Rao Doctor

APRIL 3, 2025

In my previous article I covered the types of illness and the causes. Rectal method is more appropriate for infants, children and unconscious or comatose patients who are not able to hold the thermometer in their mouth. Understanding the patient’s medical history is crucial for an accurate diagnosis. FEVER FAQs (contd.)

Diagnosis 130

Diagnosis Management Illness Diagnose 130

GeriPal

JANUARY 30, 2025

In one corner, weighing in at decades of experience, well known for heavy hits of bedside assessments, strong patient-family relationships, and a knockout punch of interdisciplinary collaboration, we have in-person palliative care consults. But watch out! Travel time can leave this champ vulnerable to fatigue and no-shows.

Telehealth 106

Telehealth Patient-Centered IT Patients 106

GeriPal

JANUARY 25, 2024

He also found gaps, including very few studies of patients with lung disease, and little impact of trials on quality of life. The article we discuss today, also published in JAMA , addresses these two gaps. Your research is a lot in this patient population, right? Big randomized control study that came out. Lyndsay: Yes.

Patient-Centered 123

Patient-Centered IT Illness Patients 123

GeriPal

JANUARY 18, 2024

We start off the conversation by talking about whether patients with cancer and cancer pain are really that different, and their paper that was just published on January 11 th in JAMA Oncology showing that substance use disorder is not uncommon in individuals with cancer. Katie, welcome back to GeriPal. And so, let’s help them.

Illness 137

Illness Patient-Centered Screening Clinic 137

GeriPal

NOVEMBER 14, 2024

Summary Transcript CME Summary Falls are very common among older adults but often go unreported or untreated by healthcare providers. Patients may feel like falls are just part of normal aging. This is Sarah Berry, who is at the Hebrew Senior Life and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical center and Harvard Medical School.

IT 125

IT Patient-Centered Screening Community 125

GeriPal

OCTOBER 17, 2024

We talk about what is heart failure, particularly HFpEF, how we treat it (including the use of sodium–glucose cotransporter-2 inhibitors (SGLT2’s), and how we should apply guidelines to individual patients, especially those with multimorbidity who are taking a lot of other medications. When I see a patient?

Primary Care 114

Primary Care Patient-Centered IT Patients 114

GeriPal

NOVEMBER 2, 2023

First, we’ve invited Jerry Gurwitz to talk about his recently published article in JAMA titled The Paradoxical Decline of Geriatric Medicine as a Profession (while it’s not the most upbeat title for the future of geriatrics, Jerry sees it as a call to action). I was going to start off by asking Jerry about why he wrote the JAMA article.

Board-Certified 91

Board-Certified IT Community Medical Student 91

GeriPal

OCTOBER 20, 2022

And, who within ASPE guides aging policy and connects policy to every day health challenges experienced by patients and clinicians? Alex: And we are delighted to welcome Rasheeda Hall, who is a physician scientist in the division of nephrology at Duke University School of Medicine, and sees patients at the Durham VA.

Complication 52

Complication Patient-Centered IT Patients 52

GeriPal

JANUARY 16, 2025

These individuals may become unrepresented, meaning they lack the capacity to make a specific medical decision, do not have an advance directive for that decision, and do not have a surrogate to help. How should we care for unrepresented individuals in inpatient and outpatient settings? Is the patient in your descriptor?

Patient-Centered 110

Patient-Centered IT Patients Healthcare 110

GeriPal

MARCH 2, 2023

The FDA-approved indications for gabapentin are only for treating patients with partial seizures or postherpetic neuralgia. valproic acid and gabapentin), in nursing homes, particularly patients with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias. There are a lot of reasons that may explain the massive increase in use of these drugs.

Patient-Centered 96

Patient-Centered IT Healthcare Medical 96

GeriPal

NOVEMBER 7, 2024

If the purpose of initiating dialysis is improving function – our complex, frail, older patients are likely to be disappointed. Eric 00:13 And, Alex, I am very excited today because there was an awesome article on Annals on conservative management versus dialysis. This is Eric Widera. Alex 00:12 This is Alex Smith.

Management 117

Management Patient-Centered Patients IT 117

GeriPal

MARCH 9, 2023

Early data on efficacy in patients with anxiety and demoralization are promising. Two of our guests today, Stacy Fischer and Brian Anderson, are involved in large multicenter trials of psychedelics for patients with advanced cancer (Fischer) or life-limiting illness (Anderson). Research is exploding. Welcome back to GeriPal, Stacy.

