December 15, 2017

Chronic kidney disease can silently progress to advanced stages, and early detection is critical for initiating effective interventions. Multiple guidelines recommend at least annual screening with serum creatinine, urine albumin/creatinine ratio, and urinalysis for patients…

Distinguishing cardiac from noncardiac causes is important because of the risk of sudden death in those with an underlying cardiac etiology. A thorough history and physical examination, followed by targeted diagnostic testing, can distinguish cardiac conditions from other…

Pigmentation disorders are often benign, but they can be psychologically distressing to patients. Hyperpigmentation, which results from excess melanin production, may be caused by postinflammatory effect, melasma, solar lentigines, ephelides, and café au lait macules…

Legal Opinion Commissioned to Help Family Physicians Gain Hospital Privileges | AAFP Opts to Not Endorse New AHA/ACC Hypertension Guideline | AAFP Releases Summary of Changes to 2018 Medicare Fee Schedule | New Medicare Beneficiary Numbers Coming Soon; CMS Resources Available

Medicine has entered a transformational era in which prevention, screening, and therapy are increasingly based on a precise understanding of attributes of health and disease in the individual patient. Ignoring this puts patients at risk from avoidable, ineffective, or hazardous…

Precision medicine has, at times, been vaguely defined, or used to convey the age-old concept of tailoring tests and treatments to an individual patient. To be a truly new paradigm, however, a more meaningful definition must signify the use of -omic (e.g., genomic, proteomic…

L.D., a 66-year-old generally healthy white man, presents for his annual physical. He has no history of cardiovascular disease (CVD); he has had consistent systolic blood pressure measurements of 140 mm Hg; he is not taking any medications; he does not smoke; he exercises three…

A man presented with fever, diarrhea, body aches, and vomiting shortly after returning from Puerto Rico.

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has updated its recommendations for preventive pediatric health care (Periodicity Schedule). These recommendations are intended for children receiving appropriate care from parents and with no health problems whose growth and development…

The existing data on gabapentinoids for chronic low back pain are limited in number and quality. The amount of pain reduction is low to moderate, and the rate of adverse effects is high. The few studies that assessed function found no improvement.

Home glucose monitoring of patients in primary care does not improve A1C scores or quality of life over one year in patients who are not taking insulin.

Adding clarithromycin and naproxen to oseltamivir significantly lowered all-cause mortality at 30 days and at 90 days. This study was limited by its open-label design. The outcome of mortality would not be subject to observer bias, though, and the groups were balanced.

Hypnosis provides small to moderate improvements in surgical pain and burn debridement pain in adults.

The USPSTF recommends vision screening at least once in all children aged 3 to 5 years to detect amblyopia or its risk factors.

The kidneys clean the blood by removing waste products, which then leave the body through the urine. The kidneys have an important role in balancing the body's fluids. They also help control blood pressure, keep bones strong, and make red blood cells.