FAST Talk

In interviews, several health care professionals are asked how they save lives, and how more can be saved. Medecins Sans Frontieres' Carol Etherington has been a nurse for more than 30 years. MSF goes into the most desperate situations to provide medical relief. To help people cope with ongoing hopelessness and helplessness, MSF in the early 1990s made a commitment to making mental health a strong component of its comprehensive health-care program. Nephros Therapeutics' David Humes says that some of the most dramatic insights come from experiments that do not turn out as predicted. His company has been building a bio-artificial kidney for nearly a decade now. The prototype for treaming acute renal failure is a foot-long cartridge filled with a billiojn numanb kidney cells. Inside, 5,000 tiny fibers house the cells, which supply vital hormones and enzymes that a dialysis machine couldn't. The Mayo Clinic's Denis Cortese says that one thing health care providers can do is create a transparent environment for delivery of care. And a serious transparency means tort reform of some kind.