People Moves
- Mark Chataway leaves chairman seat at Interscience Europe, a unit of Bcom3, to join Edelman Worldwide as chair, Europe, Edelman Health.
- Joan Wainwright leaves the U.S. Social Security Administration to join Merck & Co. as VP of corporate communications.
- Kelly Dencker and Karin Armstrong have been promoted to SVPs in the New York healthcare practice of Manning Selvage & Lee.
- Steve Immergut joins CPR Worldwide as VP of its New York operations. He hails from Hill & Knowlton's Santiago, Chile healthcare practice.
Acquisition
Publicis Groupe SA has acquired Nelson Communications, Inc., a healthcare firm, which reported billings of $1 billion+.
Reducing Medical Errors
In a plan that could save nearly 60,000 lives, a consortium of more than 60 large companies and other business leaders have created "The Leapfrog Group" to reduce the number
of medical errors at hospitals. The group (including IBM, GM, Xerox) is proposing the use of computerized physician order entry systems, the services of hospitals that specialize
in the treatment of specific illnesses, and the employment of ICU-trained physicians for critical care medicine. In an effort to save the nearly 98,000 Americans who die each year
from preventable medical errors.
Stats & Trends
- About 10% of terminally ill patients seriously consider physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia, according to a study in the Journal of the American Medical
Association. Roughly half of those who initially considered euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide changed their minds. - Underscoring growing concerns about online privacy, most Americans are not willing to transmit personal information over the Internet, according to a new Gallup
survey. In the survey, 84% said they're concerned or somewhat concerned that their personal health information would be made available to others without their consent. - Health clubs may be hazardous to some people's health. According to a just-released study by the American Heart Association, more than 25% of health clubs and fitness
centers do not provide adequate prescreening to new members to identify health problems. And more than 50% had no written emergency response plan in cases of heart attack or other
life-threatening ailments.