Dan Rooney

String Quartet Tribute to Jessica Simpson
$16.98
First off, I just want to say that I LOVE the String Quartet Tribute series... I recently discovered these CDs while planning my wedding and am so glad that I did. It's so nice to be able to incorporate modern music into the ceremony without having to worry about the "appropriateness" of the vocals. In addition to the tribute to Jessica Simpson, I also have the String Quartet Tribute to Coldplay. I'm completely satisfied with them both. Granted, I'm by no means a musician, but I do have the ability to appreciate great music. And I feel that these CDs are definitely worth looking into. :)

The songs on this particular album are great - in my opinon, anyway. I especially want to remark on the CD's version of "Take My Breath Away" - absolutely beautiful. I had been looking for an instrumental version of this piece to walk down the aisle to and found exactly what I was looking for on this CD. :)

--Highly Recommend

America's Health Care Crisis Solved: Money-Saving Solutions, Coverage for Everyone
$29.95
"America's Health Care Crisis Solved" gets one (and only one) thing right - that hospitals charge the uninsured outrageous prices, as much as 6X those charged Medicare! Just reducing hospital, physician, etc. prices to the levels charged Medicare (or even HMOs) would go a very, very long way towards solving the crisis.

Unfortunately, the authors go on. First they misrepresent the data on Canada and England to contend that they're spending more per patient than the U.S. Not true - the U.S. spends close to 2X per patient that of most other developed nations. A considerable amount of those savings are due to single-payer systems eliminating marketing (much directed at AVOIDING certain patients) and administrative expenses of reviewing pre-approval and claims data for compliance with complex rules (eg. not allowing non-covered expenses, assuring proper medical coding, prohibiting pre-existing conditions). McKinsey estimates eliminating excessive administrative costs of private health insurers would largely cover the cost of covering all the uninsured.

Perrin and Rooney then proceed to "argue"/imply that rising insurance benefits have CAUSED the medical care cost explosion in the U.S., ignoring the fact that government-provided health care in other nations hasn't had near the degree of problem as we have.

Then there's the problem with wide variations in health care practice first brought to light by Dr. John Wennberg. To remedy the nation's overdependence on costly, high-intensity interventions such as surgery and ICU stays, he calls for improved physician communication and greater patient involvement in medical decision making, and also cites are reimbursement for procedures, rather than quality, as part of the problem. Recent data from California, for example, found some California hospitals spend as much as four times more than others to care for patients with similar chronic illnesses, with no gain in quality or patient satisfaction. At the same time, many clinically proven treatments, ranging from beta blockers for heart disease to antibiotics following surgery, are consistently underused. "The irony is that most of these proven interventions don't cost that much."

Another Wennberg finding was that supply is more important than had been realized - eg. a greater supply of hospital beds and specialists led to their being used more. This finding is why most HMOs use primary-care "gatekeepers" to limit use of specialists - contrary to the author's advice. If every Medicare provider in the country spent at the same rate as the lowest 10% of providers in the program, overall costs would be slashed by 30%.

Other physician leaders such as quality improvement expert Dr. Donald Berwick have concluded that as much as 50% of health care is unneeded if standards of care were more widely developed and adhered to.

As for the authors' approach to saving on Medicare drug costs, they "forget" to mention that Congress prohibited negotiation or price dictation to lower those prices. Approximately 50% could be saved, using actual results from V.A. and Medicaid dictated price programs.

Michael Porter, Harvard guru on competition, has concluded that the American model focuses far too much on cost-reduction, increasing negotiating power, providing broad-lines of service, and cost-shifting, and instead should focus on long-term value (results vs. costs) for patients. Key to improving, he says, is the gathering of long-term data on outcomes.

Dr. Arnold Relman, Professor Emeritus at the Harvard Medical School and former long-time editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, has concluded that for-profit entities are part of the problem. A 1997 study covering all acute-care hospitals found total hospital expenses/admission 10% higher in for-profits (administrative costs were 34% of the total, vs. 25% for non-profits; however, the for-profits provided less in-house clinical personnel. Thus, it is also not surprising that a 2002 study pooling all published data found the risk of patient death 2% higher in the for-profit hospitals. Similarly, a 1999 published study of dialysis units found mortality rates 20% higher in for-profits, as well as the likelihood of being placed on a transplantation list 26% lower (would end the center's revenues). Prior studies also found lower expenditures on care within the for-profits. Most nursing home payments are from standardized, per-diem Medicaid rates. A 1998 survey found for-profits with 40% more serious care violations than non-profits. Investor-owned insurance plans take 10-25% of premiums, vs. 5-10% for non-profits and only 3% for Medicare.

Still other medical experts attest to how for-profit drug companies have driven up costs (and sometimes harmed patients) through misrepresentations, poor testing, and political power. McKinsey estimates that paying what the rest of the world pays for drugs and medical devices would by itself more or less pay the cost of covering the uninsured.

Finally, proposing HSAs as a cure-all for health costs is silly. Those earning close to Federal poverty levels cannot afford such savings, nor do they qualify for Medicaid. (The authors' claim that the "poor quality for Medicaid" is false - eg. a single person earning $362/month or $4,344/year is ineligible in Arizona unless they have offsetting medical expenses.)

Atomic Kid [VHS]
$9.98
The Atomic Kid is a wonderful, period-piece film.In true, 1950's naive film verite, it has Non-Restricted Atomic Testing Sites,regularly clothed soldiers stationed in trenches, one mile from the blast; and, the piece de resistance, Mickey Rooney as a guy who survives the blast while eating a peanut butter sandwich.It's got Greedy Capitalists, trying to commercialize the brand of peanut butter, Swarmy Communists, trying to discover Mickey Rooney's secret: and, best of all, a stunning Co-Star,Elaine Davis. What's not to like ???

Dan Rooney: My 75 Years with the Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL
$16.00
Dan Rooney's autobiography is a good read filled with a wealth of information on the history of the NFL and the Steelers. He gives a solid account of his childhood and how he got to love football.

It is interesting to read his thoughts on some of the players over the years and how much winning the first Superbowl meant not only to the Steelers and himself but to the city of Pittsburgh who had been starved of a winning football team for too many years.

I wouldn't have minded a bit more information about his father Art Rooney as he appears to have been quite a character. Maybe there is room for a biography of him in the future?

Rooney was a first-hand witness of the NFL from being a small boy taken with his father to the games to being a man who saw the sport grow and grow to where we are today.

Great read.