1. Provide the title of your story or series and the names of the journalists involved.
Too Much Medicine? High-Tech Births Vs. Nature's Way, by Josephine Marcotty, and Too Much Medicine? Where C-Sections Are Few, by Chen May Yee
2. List date(s) this work was published or aired.
Too Much Medicine? High-Tech Births Vs. Nature's Way ran on May 30, 2010; Too Much Medicine? Where C-Sections Are Few, ran on May 31, 2010
3. Provide a brief synopsis of the story or stories, including any significant findings.
One of the mysteries of American medicine is why Americans pay twice as much for health care as consumers in other developed nations while getting outcomes that are no better, and often worse. Simple over-consumption does not explain the numbers: Americans have fewer doctor visits and shorter hospital stays, for example, than patients in many European countries. But, as a team of Star Tribune reporters found, the American health care system is riddled with perverse incentives that can lead doctors and hospitals to recommend too much of the wrong kind of medicine, often the most costly and technology-intensive medicine. The result drives up health care costs and often produces inferior care.
4. Explain types of documents, data or Internet resources used. Were FOI or public records act requests required? How did this affect the work?
For the installment on childbirth, we asked the Minnesota Department of Health to compile a special database of elective induced births and we sorted them by hospital.
5. Explain types of human sources used.
The Penny George Institute for Complementary Medicine at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis, a respected clinical research organization, has become a valuable source when we_re trying to find randomized empirical research on nontraditional therapies and medical techniques.
6. Results (if any).
We found startling disparities among Minnesota hospitals in elective inductions and C-section births, with no apparent explanation in the health of the mothers or babies. One of the state_s biggest hospital networks, Fairview, has since accelerated a project to reduce the number of elective induced deliveries.
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 corrections or clarifications have followed.
8. Advice to other journalists planning a similar story or project.
Scholarly studies have identified dozens of procedures and pharmaceuticals with clear evidence of over use. But many are rare or obscure. We tried to choose conditions and surgeries that would be familiar to thousands of our readers _ and then to demonstrate why they might be more satisfied with their own care if they challenged the conventional wisdom.