Help Patients by Explaining Treatments with Treatment Scores

Help patients, because their lives are at stake and their health is at stake. Patients and patient advocates want these five problems solved:

1. There is an 88% health illiteracy rate among patients (Health.gov)
2. 60 to 80% of physicians don't understand treatment effects (CMAJ)
3. The Patient-Centered Outcomes Research (PCORI) team says, “Every day, patients and their caregivers are faced with crucial health care decisions while lacking key information that they need.”
4. PCORI also says that we need to translate “…existing scientific research into accessible and usable formats…”
5. The majority of medical guidelines are written by authors with conflicts of interest (British Medical Journal).

We have created a solution for all five problems; we produce Treatment Scores. The Treatment Score = the net treatment benefit for the patient. It’s a way to summarize information to help patients understand the medical literature.

Patients are suffering from health illiteracy, under-treatment, over-treatment, and confusion about medical statistics. If you are interested in helping patients, please email us at Dr.Hennenfent@gmail.com
but read on for more information first.

How to explain Treatment Scores? Well, every year we figure out our “gross income” and “net income” when we do our income taxes. So, we simply figure out the “gross treatment benefit” and the “net treatment benefit” for patients as digested from the medical literature. Did you see the movie "Moneyball" about Sabermetrics starring Brad Pitt? Treatment Scores are "Sabermetrics for medicine."

Treatment Scores put a graphical user interface (GUI) over evidence-based medicine (EBM). In the early days of the computer, you had to know how to use machine language to use a computer. Once Windows and Apple put a GUI over machine language everyone could use a computer. With Treatment Scores everyone can do EBM.

Every step within Treatment Scores can be validated and verified. Treatment Scores are the opposite of cookbook medicine. Patients get what they want: understandable information. Physicians get what they want: Evidence-Based Medicine in a format that saves time. Bloggers and writers can stop lying with statistics.

REVELATIONS
When you do evidence-based medicine (EBM) with a graphical user interface (GUI), and you quantify the effects of medical treatments, you can make some astonishing discoveries.

A colleague looked at the trend not to give antibiotics to children under 2 years of age who present with ear aches (otitis media). He calculated a Treatment Score of 10% for symptom resolution for giving amoxicillin. He was surprised, because he thought the Treatment Score would be much higher. On the other hand, why withhold any treatment that has a “net treatment benefit” of 10% for resolving symptoms? It should be up to the patient. Patients want to know all the choices and all the information about each treatment; they want shared-decision making, because personal preferences can change the Treatment Score.

The Ebola epidemic in Africa was not optimally treated. Hundreds of patients probably died unnecessarily. With Treatment Scores, you can see who was more logical, Doctors without Borders, or one physician at the World Health Organization who saw in the data what we saw with Treatment Scores.

Harvoni (ledipasvir/sofosbuvir) is a major advance in treating a subset of hepatitis C, having a Treatment Score of 95% (as in 95% cure rate), compared to the old interferon based protocol that has a Treatment Score of 40%.

Steve Jobs (of Apple) allegedly had stage 1, neuroendocrine, pancreatic cancer found by accident. No doubt, such a smart, wealthy CEO would immediately undergo the "best treatment" for this most curable form of all pancreatic cancers, right? No! Remember, there is an 88% health illiteracy rate among patients (Health.gov). Even “the genius” Steve Jobs wasted precious time, apparently 6 months or more, doing treatments that were not backed by clinical evidence. How many times did the tumor double in size over the 180-day delay? Doubling time can be as low as 62 days (Pancreas, 2001). Would Steve Jobs still be alive today if he had simply had immediate access to a list of all possible treatments with Treatment Scores? His disease reportedly became metastatic and he passed away.

A COMPLETE LIST OF TREATMENTS
Patients want a complete list of treatments. Recently, a man told me about being diagnosed with hives (urticaria of unknown etiology). He went from doctor to doctor without ever finding a cure. He was working from a list of treatments that included antihistamines and steroids, and all the sub-classes of those medications orally and topically. He was also taking four showers per day for itching. The treatment that finally cured him wasn’t even on any of the typical lists of treatments. I have heard this same story many times about many different diseases. Did you know there are 130 treatments for insomnia? Did you know there are 57 treatments for an acute migraine headache? Why can’t we give patients a complete list of every treatment in the literature for every disease, and a Treatment Score for every one of those treatments? Not to say what patients must do, but to say here is what you can do, and here are how the Treatment Scores change depending on your personal preferences.

