Early growth faltering in healthy term infants predicts longitudinal growth.

Background: Early growth monitoring may not identify infants at-risk for later growth faltering because it is difficult for the provider to recognize how large of a negative shift might be problematic.

Aim: The aim of this study was to determine whether a slowing in early weight-for-age could be used to identify children at increased risk of later growth faltering.

Methods: Longitudinal data for infants aged birth to two years were analyzed for 1978 healthy, term infants born between 1999-2001.

Evidence-based guidelines.

The Advanced/Policy Track of the 2004 Kaiser Permanente Evidence-Based Medicine Symposium was an interactive session that focused on developing evidence-based clinical practice guidelines. The hypothetical scenario involved the imaginary drug "Memoryboost," a treatment for dementia. The participants were given materials describing the national Kaiser Permanente (KP) methodology for developing evidence-based guidelines and a summary of the highest-quality articles about the efficacy of this drug.

Treatment decisions about lumbar herniated disk in a shared decision-making program.

Background: An explicit process of collaborative (shared) decision making involving the patient and physician has been recommended for discretionary surgical procedures in which small-area analysis demonstrates high variation not attributable to differences in the patient population in the area. One such example is laminectomy for lumbar herniated disk (HD). An observational study was undertaken to evaluate the impact of an HD videodisk program on patient satisfaction, decision making, and treatment preferences.