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As the number of retail clinics grows nationally, so does the demand for physician's assistants and nurse practitioners.

Doctors from across the country gathered in San Diego last month for the American Academy of Family Physicians' 2008 Scientific Assembly.

New AAFP President Ted Epperly strongly backs the medical home patient-care model.

Are your patients satisfied with their visits? In four rural Georgia medical offices, patients leaving their family practice will be able to voice their opinion about communication with their doctor at an electronic touch-screen kiosk developed by researchers at the Medical College of Georgia School of Medicine.

Software companies such as Microsoft and Adobe have publicly battled illegal copies of their well-known office and design computer programs for years, but historically, health-care software providers haven?t been as vocal about copyright infringement. But that doesn't mean the industry was unaffected by software piracy.

Planning any holiday-season electronic health record systems shopping? A key standards-setting health information technology nonprofit has some recommendations about where you may want to start.

Two major health insurers and two technology companies have partnered to offer an electronic prescribing service to Florida physicians for free.

The Medical Group Management Association criticized a Medicare quality reporting initiative, complaining that the program doesn't provide guidance on how to improve patient outcomes and creates an administrative burden on practices.

More than half of doctors at least "occasionally" use some form of complementary and alternative medicine in their practice, according to a July survey by physician staffing firm Jackson & Coker.

A bill was introduced in July in the U.S. Senate to award $600,000 state grants to create medical volunteer programs for which the state would assume medical liability.

Just 39 percent of patients at retail clinics said they had a primary care physician, according to a study by the RAND Corp.

More and more Americans are turning to sources other than their doctors for medical information, according to a recently released report. The web is patients' fastest-growing source of medical information.

The model of charging patients "access" fees to cover administrative expenses has given way to the concept of "concierge" or "boutique" practices.

The Department of Health and Human Services will require health care providers to use its set of new diagnosis and procedure codes known as ICD-10 by October 2011.

Health-care IT seems to be the new issue du jour for Congress. On Sept. 15, Rep. Pete Stark (D-California), the namesake of the anti-kickback medical referral law, unveiled a bill to establish a nationwide health-care IT infrastructure, but the measure faces competition from two other similar bills already under consideration.

A New Jersey health insurer has launched a pilot program that will allow participating physicians to access patients? medical imaging records through a web portal.

About 25,000 U.S. physicians have downloaded a free drug information software program that runs on Apple's popular iPhone, according to the California company that develops the software.

Overwhelmed by the number of electronic health record vendors out there? A research and consulting firm offers an in-depth look at 10 of the major vendors for the ambulatory care market and highlights the top performers for features, flexibility and physician satisfaction.

A former orthopedic surgeon has created a company dedicated to helping physicians navigate the choppy waters of purchasing the right electronic health records system - for free.

Understanding the various cultural and linguistic nuances of our patients can certainly help in strengthening doctor-patient relationships.

The good job you and other physicians are doing to increase the life expectancy of patients has a downside: Social Security may wind up on life support. Part of the solution may be to increase the retirement age to reflect this greater longevity.

Despite a sagging economy and a weak stock market during the first half of 2008, retirement plan participants increased the amounts they contributed compared to the same period in 2007, according to results of an analysis from Boston-based Fidelity Investments.

According to the terms of a class-action lawsuit, credit bureau TransUnion must provide free credit monitoring to anyone who had an open credit account or open line of credit in the United States during the past 21 years.

When a state boots a health-care provider from its Medicaid program for incompetence, fraud, or patient abuse, it's supposed to inform the federal government so that the offenders will be barred from receiving any more federal funds. But that doesn't always happen.

Many patients are responding to higher prices for basic goods by cutting back on their medical care. About 22 percent of U.S. consumers say they're visiting their doctors less.

Patients in the United States made an estimated 1.1 billion visits to physician offices, and hospital outpatient and emergency departments in 2006, an average of four visits per person per year.

A new report from the National Association of Community Health Centers cites a severe shortage of primary care physicians as the nation's biggest barrier to universal health care.

Life can be envisioned as a double helix: a spiral stairway whose length we cannot know. Have you ever paid close attention to the stairs you climb?