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I’m recovering from the STAT Summit — particularly, recovering from this beautiful view of Boston from the venue. On Wednesday night, we had an incredible view of the almost-supermoon rising as nightfall settled in over the past panel of the day.
However one of the best view? All your faces. It was so good to see some readers in particular person — and if not this time, the subsequent one!
Atul Gawande and biased algorithms
We’re nonetheless digesting every part that occurred on the STAT summit. Some tidbits to your consideration:
STAT’s Sarah Owermohle quoted one in every of her favourite strains from Atul Gawande’s ebook ‘Being Mortal’ in her session with him: “‘Our final aim, in any case, is just not a great dying, however a great life to the very finish,’” she stated. Gawande expanded on that, saying that as life expectations from across the globe have gotten longer, it’s vital to know folks’s priorities. “Whether or not it’s sporting a masks or taking most cancers chemotherapy, the questions are the identical,” he informed the viewers. “What are you prepared to sacrifice? What are you not prepared to sacrifice for the sake of extra time?” Learn extra.
We have been privileged to have three docs on the Summit who’ve spoken out concerning the ethical damage of UnitedHealth Group’s Optum taking up their main care practices. They’ve been quoted in our ongoing Well being Care’s Colossus sequence. Learn extra right here, or watch a clip right here.
Usha Lee McFarling and Katie Palmer’s Embedded Bias sequence confirmed how exhausting it’s to disentangle race from algorithms used to find out affected person care. However it’s one other factor to listen to from a affected person who waited an additional 4 years to get a kidney transplant due to the race think about a type of equations. Hear extra from Jazmin Evans and others right here.
The physician exploring music’s impact on cognition
Earlier this week, we launched you to our 2024 STAT Wunderkinds, highlighting a few of the brightest younger minds in well being care and life sciences. We additionally bought to listen to about their beautiful accomplishments and galvanizing views on the STAT Summit.
At this time we carry you a Wunderkind profile: Alex Chern’s mom began him on violin classes as a baby after he was recognized with listening to loss. Later, in med college, whereas sitting within the Vanderbilt cafeteria, he was shocked to learn {that a} neuroscientist who additionally had a vocal arts diploma was beginning a music cognition lab at Vanderbilt.
Now, he seems again on that day within the cafeteria as the beginning of the 12 months every part got here collectively. Learn extra about Chern’s journey to the place he’s now (it entails a 10-day coma) and his analysis on the ties between music, listening to loss, and cognitive decline.
Exposing the exposome
It’s possible you’ll be conversant in what a genome is, or a microbiome, however have you learnt what an exposome is? Simply as your genome is the entire genes that make up you, the exposome is the entire chemical compounds you’ve uniquely been uncovered to given your weight loss program, the medicines you’re taking, the merchandise you employ, and the standard of your water and air, and so forth.
(And let me, your pleasant neighborhood chemist, remind you that actually every part is made up of chemical compounds — you’re uncovered to lots of of them each day.)
Researchers learning blood taken from pregnant ladies lately developed a manner to display for a lot of extra of those chemical compounds than was beforehand potential — figuring out practically 300 of them on the identical time. Together with an assay that measured whether or not neurons have been stunted of their progress, the researchers have been in a position to decide each that most of the mixtures of chemical compounds have been unhealthy for neural improvement, and that even when particular person chemical compounds have been discovered at low ranges, the additive impact of them in a mix was nonetheless unhealthy. The analysis will assist establish mixtures of chemical compounds we should always display for sooner or later.
Summit highlights, from Medicare to crosswords
Being within the room for a STAT summit is a completely totally different expertise than seeing it nearly. Cerevel Therapeutics chairman Tony Coles informed the room about his work with the Black Financial Alliance: “This can be a very high-profile elected official who stated, ‘Tony, I might actually need to help the group, but it surely has ‘Black’ in it. And on account of that, I can’t be seen as supporting something that has the phrase ‘Black’ in it.’ That’s a direct quote.” All of our breaths have been taken away for a second.
Former CMS administrator Don Berwick had a spicy discuss with Bob Herman about the way forward for Medicare. Right here’s one in every of his takes on the “medical loss ratio” and the way folks from different international locations are incredulous after they hear about how we do medical insurance on this nation.One other Don quote that we at STAT beloved was this one: “I’ve to say that’s STAT’s been an actual treasure nationally, one of many journalist organizations that’s in a position to really assist folks perceive what’s practically not comprehensible.”
We don’t have a STAT Summit bingo card, however the truth that it took till the second day for GLP-1s to be talked about made me assume we should always! We did, nevertheless, have a enjoyable STAT newspaper. It was a print-only particular, however you could find the crossword right here in the event you like!
Asian People in well being care aren’t a monolith
After touring to each Tokyo and Hong Kong on the identical journey final 12 months, I used to be struck by how shockingly totally different these two cultures have been, although they’re each East Asian international locations. However within the U.S., folks from each backgrounds can be categorized underneath the generic label of “Asian American.”
A brand new examine in JAMA Community Open breaks down the Asian American class into 40 ethnoracial subgroups to research who’s doing what jobs in U.S. healthcare. The outcomes present that the overarching class hides inequities amongst totally different populations that the authors say return to historic imperialism, colorism, and different injustices which have resulted in socioeconomic disparities.
Whereas Indian and Chinese language People comprise the most important proportion of Asian-American physicians, Cambodian and Hmong People are largely underrepresented. Filipinx People make up greater than half of Asian American nurses and nursing assistants, and Bangladeshi and Chinese language People made up the most important proportions of dwelling well being aides. General, Asian People represented an estimated 22% of physicians, 10% of RNs, and eight.3% of dwelling well being aides.
For extra on how the Asian American label hides well being disparities, learn this award-winning piece from my colleague Usha Lee McFarling.
What we’re studying
‘Limitless {dollars}’: how an Indiana hospital chain took over a area and jacked up costs, The Guardian
Authorized marijuana comprises harmful mildew. States approve it anyway, Wall Road Journal
High HHS official doesn’t assume the election will affect AI guidelines, STAT
GLP-1 goes the way in which of intestine well being, The Atlantic
D.A. Wallach on his spouse’s tragic dying and making a ‘golden document’ for drugs, STAT
These tiny worms account for at the very least 4 Nobel Prizes, New York Instances