Patients want to know about all treatments whether they are Western medicine, Eastern medicine, herbal medicine, naturopathic medicine, Ayurveda, or any other type of alternative medicine. Patients spend $34 billion dollars per year on alternative medicine. You can give patients what they want with treatment lists and positive Treatment Scores, because sometimes excellent clinical studies do exist. Or, you can tell them when the Treatment Score = 0, because studies do not exist or the treatments don’t work. You can even tell patients when the Treatment Score is negative (harmful).

LOOKING 
We are looking for a person (or a group of people) who want to help patients with treatment transparency using Treatment Scores. This is a great educational opportunity (over the Internet).

AUDIENCE
The essays you write with Treatment Scores will be seen by a wide audience. We have over 116,000 followers on Facebook, over 9,000 followers on Twitter, and we hold all top 10 positions on Google search. As I write this, we are growing by over 1,000 followers per day on all our social media accounts combined. Patients clearly want better treatment transparency. You can also write for your hometown newspaper or for major publishers. Everyone needs Treatment Scores.

LEARNING
What will Treatment Scores give you besides worldwide and local publicity? You will receive an extraordinary education in evidence-based medicine. You will discover amazing revelations currently hidden in the medical literature. You will find scoop after scoop that can “go viral.”

CONTACT
If you are interested in Treatment Scores, please email:
Dr.Hennenfent@gmail.com
Feel free to send your LinkedIn profile, CV, or any other information.

There is a 1 minute explainer video about Treatment Scores on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/GLIIB3oOVJA

There is an explanatory essay about Treatment Scores and Smart Phones here:
http://www.treatmentscoresblog.com/2017/03/patients-desperately-need-treatment.html

Bradley R. Hennenfent, MD
Physician & Economist (Retired)
Florida, USA
Dr.Hennenfent@gmail.com

ABOUT
Treatment Scores was started by an anesthesiologist, an emergency physician, a physician programmer, and Dr. Hennenfent. Brad Hennenfent graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in economics, graduated medical school from the University of Illinois, and did his Emergency Medicine residency at the UIC Affiliated Hospitals Emergency Medicine Residency Program. After two years as a practicing emergency physician, he became director of an inner-city emergency department in Chicago. Then, he went into business and became the director of over 10 emergency departments and urgent care centers. Dr. Hennenfent has had five uncles with prostate cancer. He became an advocate, and, while working with a medical non-profit, helped get over $20 million dollars of federal funding released for medical research to the National Institutes of Health. He also helped get over $100,000 worth of grants in kind or donations year after year. In his retirement in Florida, he has become very interested in medical statistics and treatment transparency for patients. He believes patients should be more informed and more powerful. Dr. Hennenfent likes to combine the mathematics of economics with the mathematics of medicine.

To support Treatment Scores and the treatment transparency movement:

FOLLOW FACEBOOK:
https://www.facebook.com/TreatmentScores

FOLLOW TWITTER:
https://twitter.com/TreatmentScores

DISCLAIMER
You must always see a licensed physician for diagnosis and treatment. Treatment Scores are only an educational exercise. Death or disability can result if you don't see your own medical physician, call an ambulance, or go to the emergency department immediately for your medical issues.

Copyright © 2017 Bradley R. Hennenfent, M.D. All rights reserved.

Treatment Scores and Evidence-Based Medicine with Quantification

If you are interested in evidence-based medicine you should visit the following blog, TreatmentScoresBlog.com:

TreatmentScoresBlog.com

While you are at TreatmentScoresBlog.com you should sign up to receive blog posts from TreatmentScoresBlog.com in the upper right corner using your email address.

You should also follow Treatment Scores on Twitter, Facebook, and at the main website for creating treatment scores, TreatmentScores.com.

Follow Treatment Scores:
Twitter:
https://Twitter.com/TreatmentScores
Facebook:
https://Facebook.com/TreatmentScores
Blog:
http://TreatmentScoresBlog.com
Website:
http://TreatmentScores.com

DISCLAIMERS: You must consult your own licensed physician, or other licensed medical professional, for diagnosis, treatment, and for the interpretation of all medical statistics including Treatment Scores. Treatment Scores are for educational purposes only. Treatment Scores may be incomplete, inaccurate, harmful, or even cause death if used for treatment instead of consulting a licensed medical professional. No medical advice is being given. We DO NOT CLAIM to cure, treat, or prevent any illness or condition. Nor do our services provide medical advice or constitute a physician patient relationship. Contact a physician or other medical professional if you suspect that you are ill. Call emergency services (call 911 if available) or go to the nearest emergency room if an emergency is suspected. We are not responsible for any delays in care from using our website, our services, or for any other reason. We are not responsible for any consequential damages of any nature whatsoever. We make no warranties of any kind in connection with our writings or the use of TreatmentScoresBlog.com or TreatmentScores.com. Treatment Scores are about what happened to patients studied in the past; they do not predict the future.

