Top Highlights

• In the Revolutionary War, American soldiers faced bayonets and single-shot rifles, and 42 percent of the battle wounded died. In World War II, American soldiers were hit with grenades, bombs, shells, and machine guns, yet only 30 percent of the wounded died. By the Korean War, the weaponry was certainly no less terrible, but the mortality rate for ...
• something called Forward Surgical Teams (FSTs). These are small teams, consisting of just twenty people: three general surgeons, one orthopedic surgeon, two nurse anesthetists, three nurses, plus medics and other support personnel. In Iraq and Afghanistan, they travel in six Humvees directly behind the troops, right out onto the battlefield. They c...
• The average time from battlefield to arrival in the United States is now less than four days. (In Vietnam, it was forty-five days.)
• Doctors quickly learn that how much they make has little to do with how good they are. It largely depends on how they handle the business side of their practice.
• recommendations are pretty straightforward. Physicians must computerize their billing systems, she said. They must carefully review the bills they send out and the payments that insurers send back. They must hire office personnel to deal with the insurance companies. A well-run office can get the insurer’s rejection rate down from 30 percent to, sa...