1. Provide the title of your story or series and the names of the journalists involved.
Overtreated
Lauran Neergaard, Marilynn Marchione, Lindsey Tanner, Randolph Schmid
2. List date(s) this work was published or aired.
This series was sent for publication in June and appeared in newspapers on these dates: June 7-8, 14-15, 21, 28.
3. Provide a brief synopsis of the story or stories, including any significant findings.
For months, politicians and ordinary Americans argued about health care and whether to expand access to millions of uninsured people and how to do it. What that debate mostly ignored is a stunning and contrary idea: Many Americans are actually getting too much health care and are sicker for it. Four members of The Associated Press medical and science team investigated that phenomenon in a six-part series. Among the findings: _Thousands who got stents for blocked arteries should have tried medicine first. _Americans get the most radiation in the world, mostly from repeated CT scans, raising the risk of cancer. _People with back pain have too many tests and too many operations when exercise and no treatment at all is often the best remedy. _Extreme measures are taken far too often on people who are dying, making their final days even more excruciating, isolating them from their families.
4. Explain types of documents, data or Internet resources used. Were FOI or public records act requests required? How did this affect the work?
Reporters performed a detailed PubMed search, compiling hundreds of pages of studies, to determine which conditions/areas of medicine had the best evidence of overtreatment. In addition to medical journal and studies presented at medical meetings, documents included quality-of-care guidelines, Institute of Medicine reports on treatment effectiveness, the Dartmouth Atlas and Medicare data on end-of-life hospital admissions. For the Radiation story, we reviewed UN and IAEA reports on worldwide radiation exposure. For the ER story we evaluated data on malpractice lawsuits supplied by the Physicians Insurers Association of America
5. Explain types of human sources used.
Dozens of interviews with physicians, researchers, policymakers including a member of Congress, and of course patients, some of whom realized they'd been overtreated only after suffering adverse effects. Finding powerful examples of over-radiation involved numerous doctor interviews that led to a New England radiologist working for small community clinics. Reporters used the "Help a Reporter" site to find examples of patients for the Final Days story.
6. Results (if any).
The series got tremendous play, raising the profile of a huge problem that is little recognized by the public. The first day's story landed on at least 14 front pages, according to a random spot check at a time when the Gulf oil spill was the focus everywhere. Virtually every story dominated Yahoo's Most Popular, and garnered thousands of reader comments. The series was the subject of several editorials and praised by the Health News Review blog. The story on end-of-life treatment was touted on the prestigious Health Care Blog. . At least a half dozen newspapers editorialized on it, including: _St. Cloud (Minn.) Times http://tinyurl.com/286efwq _Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: http://www.jsonline.com/news/opinion/96425599.html _Deseret (Utah) News: http://bit.ly/bILzFl Just one week after the piece on the risks of too many CT scans, experts wrote in the New England Journal of Medicine that the scans pose a growing risk and more regulation of them is needed. In December, officials announced at the annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America that 700 health care providers had signed onto a campaign urging the lowest amount of radiation be used. The AP series wasn't cited, but we believe the wide play of our radiation story could have played a role in raising the profile of this issue.
7. Follow-up (if any). Have you run a correction or clarification on the report or has anyone come forward to challenge its accuracy? If so, please explain.
No
8. Advice to other journalists planning a similar story or project.
na