TreatmentScores.com Twitter Feed

Tweets by @TreatmentScores

There Has Never Been Product Transparency in Medicine

One of my grandfathers lived from 1900 to 1969 on a farm in rural Illinois. Many of his generation and his initial descendants went to a general physician, Dr. S.

I was young, and Dr. S was elderly when I met him, but he was locally famous. He seemed at home in “farm country” and he never held any pretensions of grandeur.

Patients had no clue about the Science of Medicine behind any of Dr. S’s prescribed medical practices, because no other sources of information were available to them other than Dr. S himself. There was a monopoly on medical information. There was no “product transparency.”

You only have true product transparency when you know everything you need to know and want to know about a product before you buy it. Take food for example. There is pretty good product transparency for a hamburger. Everybody knows what a hamburger is and everybody pretty much knows what a hamburger tastes like. It’s easy for the consumer to compare a hamburger from one restaurant to a hamburger at another restaurant.

Or take the computer. Nowadays, you can get an extensive list of all the specifications of a computer before you buy one. Not so with medical treatments.

This monopoly on the "inside medical information" has continued throughout my father’s generation. There is no true “product transparency” when it comes to medical treatments. The exact specifications of medical treatments, the really important information, the inside medical information that you really need to know, is still a secret. The advent of the Internet has helped, but it has not solved the problem.

Patients and healthcare providers need to be empowered with better medical information. They need near perfect “product transparency.” They need to know exactly how well medical treatments work without spending months sorting through the existing 20 million medical studies,[1] and without visiting doctor after doctor.

For many years now, I’ve been working how to solve the product transparency problem in medicine, which could also be called the “treatment transparency” problem. Actually, I also like to say that we need “medical practice transparency.” A medical practice can be a treatment, or it can be any other medical action such as ordering a blood test, or ordering an x-ray.         

---

[1] Fraser AG, Dunstan FD. “On the impossibility of being expert.” BMJ. 2010 Dec 14;341:c6815. doi: 10.1136/bmj.c6815.

Bradley Hennenfent, M.D. - Biography: Basketball & Medical

I recently needed to provide a short biography for a business transaction regarding a patent pending invention involving basketball. I have several patents and trademarks in the works, including medical patents, so I am sharing my basketball/medical biography here.

Overview
Before retiring from medicine and economics, I was the overall director of thirteen Emergency Departments and Urgent Care Centers, overseeing 60,000 patients per year. While in the Chicago Metropolitan Area, I delivered more than forty-five lectures at various hospitals on topics such as “Cervical Spine Injuries and Nightmares,” “Advanced Cardiac Live Support,” and “Advanced Trauma Life Support.”

Basketball Experiences
Older Brothers
In 1971 my three older brothers, George 6' 2", Frank 6' 7", and Nick 6' 6" were allegedly the first three brothers in Illinois High School basketball history to start Varsity Basketball simultaneously. Their High School team scored over 100 points twice in games that season. They had a dream season and their teammate Dick Grant was voted first team All-State in Illinois that year. My brother Frank was the all-time leading scorer until the invention of the 3-point line. Frank also had a record setting 75 point weekend during High School. Frank and Nick played college basketball.

My Basketball Career
I am the 4th of five brothers, and one sister, all of whom played basketball. I’m 6’4”. For my high school basketball picture in 1975, I had them take it while I dunked it backwards and they didn't publish it. They said they "couldn't see my face." Some people just don't understand basketball!

Dunking in games was outlawed in those days by the Lew Alcinder/Kareem Abdul Jabbar rule.

I started High School Varsity basketball as a sophomore. I was Honorable Mention All-State in Illinois Class A basketball in 1976. I was a High School All-American. I won all four High School basketball awards simultaneously: 1. Most Valuable Player, 2. Most Rebounds, 3. Best Free Throw Shooter, and 4. Team Captain my senior year.

I tried to walk directly onto the Big Ten Varsity Basketball Team—there was no Junior Varsity Team back then—at Northwestern University. In 1977, Northwestern was being led by Billy McKinney, Northwestern’s all-time leading scorer, who played for seven years in the NBA. Northwestern also had 7’0” center Brian Jung who would be drafted by the Boston Celtics in 1980. Northwestern’s Mike Campbell was drafted by the Chicago Bulls that same year.

I was the last man cut during the tryouts by Coach Tex Winter, thus missing inevitable college glory and NBA stardom by a hair—or else I was spared from lots of failure and embarrassment (smile). Tex Winter went on to coach Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls, specializing in the triangle offense, and I went on to medical school.

