Below are some links to popular media coverage of my research.
Too Small to Work? – 04/30/2013
As part of Obamacare, people are required to get health insurance or pay a penalty. For some, the penalty may be as low as $95. Would anyone in their right mind, who is not otherwise inclined to buy health insurance, buy it just to avoid such a small penalty?
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Will you buy into Obamacare or pay the penalty?
Shared Decision Making Gets a Boost – 11/29/2012
Joanne Kenen looks at the boost shared decision making is getting from the Affordable Care Act. I was able to provide some insight as to where this new model fits into doctor-patient communication and medical decisions.
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ACA boosts ‘shared decision-making’
Get to Know Your Doctor – 10/11/2012
A recent piece by a USA Weekend where I share ways to make stronger connections with doctors. Stronger connections can lead to great care!
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Want great care? Get to know your doctor
Rare Diseases Too Expensive to Treat? – 9/5/2012
A great piece by a Forbes reporter discussing why rare disease treatments can cost as much as $400,000 per patient, per year.
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How A $440,000 Drug Is Turning Alexion Into Biotech’s New Innovation Powerhouse
Is Patient Health Taking a Hit? – 8/1/2012
A nice article on Workforce.com, by a reporter I spoke to, on the potential hazards of high deductible health insurance.
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High deductibles hazardous?
Pay more, but live longer – 4/17/2012
Pharma Times recently published an article on the costs and benefits of US cancer care. The article highlights studies published in April’s issue of Health Affairs, including a study I recently led on the inconsistency in how oncologists judge the value of high-cost cancer drugs in relation to survival gains.
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US cancer care costs more, provides longer survival than Europe: study
Whose life would you save? – 7/12/2011
WHYY in Philadelphia has a report out on a new study I participated in, led by my good friend Scott Halpern. The study revealed the strange lengths to which physicians will go to help their patients, even if it hurts other patients.
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Savings are in the balance in hard choices in health care
Tough decision? Take it piece by piece – 4/21/2011
Brian Zikmund-Fisher took the lead on a study published this week in which we found evidence that when people face tough decisions, it helps for them to break the decision into smaller pieces, and take it one step at a time.
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Collect piece-by-piece info on cancer
Do patients need the numbers? – 4/14/2011
An interesting article by Peter Schwartz in the latest Hastings Center Report on whether patients, facing difficult medical decisions, ought to get precise numbers on the risks and benefits of their alternatives. I contributed a commentary, urging researchers to keep developing better ways to help patients make rational use of the numbers.
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Too Much Information?
What would you do, doc? – 4/11/2011
A bunch of media outlets are beginning to report on a new study of mine (conducted with a couple great colleagues) in which we found that docs choose different treatments for themselves than they recommend to their patients. Kinda scary stuff.
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Doctors ‘often defy’ their own treatment advice
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Doctors don’t always take their own advice: survey
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Physicians may heal themselves differently
When less is more – 3/29/2011
Here is a news article discussing a paper I wrote with Michael Volk, in which we try to find ways to keep doctors from harming patients by finding and then getting all worked up over what we in medicine call incidentalomas–unexpected and ultimately benign findings that show up with unnecessary tests. The article is in the Archives of Internal Medicine this week.
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Should radiology ignore incidental findings?
Age and happiness – 12/18/2010
As we get ready to turn the clocks on a new year, it is good to remember that for most of us, our happiness increases with age. See this recent news article which talks about some of my old, ahem, research on aging and happiness.
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The U-bend of life
Life or quality of life — what matters to oncologists? – 12/8/2010
Take a look at a brief summary of a new paper I just published, led by a wonderful medical student at Michigan, Michael Kozminski. It shows that oncologists seem to place far greater value on quantity of life over quality of life.
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Oncologists value survival over quality of life, study finds
I Need to understand you better – 12/1/2010
I gave a talk as part of an ethics series here at Duke. Here is one take on my presentation. See if you can spot the Far Side reference!
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I need to understand you better
Gender differences in career grant rates – 12/12/2009
My colleague, Dr. Reshma Jagsi, and I found in a recent study that women are less likely than men to receive major funding for scientific research.
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Women researchers less likely to receive major career funding grants
Why aren’t women more interested in tamoxifen? – 12/4/2009
Dr. Angela Fagerlin, my colleague at the University of Michigan, and I (along with several other colleagues) recently published a research study, and the findings have caught the media’s attention! Our study found that many women who have a high risk of developing breast cancer are not interested in taking a drug called tamoxifen to reduce their chances of developing cancer because of the serious side effects.
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High-risk women may often avoid using tamoxifen
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Women wary of breast cancer prevention drug side effects
Recommendations = rationing? – 11/23/2009
Josh Gerstein delves into the debate that sprang up around the new breast cancer screening recommendations. I was able to provide some insight as to how and why people react drastically to such health-related information.
• GOP: Breast exams show ‘rationing’
Acceptance and moving on – 11/10/2009
My research colleagues and I (at the Center for Behavioral and Decision Sciences in Medicine at the University of Michigan) published an article in Health Psychology that will be available online November 17th. Our study found that colostomy patients who felt that their condition was irreversible reported better quality of life than those patients who hoped that they would be cured.
• Acceptance of chronic illness helps people move on
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Research shows chronically ill might be happier if they gave up hope
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Living in an uncertain world
How to pitch medical research to Democrats versus Republicans – 10/18/2009
My colleague, Dr. Sarah Gollust of the University of Pennsylvania, and I conducted an experiment to determine how people’s political beliefs are related to their attitudes towards health research and healthcare reform..
• Why Americans disagree about healthcare reform
• U of M study: Political beliefs and medical research
Free Market Madness – 1/29/2009
Michigan Radio’s Jack Lessenberry reviews my book, Free Market Madness.
• Essay: Freedom
Concentrate Media profile – 10/1/2008
Jeff Meyers of Concentrate Media picks my brain!
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Mastermind: Dr. Peter Ubel
Elevator talk gone wrong – 6/25/1995
A nice piece on some of my favorite past research.
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When elevator etiquette takes a dive
