Daily Rounds: 'Cutters' On YouTube: Healing Senior Sports Injuries; Selling Prescription Data

Teens share self-injury, 'cutting' videos on YouTube - USATODAY.com "In what researchers call an "alarming new trend," teens and young adults are creating and sharing YouTube videos about cutting, burning or otherwise harming themselves — and even demonstrating techniques, a study says today in Pediatrics. Previous research suggests that 14% to 21% of teens and young adults have deliberately injured themselves at least once — using knives to cut their arms or legs, for example, says lead author Stephen Lewis of the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada. Some go on to attempt suicide, the third-leading cause of death for ages 15 to 24." (yourlife.usatoday.com)

Targeting sports-related injuries with new treatments - The Boston Globe "The surge is spurring researchers to develop and hone new techniques aimed at helping aging bodies maintain fitness and mend injuries. Many of the new approaches — including platelet-rich plasma therapy, or PRP, which Borg-Stein selected for Mascoop — harness the body’s own healing powers to speed recovery." (boston.com)

amednews: Supreme Court to tackle access to prescription data :: Feb. 21, 2011 ... American Medical News "Should physicians' prescription data be off-limits to drug companies? It's a question legislators have wrestled with for years. Maine and New Hampshire have answered by banning the practice. The U.S. Supreme Court will examine the issue and decide whether Vermont can bar selling prescription information to drug companies — or whether the ban violates free speech." (ama-assn.org)

Cape lawmaker wants to lift health care fine | CapeCodOnline.com "While the governor and the Legislature attempt to control rising health care costs, one Cape lawmaker has introduced legislation he believes will take the pressure off citizens who are choosing between mandatory insurance or paying a state penalty. The Help Expense Lowering Plan (HELP), introduced by Rep. Randy Hunt, R-Sandwich, would suspend the state's minimum coverage requirements on health insurance until Jan. 1, 2014, when national health reforms go into effect. There would be no fine ($1,212 in 2011) for not complying with Minimum Creditable Coverage requirements. The requirement for insurance of some kind would remain in place. Certain categories of care would not need to be covered, such as maternity care and prescription drugs.State residents would still be required to carry some form of health insurance but would no longer have to pay for certain categories, such as prescription drugs or maternity and newborn care coverage." (Cape Cod Online)

Money Won’t Buy You Health Insurance - NYTimes.com "The truth is that individual health insurance is not easy to get. I found this out the hard way. Six years ago, my company was acquired. Since my husband had retired a few years earlier, we found ourselves without an employer and thus without health insurance. My husband, teenage daughter and I were all active and healthy, and I naïvely thought getting health insurance would be simple."(nytimes.com)