Health Highlights – September 22nd, 2009

Reading time: 2 – 3 minutes

Health Highlights is a biweekly summary of particularly interesting articles from credible sources of health and medical information that we follow & read. For a complete list of recommeded sources, see our links page.

• HIPAA’s Broken Promise | e-Patients.net

  When researchers have access to private health information, they can use it to develop treatments and therapies. However, there's a danger to all that identifying information floating around. Susannah Fox weighs the costs and benefits of anonymizing personal health data.

• Solidarity (at High Costs): The French Health Care System | Healthcare Hacks

  How les francais manage healthcare – high quality, universal coverage without reliance on a single-payer system.

• The Trouble with Wikipedia as a Source for Medical Information | Laika’s MedLibLog

  Jacqueline provides an in-depth review on the use of Wikipedia as a source of health information, citing several reasons why health consumers should use the resourc with caution.

• Science versus pseudoscience | Science-Based Medicine

  Homeopathy and nutritionists vs. real science.

• Interview: Susannah Fox, Pew Internet Project | Pulse + Signal

  Andre Blackman interviews Susannah Fox of the Pew Internet Project about new media advances in public health.

• Anti-"publication bias" efforts not panning out for science | Ars Technica

  Negative results can be useful, especially when it comes to drugs that don't work. However, a recent JAMA study shows that many clinical trial results published differ significantly from their proposed experimental design.