T = Tesla

The New York Times just posted an interesting article about how medical scans cost the same regardless of quality. Basically, patients are charged the same rate for being scanned with a ten year old low resolution MRI scanner as with a state of the art piece of equipment. The implication is that the older scans are essentially useless and that patients are being charged exorbitant fees for nothing.

You can read the article here.

I've actually heard about a related issue where patients are being charged more to be scanned with a 3T MRI scanner than a 1.5T. This might seem reasonable except for the fact that most 3T scanners are set up for research purposes not medical scans. SBU hospital tried to get permission to use our new (3T) research scanner... but the doors of the building are (thanks to some architectural blundering) too narrow for a gurney.

You know, the more time I spend inside hospitals, the happier I am that I decided to not be a "real" doctor. All I have to do is fund myself, publish tons of papers, and deal with undergraduate students.

Well that was a fun week of panic...

It turns out our tuition waivers are guaranteed for at least the next 2 years. Now we just need to re-negotiate our contract with New York for a fair downstate wage...

At the same time, the university is saying it fully intends on covering our tuition. I'm sure they also fully intended on applying the stipend increase given to my class to future classes as well. Thats not happening, but for the time being grad students aren't being forced into the wild blue yonder that is the real world.

And since all of this is making me feel just a tad bit too optimistic, here is a nice happy podcast from This American Life about the economy.

Jimi Hendrix Live at Clark University

Atwood Hall, Clark University, Worcester, MA, 1968-03-15.

Tuition Waivers

Rumor is SUNY might be cutting tuition waivers for grad students. Time to fill out those FAFSA and TAP forms...

This apparently ran after the Oscars last night.

Here is a quick preview of some of the big movies set to come out later this year.



...and I'm excited about approximately two of these. I'm not sure why it was necessary to remake The Taking of Pelhem 123 with John Travolta in the Robert Shaw role, but at least Public Enemies looks good. Its hard to go wrong with Johnny Depp, Christian Bale, and Michael Mann.