Patient-Centered 91

Patient-Centered Community IT Medical 91

GeriPal

DECEMBER 8, 2022

Clinicians “catching” patient life stories. . Our patients aren’t “the 76 year old with heart failure in room 202,” as Heather Coats astutely noted. My Life, My Story: VA’s healthcare improvements through deliberate storytelling – YouTube. Storytelling Helps Hospital Staff Discover The Person Within The Patient.

Patient-Centered 116

Patient-Centered Illness Healthcare IT 116

GeriPal

APRIL 14, 2022

And if you want to learn more about buprenorphine from these amazing palliative care clinicians and others, check out of some of these articles: Learn more about caring for those with substance use disorder: . Adapting Palliative Care Skills to Provide Substance Use Disorder Treatment to Patients With Serious Illness . Transcript.

Illness 103

Illness Patient-Centered IT Patients 103

GeriPal

MAY 25, 2023

Others cited the call from communities to meet them where they are – be they senior centers, Black-owned businesses, or churches (we have a podcast planned in the fall with Fayron Epps and Karen Moss on the church setting). And as you know, it’s a great article. Welcome to the GeriPal podcast. Hillary: So great to be here.

Community 96

Community IT Patient-Centered Primary Care 96

GeriPal

DECEMBER 15, 2022

In an article in the NEJM (a published article this time, wonder of wonders!) Along the way we address: Is this degree of slowed cognitive decline meaningful to patients or care partners? She was a heart failure patient. But wait, there’s a shiny new anti-amyloid drug, lecanemab! (No Alex: It’s a great choice.

IT 106

IT Patient-Centered Healthcare Illness 106

GeriPal

MAY 8, 2025

Summary Transcript CME Summary Weve covered psychedelics on the podcast beforefirst in 2019 with Ira Byock, where we explored their potential role in medicine , and then again in 2023 with Stacy Fischer, Brian Anderson, and Theora Cimino, focusing on the reasons to approach psychedelic use in patients with caution. Gordon Alwasa.

Illness 109

Illness IT Patient-Centered Patients 109

GeriPal

OCTOBER 26, 2023

Within hours of recording this podcast, I joined a family meeting of an older patient who had multiple medical problems including cancer, and a slow but inexorable decline in function, weight, and cognition. The patient’s capacity to make decisions was marginal, and his sons were shouldering much of the responsibility.

Patient-Centered 133

Patient-Centered Hospital Patients IT 133

GeriPal

FEBRUARY 8, 2024

Accreditation In support of improving patient care, UCSF Office of CME is jointly accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME), the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), and the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), to provide continuing education for the healthcare team.

IT 137

IT Families Family Physicals 137

GeriPal

FEBRUARY 29, 2024

Accreditation In support of improving patient care, UCSF Office of CME is jointly accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME), the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), and the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), to provide continuing education for the healthcare team.

IT 127

IT Patient-Centered Illness Education 127

GeriPal

APRIL 4, 2024

The Cruzan ruling led to a flood of interest in Advance Directives, and eventually to the Patient Self Determination Act, which mandates provision of information about advanced directives to all hospitalized patients. You write about this, you’ve written this New England Journal article, you’ve written past articles.

Families 113

Families Family Patient-Centered IT 113

GeriPal

JULY 28, 2022

And I just want to highlight, Jennifer has a great JPSM article that just came out. But at that time I was struck by how in that field, there wasn’t a focus or really interest in symptom management and support for patients and their families. Would you also just mind mentioning kind of the JPSM article too?

Illness 111

Illness Hospital Patient-Centered Patients 111

GeriPal

MAY 15, 2025

Prior podcasts on the ethics of nudging , and a different trial conducted by Kate and Scott in which the default for hospitalized seriously ill patients was to receive a palliative care consult. Clinicians were randomized to 4 groups: Usual care Prognosis nudge – EHR prompt asking, do you think your patient will be alive in 6 months?

Patient-Centered 118

Patient-Centered Hospital IT Illness 118

GeriPal

JUNE 30, 2022

You have a patient with dementia severe enough that she cannot recognize relatives. A huge part of this decision rests on (1) her previously stated wishes, values, and goals (prior to the onset of dementia); and (2) the outcomes of surgery for patients with dementia. Summary Transcript Summary. She falls and breaks her hip.

Patient-Centered 101

Patient-Centered Complication Patients IT 101

GeriPal

FEBRUARY 6, 2025

He is associate professor at the University of Wisconsin and medical director of their Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center. That screening influences kind of further treatment, actually, probably more importantly, patient outcomes. And when I asked the patient, well, what happened, the test was sprung on them.

