This week’s MedBlogger Roundup is an eclectic mix of posts from over the last week, from wonky policy posts to first-person experience in the medical field.

Here's what's caught our eye:

1) Emergiblog: “The Nursing Shortage: A Sticky Wicket.”  Kim at Emergiblog has a thought-provoking post about the nursing shortage (a subject that we’ve posted about on our blog quite often) and why it’s leading nurses away from the profession that they love.

Says Kim:

“Nurses quit because there is little in the profession that causes them to ‘buy-in’, to be loyal to the profession. Oh, we all start out like that. We ‘buy-in’ to the altruistic, self-sacrificial, ‘angel of mercy’ persona for awhile.

But within a few years we find our altruism singed around the edges. We have increasing responsibility with very little power to control our work environments. There is little incentive to advance our education, as if we had the energy to actually do it. The patients are emotionally demanding. The work is physically demanding, especially for those of us (cough!) who are veterans of the profession.”

Kim concludes:

“Oh, there were times it looked like the grass was greener outside of nursing and I thought about what it would be like to do something else. But nursing is in my blood at the genetic-molecular level; map my genome and you’ll find it. My chromosomes are shaped like tiny nursing caps.

Nursing isn’t something I do, it’s something I am.”

Read the full post here: http://www.emergiblog.com/2008/10/the-nursing-shortage-a-sticky-wicket.html

2) Effect Measure: “Annals of McCain – Palin: The Medicare Fraud of John McCain.”  Over at Effect Measure, Revere (the handle of all of the authors) writes about Senator McCain’s proposed $1.3 trillion in Medicare cuts.  The author, who depends on Medicare, isn’t too thrilled:

“Here I am watching 20% of my retirement savings going down the toilet and John McCain tells me he will be doing me a favor over the next ten years by cutting $1.3 trillion from the Medicare and Medicaid budgets. $1.3 trillion. I'm on Medicare and I am not too happy about this.”

“He wants to give me a $2500 tax credit for health insurance that will cost me much more. Meanwhile my Medicare benefits will likely shrink. Thanks, but no thanks.”

“The savings by squeezing out fraud and abuse in Medicare and Medicaid is supposed to be $1.3 trillion? Yeah, right. So my benefits won't go down? Yeah, right. Like the economy is fundamentally sound. If change means making things even worse, then McCain is for change.”

Read the full post here: http://scienceblogs.com/effectmeasure/2008/10/annals_of_mccain_palin_xxi_the.php

3) WSJ Health Blog: "Obama, McCain Debate Whether Health Care Is a Right or Responsibility." Following our coverage of last week’s medblogger debate on whether healthcare is a right or a moral obligation, the Wall Street Journal’s Health Blog covers a section in last week’s presidential debate where Senators Obama and McCain debate this very subject:

“Is health care in America a privilege, a right, or a responsibility?”

Tom Brokaw threw that question at John McCain and Barack Obama in the middle of last night’s debate. Their answers went beyond the already-familiar details of each man’s health care plan to suggest an underlying philosophy.

McCain said:

    I think it’s a responsibility, in this respect, in that we should have available and affordable health care to every American citizen, to every family member. … But government mandates I — I’m always a little nervous about. But it is certainly my responsibility.

Obama said:

    I think it should be a right for every American. … for my mother to die of cancer at the age of 53 and have to spend the last months of her life in the hospital room arguing with insurance companies because they’re saying that this may be a pre-existing condition and they don’t have to pay her treatment, there’s something fundamentally wrong about that.”

Read the full post here: http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2008/10/08/obama-mccain-debate-whether-health-care-is-a-right-or-responsibility/

As always, if you have a blog post to submit for consideration, please e-mail me at brad@healthcareunited.org!

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