''America has spoken'' says Nick Cannon from America's Got Talent and the winner is: The American People! This is the feeling of many when the Supreme Court ruled that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is constitutional. Are the American people really winners? Absolutely! As the healthcare reform unfolds, nurse ...

Most of my spare time is spent listening to and watching the healthcare reform debate. I know that I favor a single payer system but I also know many people do not. My intent is not to get in a debate about this, as I don't think it will happen. What I do think has a chance is a public insurance option. That is if everyone is not scared to death ...

On May 12, Representative Allyson Schwartz from Pa. introduced, with 106 cosponsors, the Preserving Patient Access to Primary Care Act of 2009. The bill aims to increase primary care access for patients and includes nurse practitioners as leaders of patient-centered medical homes. Stephen Ferrara, NP, who writes the blog A Nurse ...

According to data published by Wolters Kluwer Health, patients are increasingly declining to fill their prescriptions as their wallets become thinner. The Wall Street Journal reported these findings today, showing that 6.8% of patients did not fill their brand-name prescriptions in the last quarter of 2008, an increase of 22% from the first ...

A new tobacco tax scheduled to go into effect April 1 will cost smokers about $1 more per pack. Those interested in helping Americans quit smoking say that the extra cost will naturally keep some from buying cigarettes and therefore decrease overall health care expenditures on smokers by $44.5 billion over time, according to an article ...

I'm writing from Nashville, Tennessee, also known as Music City, site of the 2008 American College of Nurse Practitioners National Clinical Conference. Over 1,200 registrants showed for this five-day event, and almost all sessions conducted today were overflowing with interested, engaged NPs. The keynote presentation, given by Ken Thorpe of the ...

For those who know me and those of you who will get to know me through this blog, I am passionate about quite a few things. Topping that list are my children, family, finding a cure for cancer, activism and patient advocacy, to name a few. Therefore, with September being Prostate Cancer Awareness Month, it would only seem fitting to dedicate my ...

Have you all been watching AMC's Mad Men, the TV series about a Madison Avenue advertising firm in 1960? The premise explores the lofty question of how we create truth — and sell falsehood. We follow the power of sex, ethnicity and money through each episode. The women wear bullet bras, and the men swill bourbon from bottles kept in their desks. ...