When to Travel for Medical Care

U.S. News & World Report

7/17 issue

The several hundred institutions atop medicine's highest rungs go by different names--tertiary-care hospitals and referral centers are two. Most provide their communities with basic hospital care. But their real worth, because almost all of them are involved in research and teaching, is that they study, diagnose, and treat tough cases every day. Among the times when extra medical firepower might be worth seeking is for treatment of late stage emphysema. The standard treatment is simply to ease patients' physical distress by giving them supplemental oxygen, inhalers, and other drugs. Many patients never hear about an option called lung volume reduction surgery that might actually restore some quality of life. Their primary-care doctor may not know about the treatment, which is done at only a handful of medical centers. And lung-care specialists might not bring it up. Says pulmonologist Philip Diaz, medical director of lung volume reduction surgery at the Ohio State University Medical Center in Columbus: "They may figure the person is untreatable--why put them through surgery?" A team of specialists is needed, just as it is with transplant surgery, to screen out the highest risks, identify the patients most likely to benefit, and work with them after they recuperate to keep up their gains. Ohio State recently became the first hospital to meet specific new standards for lung volume reduction programs set by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations. This story in the "America's Best Hospitals" issue is accompanied by a photo of Diaz with a lung volume reduction surgery patient and two operating room photos of Dr. Patrick Ross, who performs the surgeries.

http://www.usnews.com/usnews/health/articles/060709/17best.htm