Recently I had the pleasure of reading Rich Cohen’s wonderful book: The Fish That Ate the Whale – the Life and Times of America’s Banana King. The book tells the story of Samuel Zemurray, a true rags to riches story, a man who started by spending his entire life savings – all $150 – to…
A recent news article reported that a grocery store in Durham, North Carolina now offers healthy checkout aisles for people interested in minimizing temptation. Ring up your groceries in that aisle, and you won’t be surrounded by candy bars and bags of chips. On the other hand, I’m guessing you will still be surrounded by magazine…
Most people would say they would prefer to work in a job with interesting and fulfilling opportunities. But new research shows that people may pick a boring job over a stimulating one if they perceive they aren’t being paid enough for extra effort. Duke University Fuqua School of Business marketing professorPeter Ubel and David Comerford, an assistant professor at…
The hospital price transparency bill that was signed into effect on August 21 has elicited criticism from the Duke health community. House Bill 834 mandates that hospitals and medical care agencies in North Carolina—including Duke University Medical Center—provide pricing information on 140 of the most common health care procedures to the Department of Health and…
Imagine you are the breadwinner for a family of four, and have been out of work for a while in the recessionary economy. Your financial situation is so dire that you have had to enroll your family in Medicaid. Then you find a job, not one that will make you wealthy but one that pays…
I just came across this picture, from the Kaiser family foundation website, illustrating just how often employee healthcare costs take up 10% or more of employee payroll. The number was already pretty high more than a decade ago, but it’s gotten even higher: For large employees, this amounts to almost $5 per hour put aside…
The urologist broke the news: “Out of 12 cores, three were positive for cancer, so you have a small amount of cancer.” He would soon explain the treatment choices—surgery, radiation, or active surveillance (watching the cancer closely with blood tests and biopsies). He described each option in elaborate detail, because he knew that the “right…
I don’t read much war history. I’m fascinated by what causes humans to end up in a state of war, but not so interested in the bloody details of how they fight their battles. Nevertheless, I thoroughly enjoyed The Day of Battle, a book by Pulitzer Prize winner Rick Atkinson. The book covers the war…
I know, I know: I usually write about health and healthcare; why should anyone care about my opinion on whether Larry Summers should be Federal Reserve Chair? As it turns out, my work on doctor/patient communication has given me insight into the danger of judging job candidates—be they physicians or Federal Reserve chairs—based purely on…
The Surgery Center of Oklahoma’s decision to publicly post prices for common procedures could prompt other hospitals and medical facilities to follow suit. Want to know how much it will cost to repair your torn Achilles tendon? At the Surgery Center of Oklahoma, you won’t run into a wall of bureaucracy trying to find out: The…