Revisiting 'The clinic': ethical and policy challenges in U.S. community health centers.

Where do poor people in the United States (US) go when they get sick? Often, they go to Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) and hospital emergency departments. Even after the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), these safety-net health care organizations will continue to play a crucial role in the US health care system. FQHCs have long grappled with some of the biggest questions facing the US health care system and their leaders and clinicians face ethical challenges in everyday practice.

PET and PET/CT imaging: what clinicians need to know.

Positron emission tomography (PET), once the sole province of academic medical centers, is rapidly being adopted in daily clinical practice in community hospitals and outpatient centers. It can be especially useful in oncology, cardiology, and neurology. We provide an overview of the fundamentals of PET and PET with computed tomography (PET/CT) and discuss their current clinical utility.

Advantages of a targeted approach in minimally invasive radioguided parathyroidectomy surgery for primary hyperparathyroidism.

Objective: In a large series of patients, we associated the need for preoperative parathyroid hormone (PTH) and calcium levels as a vital component in our approach to the radioguided minimally invasive parathyroidectomy (MIRP) procedure. Our objective was to determine whether these preoperative levels indeed complemented the procedure. Our study also included a postoperative assessment of excised gland volume and length of operation.

Positron emission tomography in orthopedics.

Musculoskeletal infections are often a diagnostic dilemma as most of the currently available diagnostic modalities lack the specificity needed to make an accurate diagnosis of osteomyelitis or septic arthritis. Positron Emission Tomography (PET) has shown great accuracy in this capacity. This paper reviews the history of PET scanning, its associated physiology, and evidence supporting its use in the diagnosis of musculoskeletal infection.