What I Learnt Today

Go Caine

What I Learnt On 17th April in other years

17th April 2011 Appspin: You Don’t Know Jack

There are many astounding things about the US Health System

The United States is the only industrialized democracy that doesn’t provide health care for all its citizens, despite spending considerably more per person than any other country.

“It’s generally agreed,” says Dr. Elliott Fisher, of the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy,” that about 30 percent of what we spend on health care is unnecessary. If we eliminate the unneeded care, there are more than enough resources in our system to cover ever.”

Some communities in America achieve excellent health outcomes at a much lower cost than others. There is massive variation from one town to the next in the treatments of the same conditions. As a result, some U.S. counties spend $17,000 per year on the average Medicare patient, while others spend less than $7,000 per year with results that are just as good.

A PBS documentary, “U.S. Health Care: The Good News” looks at a few of these high-quality, low-cost regions of the country, to find out how they do it.

Common to the low cost communities is a focus on Primary Care and the Medical Home.

You can view the full 50 minute program at http://video.pbs.org/video/2198039605/

The work of the Dartmouth Institute is also highlighted in an article published in the New Yorker by Atul Gawande.

More is not better . The more money Medicare spent per person in a given state the lower that state’s quality ranking tended to be.

“The Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care” is available at www.dartmouthatlas.org.

What I Learnt On 14th April in other years

14th April 2011 Mt McKinley: Because it’s there

Last year WILT asked ‘What do these three baddies have in common?”

This was part of our report on the 2011 Purdue University Goldberg Machine Contest.

The 2012 winner has just been announced. The challenge – blow up and pop a balloon.

The old world record was smashed.

What I Learnt On 12th April in other years

12th April 2011 Micro-apps

The very first post to What I Learnt Today was about Neil Pasricha’s “1000 Awesome Things”.

On June 28, 2008, Neil posted his first awesome thing, Number 1000, “The Brocoflower“.What an ambitious undertaking – not 10, not 100, but 1000!

The countdown has ben maintained every weekday since then. Neil’s blog was an inspiration to this blog, and has been a stawalt of Emaildigest. The site has auspiced two books and been featured in all major media networks.

Awesome Thing 780 Squeezing through a door as it’s shutting without touching it

Awesome Thing 438 Your almost name – What your parents were going to call you but didin’t.

At the time of our first post, on January 1st 2011, Neil was up to Awesome Thing #341 – “Saying See you next year!’ to everyone on new year’s eve and then laughing hysterically“

Awesome Thing #11 Driving through your old neighborhood and stopping to see the house you grew up in

We are now up to Awesome Thing #8 Looking back, smiling and saying thanks. There is just one week to go.

Neil writes –

This is the end, beautiful friend.

Late next week 1000 Awesome Things will hit #1 and we’ll have finished four years counting down one awesome thing every weekday. So… like Luke Skywalker’s triumphant final battle against the Fish Monsters, the Jamaican bobsled team’s mighty last-second push to capture gold in ’88, and Milli Vanilli’s final sold-out show in Wembley Stadium, so too is my time writing about awesome things climaxing in one last blaze of glory

What will make it to Awesome Thing #1?

What is your favourite Awesome Thing?

What I Learnt On 11th April in other years

11th April 2011 The Only 4 Chords You Need