Faculty Bibliography

When more than one sperm penetrates an egg the resulting embryo cannot become a baby. They took 17 of the abnormal embryos and put them in a specially prepared fluid. There the embryos were allowed to divide into two, four or eight-cell embryos. Then, they separated these into single cells. The cells began dividing again, meaning that 48 genetically identical embryos had been made from 17

When more than one sperm penetrates an egg the resulting embryo cannot become a baby. They took 17 of the abnormal embryos and put them in a specially prepared fluid. There the embryos were allowed to divide into two, four or eight-cell embryos. Then, they separated these into single cells. The cells began dividing again, meaning that 48 genetically identical embryos had been made from 17

A retrospective study of all adults receiving BMT over a 13 year period at a large transplant center was performed to determine overall survival and prognostic indicators of poor outcome among patients receiving mechanical ventilation (MV). Of 653 adult BMT patients, 191 (29%) received MV after transplant. Of these 191, 161 (84%) died on the ventilator or within hours of extubation; 18 (10%) survived 1 week after extubation and 6 (3%) survived 6 months. Survival was not predicted by type of graft, use of total body irradiation (TBI) or reason for intubation. The patient's age and the timing of intubation were predictive of survival. Of patients > or = 40 years, 98% died within a week of extubation and all died within 30 days. Similarly, of those intubated within 90 days of transplant, 94% died within a week of extubation and all died by day 100. These results suggest that MV is rarely effective in achieving long-term survival in adult BMT recipients, especially older patients and those early in their transplant course. An argument, based on cost/benefit considerations and medical futility, can be developed to withhold MV in certain patient subsets apart from a clinical research trial.

Review

Don't get me wrong - I am hardly the quintessential political insider. I went to Washington leaning toward a single-payer, Canadian-style plan as best for the United States. I left strongly convinced that some form of government-sponsored, state- administered single-payer system is the best way to provide universal coverage for a basic package of services at an affordable price to every American

OK, you may now all exhale. The president has finally delivered himself of his thoughts on health care. Whatever else he achieved with his superb speech, he did succeed in bringing to an end the longest period of national collective breath-holding since NASA aimed a contraption with some humans strapped on top at the moon

NOW that the broad outline of President Clinton's health-care plan has emerged, it is important to understand what sorts of obstacles, roadblocks and potholes the plan will encounter as it wends through Congress

Few in the room seemed to be listening as a VA official spoke quietly, but what he said was worth heeding. The VA system, he said, is the biggest government sponsored health-care system in the world. It has a bigger budget than the entire British National Health Service. There is delicious irony in the fact that Congress, the U.S. military and its veterans all get their health-care from a single-payer system