Literature Review

Mass General Brigham's generative AI plans for '24Becker's Health IT, by Bruce Giles; 1/2/24Mass General Brigham plans to use generative artificial intelligence to compare patients to ones with similar profiles to help with their treatment, The Wall Street Journal reported. The health system also intends to release its first AI-powered diagnostic products as part of its new commercial AI office in the first half of 2024, according to the Dec. 29 story. ... With advancements in large language models, algorithms that scan medical images for insights used to take millions of dollars and several years to create, he told the news outlet. Now they can be built in a matter of months.

Biased AI models in healthcare may lead caregivers and clinicians astray, new study warnsMcKnights' Tech Daily News, by Aaron Dorman; 1/2/24Over the past year, studies have highlighted how artificial intelligence models in healthcare sometimes can increase bias. Now, a new study warns that clinicians could follow AI down the wrong path. When reviewing data for respiratory failure, a common problem for older adults, clinicians were 11% less accurate in their diagnoses when using a biased AI model than if they didn’t use AI at all, the study found. Disturbingly, this fact was true even when given explanations about how the AI came to a diagnostic conclusion. 

‘Profound’ financial, workforce challenges persist for senior living providers as 2024 beginsMcKnights Senior Living, by Lois Bowers; 1/2/24Senior living operators will continue to face inflationary pressures and capital market challenges in 2024, but some effects may lessen before the year is out, according to industry experts.

Man 'accidentally' fires gun in Iowa hospital: policeBecker's Clinical Leadership, by Mackenzie Bean (Twitter); 1/2/24 Police are investigating an incident in which a gun was discharged at MercyOne Waterloo (Iowa) Medical Center Dec. 29, according to NBC affiliate WHO 13 News. Authorities found damage from a single gunshot in a restroom after responding to a report of a gun being fired at the hospital around 9:40 a.m. CST. No injuries were reported.

Palliative medicine helps stage IV melanoma survivor reclaim her life after treatmentAtrium Health; 1/1/24After a stage IV malignant melanoma diagnosis, brain surgery, radiation therapy and immunotherapy, Kate Crawford, 45, has reclaimed her quality of life thanks to palliative medicine at Atrium Health Levine Cancer. ...  While she has a vibrant, positive energy, the cancer treatments and disease itself led to numerous side effects and symptoms that drastically affected her quality of life. But thanks to palliative medicine at Levine Cancer, Kate says she feels more clear than she has in years. And her family says: “Kate is back.”

South Carolina NASCAR legend Cale Yarborough has diedPost and Courier, by Chris Day; 12/13/23 South Carolina racing legend Cale Yarborough died the morning of Dec. 31 at McLeod Hospice House in Florence. The Timmonsville native is closely linked to historic Darlington Raceway where he made his big-league debut. ... Yarborough was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2012 as part of the stock-car shrine’s third class of inductees. NASCAR Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Jim France called Yarborough one of the toughest competitors ever to compete in NASCAR.

What is your greatest hope for the new year? (per a Wall Street Journal email)Answers shared tomorrow!

We’re college students with ideas of how to promote senior living careers to a younger generation

A Birmingham mother draws on personal tragedy to assist grieving familiesAlabama Reflection, by Ralph Chapoco; 1/2/24Ella Shakeel has been volunteering with Faith in Action Alabama for five years. In that time, she worked exclusively with victims of violent crime as they came to terms with not only the tragedy of losing a loved one, but also with dealing with the logistics of laying them to rest. The source of her empathy stems from the tragedy that she herself has endured.

Here are the new state healthcare laws taking effect in 2024NOTE: IN PROCESS  ... have to head out early to radiation ... Joy

Offering ‘emotional first aid’ to people in shock over a sudden deathLas Vegas Review-Journal; 12/30/23When first responders in Clark County encounter relatives, friends, co-workers and bystanders upset about a sudden death, they contact volunteers of the Trauma Intervention Program of Southern Nevada to come to the scene. 

History despite its wrenching pain cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again. ~Maya Angelou

Doctors are pushing Hollywood for more realistic depictions of death and dying on TVKQED, by April Dembosky; 12/28/23We've seen it so many times. A young, handsome man rushed into the emergency room with a gunshot wound. A flurry of white coats racing the clock: CPR, the heart zapper, the order for a scalpel. Stat! Then finally, the flatline. This is Dr. Shoshana Ungerleider's biggest pet peeve. Where are the TV scripts about the elderly grandmothers dying of heart failure at home? What about an episode on the daughter still grieving her father's fatal lung cancer, ten years later? "Acute, violent death is portrayed many, many, many times more than a natural death," says Ungerleider, an internal medicine doctor and founder of End Well, a nonprofit focused on shifting the American conversation around death.