rounds checking on the critically injured at the unit. Dr. Kevin...

Host: Mary Leuchars, MD Guest: Barry Marshall, MBBS Nobel Prize winners are among the most honored individuals on Earth. Yet in the case of medicine or physiology, it's said that prize winners find more success cultivating quiet careers in basic science research composing solid litanies of publications than assuming roles of "celebrity experts." Dr. Barry J. Marshall, Australian physician and prof...

Host: Mary Leuchars, MD Guest: Barry Marshall, MBBS After failed attempts to infect piglets with H.pylori in 1984, Dr. Barry Marshall decided to use himself as an animal model and drank from a petri dish cultured with the bacteria. His resultant development of gastritis, and the subsequent discovery of H.pylori's role in gastric ulcer disease pathogenesis, led to a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Med...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Randy Danielsen, PhD, PA-C The National Commission on Certification of Physician Assistants (NCCPA) will launch their specialty certification program, beginning with five specialties, in 2011. What does a PA who may want to get certifiedneed to know? Dr. Randy Danielsen, dean of Arizona School of Health Sciences at A.T. Still University in Mesa, Ar...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Ruth Ballweg, PA-C When PAs meet other PAs from across the country, they often ask each other, Are you a Duke-trained PA or a MEDEX PA? This question comes from the early days of the profession when a difference in training depended on whether you lived on the east coast or the west coast of the United States. Ruth Ballweg, director of the MEDEX No...

Host: Lee Freedman, MD Guest: Lawrence Hurst, MD Dupuytren's disease can cause severe joint contracture in the hands, and surgery is often recommended for these patients most affected by the condition. But Dr. Lawrence Hurst, professor, chairman and chief of the division of hand surgery in the department of orthopaedics at Stony Brook School of Medicine Health Sciences Center, tells us about anoth...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Jenni Hunter The field of temporary workers has become commonplace to satisfy shortages of nurses and fill gaps to ensure health care delivery. Doctors too — and particularly primary care physicians — are increasingly going locum tenens. The numbers may surprise you. Jenni Hunter, divisional vice president of Staff Care, tells host Bruce Japsen about how physician staffin...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Jeff Belkora, PhD Informed decision-making involves helping patients arrive at the questions that can ultimately help their doctors deliver the best possible medical care. Jeff Belkora, director of Decision Services at the University of California San Francisco Breast Care Center, a demonstration program of the Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making, tells host B...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Tom Zampieri, PhD, PA-C The Department of Veterans Affairs is the single largest employer of PAs in the United States. With 1,600 PAs in the VA workforce, the PA leadership is only a part time field position. Dr. Tom Zampieri, director of government relations for the Blinded Veterans Association, joins host Lisa D'Andrea Lenell to talk about the po...

Host: Bruce Japsen Guest: Wendell Potter Once an insider in the health insurance industry crafting messages in a battle against health reform, he's now telling secrets in hopes of affecting change. Wendell Potter, a former public relations executive for health insurance giants Humana and Cigna, warns about industry practices he says short-changed doctors and their patients and boosted health plan...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Ian Jones, PA-C, MPAS Physician assistants have been practicing in Manitoba, Canada, for only the past 10 years. With a shortage of physicians across the country, the need for PAs is more crucial than ever. Ian Jones, president of the Canadian Association of Physician Assistants, joins host Lisa D'Andrea Lenell to discuss the success of PAs within...

Host: Lisa Dandrea Lenell, PA-C, MPAS, MBA Guest: Reginald Carter, PhD, PA-C Where is the beginning of the physician assistant profession? Is it in the 1960's, in response to a growing a shortage of physicians? Or does it go back even earlier than that? Dr. Reginald Carter, founder of the PA History Center in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina, joins host Lisa Dandrea Lenell to talk about the pioneers...