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Today's Globe: doctors via robots, chelation study, swine flu in Britain

E-mail | Print | Comments () Posted by Elizabeth Cooney July 3, 2009 07:01 AM

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The robot glides past the beeping heart monitor, past a row of patients supine on their electric beds, past the beehive of the nurses’ station. The sleek, metallic body, dusky blue, stops outside Room 9 and slowly rolls through the doorway. The face of Timothy Liesching, a pulmonary critical care doctor, gazes at his patient from a computer screen on top of the robot. The machine that Liesching, director of telemedicine at the Lahey Clinic, is guiding down the corridors of Beverly Hospital is the only one like this in New England, say officials at the clinic.

A federal investigation has found that heart attack survivors enrolled in a study of chelation, a controversial alternative medicine treatment, were not told enough about potential dangers from the drug being tested, including death.

Britain faces a projected 100,000 new swine flu cases a day by the end of August and must revamp its flu strategy to cope, the nation’s health minister said yesterday.

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White Coat Notes covers the latest from the health care industry, hospitals, doctors offices, labs, insurers, and the corridors of government. Chelsea Conaboy previously covered health care for The Philadelphia Inquirer. Write her at cconaboy@boston.com. Follow her on Twitter: @cconaboy.

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