In the Nov. 18 issue of "DC," we reported on the the Florida Peer Review Committee, and that six of the seven DCs on that committee were consultants for DRS, a utilization review company.
We suggested a simple solution to the concerns over conflicts of interest with the Florida Peer Review Committee would be to prohibit board members from working for utilization review companies.
We have since received a position statement on this matter from Ronald Wellikoff, DC, president of the Florida Chiropractic Association. He states that although the peer review committee members are not in violation of any existing ethical regulation, that the FCA would support "establishing a baseline of standards" that would balance the rights of a private doctor who volunteers to do the important work of peer review. The FCA stated it would continue to "stand behind the peer review committee's efforts to identify overutilization which only occurs in a small percentage of cases."
Many relevant diagnostic signs are not performed deliberately by the examiner or by the patient at the examiner’s direction. They are observed as the patient reacts to their condition. Fortin’s finger sign, Minor’s sign, and Vanzetti’s sign are three examples of this principle.
Spearheaded by burgeoning scientific and clinical research literature, psychedelics have reached a level of media coverage and popular interest that has not been seen for over half a century. By “psychedelics,” we are referring to the unique class of substances that includes psilocybin (the active compound found in so-called “magic mushrooms”), LSD, dimethyltryptamine (DMT), ayahuasca, 5-MeO-DMT, and mescaline – each of which occurs in the natural world (except for LSD, which is a semi-synthetic compound).
While working at the Lovelace Medical Center in Albuquerque, N.M., one of the primary care physicians stated that imaging every patient prior to receiving chiropractic was not medically necessary. It was at that point I reconsidered the need for the imaging of every patient to avoid malpractice.