Medical Credentials
I graduated from Northwestern University in 1980. I went on to graduate from the University of Illinois Medical School and the University of Illinois Affiliated Hospitals Emergency Medicine Residency Program.

After five of my uncles suffered prostate cancer, I became a men's health advocate. I wrote the book, Surviving Prostate Cancer without Surgery, which became a bestseller for Biblio Distribution. It was recently published for the Kindle: Surviving Prostate Cancer without Surgery.

I have been published in The British Journal of Urology, The Digital Urology Journal, Emerging Infectious Diseases, Annals of Emergency Medicine, Consultant, EMERGINDEX, Techniques in Urology, and The Journal of Pelvic Surgery.

I also authored a monograph entitled The Prostatitis Syndromes and donate all proceeds to the non-profit Prostatitis Foundation (http://Prostatitis.org).

My literary career in fiction is expected to begin eventually. I'm also excited about a new medical patent that could save many lives, which will be ready by 2013.

Contact:
Bradley R. Hennenfent, M.D.
E-mail: Dr.Hennenfent@gmail.com
Tel. 863-535-1175
E-fax: 206-350-1242

Hennenfent.com

Hennenfent.com is a domain owned by Bradley Hennenfent, M.D., physician & economist (retired).

Hennenfent

This blog contain some of the musings of Bradley Hennenfent, M.D.

Here is the information from the publicity sheet for the book I wrote called, Surviving Prostate Cancer Without Surgery, which is available at:
Surviving Prostate Cancer Without Surgery

Bradley Hennenfent, M.D. graduated from Northwestern University, the University of Illinois Medical School, and the University of Illinois Affiliated Hospitals Emergency Medicine Residency Program.

He became shockingly interested in the prostate when his Uncle Steve, who inspired him to attend medical school, died from his prostate cancer treatment in 1984. As Dr. Hennenfent researched the prostate, he became increasingly dismayed by the drastic operations that men were being subjected to without an understanding of their consequences. He discovered that the methods of diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer were controversial, and that the research sometimes published was substantially flawed.

Dr. Hennenfent became a men’s health activist. He began doing original research. He founded the Internet newsgroups sci.med.prostate.cancer, sci.med.prostate.bph, and sci.med.prostate.prostatitis. He was also one of the original founders of the Internet Prostate Problems Mailing List.

Together with his father, Mike Hennenfent, he co-founded the nonprofit Prostatitis Foundation (www.prostatitis.org), where almost a million men per year visit for help.

Surviving Prostate Cancer Without Surgery instantly became a bestseller for its distribution company.

Dr. Hennenfent has been published in the British Journal of Urology, the Digital Urology Journal, Emerging Infectious Diseases, Annals of Emergency Medicine, Consultant, EMERGINDEX, Techniques in Urology, and the Journal of Pelvic Surgery. He also authored a monograph entitled The Prostatitis Syndromes, donating all proceeds to the non-profit Prostatitis Foundation.

Besides being a physician, Dr. Hennenfent is also an economist who believes that a well-designed health-care system is more important to the health of a nation’s people than any single physician’s skill and knowledge. Dr. Hennenfent has traveled the world doing medical research and studying health-care delivery systems. “It’s simple,” he says, “The patient should be in charge of spending the money.”

Dr. Hennenfent has delivered more than forty-five lectures at various hospitals. He already owns one medical patent. Dr. Hennenfent has spent time educating congress on the need for prostatitis research and has helped secure millions of dollars in federal funding for prostatitis research.

Among the author’s heroes are Jessica Mitford, whose book, The American Way of Death, exposed the funeral industry’s financial exploitation of grieving relatives; Randy Shiltz, whose book, And the Band Played On, exposed the system's lack of response to the AIDS epidemic; and Hillary Johnson, author of Osler’s Web: Inside the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Epidemic, which exposed another shameful response of the medical system to a major health issue.

Dr. Hennenfent is a fan of Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics: The Manipulation of Public Opinion in America, the book by Michael Wheeler that first brought popular attention to how and why statistics are often misused; the hilarious How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff; and The Honest Truth about Lying with Statistics by Cooper B. Holmes.

Currently, Dr. Hennenfent, writes, does medical research, and contributes to the non-profit Prostatitis Foundation. Someday, he hopes to open a clinical research center for prostate diseases and to organize a biomedical company to do research. Another goal is to start a new specialty of medicine to better treat diseases of the prostate.

Disclaimer. Dr. Hennenfent does not provide medical advice for individual cases and does not form doctor patient relationships over the Internet. See your own physician.