Primary Care 97

Primary Care Diagnosis Screening IT 97

GeriPal

FEBRUARY 23, 2023

Summary Transcript Summary You know when you walk out of a patient’s room and have that sense, “This isn’t going to go well.” The patient is sick and getting sicker, and refuses to let you talk with family or other members of her inner circle. Should you stop at “no?” AlexSmithMD Transcript Eric: Welcome to the GeriPal podcast.

Families 98

Families Family Patient-Centered IT 98

GeriPal

AUGUST 24, 2023

Harvey is probably best known for his work in developing dignity therapy, a psychological intervention designed specifically to address many of the psychological, existential, and spiritual challenges that patients and their families face as death approaches. Just an extraordinary cast of individuals who were really so incredibly inspiring.

Patient-Centered 98

Patient-Centered Patients IT Illness 98

BMJ

FEBRUARY 8, 2021

1 The purpose of this article is not to denigrate youth (or their parents) for whom these medications are truly needed for medical reasons. Besides the risks to an individual, there are also population-level harms from normalizing certain harmful behaviors (e.g., Hyattsville, MD: National Center for Health Statistics.

Medical 40

Medical Holistic Care Healthcare Healthcare Professional 40

GeriPal

DECEMBER 14, 2023

More recently Sharon Kaufman ‘s book And a Time to Die described the ways in which physicians, nurses, hospital systems, and payment mechanisms influenced the hour and manner of patient’s deaths. We discuss the moral distress that clinicians felt including, as one physician put it, a sense of your soul being ripped out.

Hospital 126

Hospital IT Patient-Centered Patients 126

GeriPal

OCTOBER 19, 2023

Caveat as well that RCTs should not be placed on pedestal as the only answer- often patients enrolled in RCTs do not represent real world patients – observational studies do. For a trial to have value, it should not exclude patients over age 80, or those with dementia, or patients residing in nursing homes.

Patient-Centered 127

Patient-Centered IT Patients Illness 127

GeriPal

AUGUST 17, 2023

However, as noted in our editorial published with the donanemab trial , the modest benefits of amyloid antibodies would likely not be questioned by patients, clinicians, or payers if amyloid antibodies were low risk, inexpensive, and simple to administer. However, they are none of these. Welcome back to the GeriPal podcast, Jason.

Patient-Centered 98

Patient-Centered IT Clinic Patients 98

GeriPal

JANUARY 26, 2023

Second, as we discussed in last week’s podcast , older adults, particularly those in nursing homes, were far more likely to die than younger individuals. The article was titled, “ Change is coming ” – which also gives you a hint as to today’s song request. I probably should have said GFR. Eric: Yes. I just choose GFR.

IT 92

IT Patient-Centered Healthcare Patients 92

GeriPal

OCTOBER 5, 2023

We’ve invited Jacqueline Kruser and Bob Arnold on this week’s podcast to talk about their recently published JAMA Viewpoint article titled “ Reconsidering the Language of Serious Illness. ” You recently published an article in the New Yorker titled, I can’t even read my own, what was the title again? This is Eric Widera.

Illness 136

Illness IT Patient-Centered Families 136

GeriPal

JUNE 16, 2022

First, we talk with Christine, a researcher and geriatrician from the University of North Carolina, who recently published a JAGS article titled Overdiagnosis of urinary tract infections by nursing home clinicians versus a clinical guideline. So that could be symptoms in a patient with dementia, maybe some delirium and off.

Management 123

Management IT Medical Patient-Centered 123

GeriPal

FEBRUARY 20, 2025

If you want a deeper dive, check out the following resources: Our Nature of Suffering podcast with BJ Miller and Naomi Saks Dani Chammas Annals paper on countertransference and why we shouldnt say that the patient was difficult rather than that I felt frustrated. Some of them are really deeply individual experiences. Kate 01:09 Yeah.

IT 67

IT Patient-Centered Individual Screening 67

GeriPal

MARCH 24, 2022

Start by reading this article by Sean Morrison, Diane Meier, and Bob Arnold in JAMA , and this response from Rebecca Sudore, Susan Hickman, and Anne Walling. Although, certainly when you start facing complications of serious illness, it is increasingly important to engage as individuals and conversations about goals, values, and preferences.

Illness 73

Illness IT Healthcare Patient-Centered 73

GeriPal

APRIL 24, 2025

We and our guests have noticed that in our clinical practices, patients and caregivers seem to be asking for such treatments more frequently. We discuss an article they wrote about PULET for the American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine, including: What makes a PULET a PULET? Ivermectin to treat cancer. Stem cell treatments.

Patient-Centered 79

Patient-Centered IT Patients Illness 79