"To compensate a little for the treachery and weakness of my memory, so extreme that it has happened to me more than once to pick up again, as recent and unknown to me, books which I had read carefully a few years before . . . I have adopted the habit for some time now of adding at the end of each book . . . the time I finished reading it and the judgment I have derived of it as a whole, so that this may represent to me at least the sense and general idea I had conceived of the author in reading it." (Montaigne, Book II, Essay 10 (publ. 1580))

Wednesday, October 30, 2024

Random Acts of Medicine (Anupam Jena and Christopher Worsham, 2023)

(244 pages)

Had seen great reviews on this but did not find it all that useful - that's not really a knock on the book, but Taleb and Kahneman (just read within the last few weeks/months) cover a lot of similar concepts in a way that I found more helpful.

Jena is "Freakanomics" podcast host; I don't listen to these but I know they are highly regarded.

Some of the studies have been in the news - how ADHD diagnoses fall on the very youngest boys in a class; the effect on cardiac patient care if an incident happens when the big guns are off at a conference.  Also look at things like the effect of a provider's birthday on care, whether it's better to have a younger or older doctor in hospitalist (get younger unless older consistently handles high volume) or surgery (probably the older) settings, etc.

But studies are notoriously difficult to construct so have limits; no clear takeaway here, I think we best continue to rely on referrals.  But there are items to keep in mind.

   

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