by Evan Falchuk

Friday, I went to the National Press Club in DC for the Putting Patients First event.  It was organized by Dr. Val Jones of the Better Health blog, and was meant to raise the profile of patient issues in our discussion of health care reform.

Val deserves congratulations, as the issue has gotten wide attention in the medical blogosphere and beyond.

Here’s a round-up of reactions.

• Dr. Val herself was on the news on the ABC affiliate in Washington, DC talking about the event, and about health reform in general.  Val also posted the text of Congressman Ryan’s speech.

• Kevin, MD posted his prepared remarks, as well as his recap of the event.  I was pleased to make it back to Boston with Kevin on my favorite flight….the earlier one.

• Dr. Rob posted his take and comments about his own travel odyssey at Musings of a Distractible Mind.  Rob is a funny fellow, I always respect a man who enters an elevator carrying a glass of wine.

• Dr. Edwin Leap wrote his thoughts, before, in his words, going back to dealing with health care face to face.  And speaking of faces, he promised to add a picture to his twitter avatar.

• Dr. Wes posted his pithy reactions but added 1,000 words with a humorous cartoon.  Wes carries camera equipment with him that puts the rest of us to great shame.

• Emeriblog’s Kim gave her thoughts and a nice pic of her with Kerri Morrone Sparling and Lisa Emrich at the event.

• Kerri Morrone Sparling of Six Until Me added a thoughtful update and gets bonus points for pics from the wonderful dinner the night before.  Kerri gets special bonus points for being such a loyal fan of Nip/Tuck.

• To hear another important voice from a patient (i.e. regular person!) perspective, you should also read Lisa Emrich’s take at Brass and Ivory.  I was sorry not to have a chance to meet Lisa at the event but enjoyed her thoughtful post.

• Two fascinating posts about the event are from Duncan Cross, who I had the pleasure to speak with after the event.  He is a very smart gentleman who suggests he may have more to say about the event in future posts, so check back often.

• Dr. Rich Fogoros was hands down the most popular of the bloggers among the bloggers for his use of colorful descriptions.  I had never written the words “soothing blandishments” until I had the chance to live tweet Rich’s remarks.  Thank you!  Meanwhile read his review of the day here.

• Surviving the Journey was one of the folks who weren’t there who posted on the event.

• Talk Radio News Service had a reporter at the event who wrote about the it at the link.

• Trisha Torrey, who was an interactive tweeter from afar wrote about the event at Patient Empowerment.

• You can check out the twitter transcript of the day here, just keep going backwards to see the tweets as the day unfolded.

If I missed any please send them my way, I am sure other reactions will emerge and I will be glad to update the post.

I’ll post some of my own reactions later.

UPDATE:

Mother Jones, RN of Nurse Ratched’s Place posted her analysis here.

My reaction is up here.