Doctors Urged to Cease Gratuitous Tests

Michael Krasny

Apr 5, 2012 at 9:00 AM

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A coalition of doctor and consumer groups says Americans get too many unnecessary medical tests and treatments. The Choosing Wisely Initiative has just released a list of tests and procedures that they say doctors should prescribe less frequently. But some of the recommendations -- for example that patients debilitated with advanced cancer shouldn't get chemotherapy -- are likely to cause concern.

We discuss the initiative, and whether patients really do want fewer tests.

More: About the Choosing Wisely Initiative - at ChoosingWisely.org
More: Doctors Urge Their Colleagues To Quit Doing Worthless Tests - from NPR's Shots blog
More: Read lists of "Five Things Physicians and Patients Should Question" - from nine different societies representing 374,000 physicians, at ChoosingWisely.org

Guests:

Catherine Lucey, vice dean for education at the UCSF School of Medicine, chair of the American Board of Internal Medicine (ABIM) and a trustee of the ABIM Foundation that spearheaded the Choosing Wisely Initiative

John Santa, director of the Health Ratings Center of Consumer Reports, which is partnering with the ABIM Foundation on the Choosing Wisely Initiative

David Magnus, director of the Center for Biomedical Ethics, Thomas A. Raffin professor of medicine and biomedical ethics and professor of pediatrics at Stanford University