by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Oct 17, 2022 | Fight the Good Fight
Some months ago I gave a Webinar on massive localized lymphedema (MLL). Recently a young man reached out to me with a heart-wrenching email about his wonderful Mom. She’s got MLL and has had multiple bouts of cellulitis. She’s now homebound and giving up hope. He...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Aug 2, 2022 | Fight the Good Fight
It’s 2 am and I am up with a migraine but at least I have figured out why. Ten years ago, I was diagnosed with iron deficiency anemia due to malabsorption syndrome. I was pretty sick by the time I sought help because the onset of the anemia was insidious (5+ years)...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Jul 22, 2022 | Cellular / Tissue-Based Products, Fight the Good Fight, Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy
I will probably get a lot of unhappy messages about this post, but given the sweeping changes that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has proposed for cellular and/or tissue-based products (CTPs), it might be time to “say the quiet part out loud.”...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Jul 14, 2022 | Cellular / Tissue-Based Products, Fight the Good Fight, Healthcare Payment Policy
The 2023 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (CMS-1770-P) went on display late afternoon July 7, 2023. The proposed rule involves sweeping changes to the way that cellular and/or tissue based products for skin wounds (CTPs) are paid for in the physician office setting....
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Jan 25, 2022 | Fight the Good Fight
Dr. David Charash is a longtime friend and colleague in the field of Undersea and Hyperbaric Medicine. He’s passionate about Diving Medicine and is producing a series of podcasts on Fitness In Diving. It’s the first ever podcast on the topic and will feature...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Aug 19, 2021 | Fight the Good Fight
This interview with one of my patients was filmed one day before my hospital closed to visitors at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. The story is so incredible I wanted the patient to tell it herself so I was thrilled when, a few days ago, the Microgen team sent me...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Aug 16, 2021 | Miscellaneous Musings
This past Saturday morning (August 14th), a magnitude 7.2 earthquake hit southern Haiti. To make matters worse, a tropical storm is headed that way which will complicate search and rescue. If you are moved to donate money in the face of these tragedies, I’d like to...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Jun 4, 2021 | Nutrition & Wound Healing
Check out this article by Efthymios Gkotsoulias, David Kuten and me, published in the April issue of Today’s Wound Clinic entitled, “Multidisciplinary Teams, All the Time: Treat the Patient and Not the Wound.” The patient had a limb-threatening lesion, and his leg was...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | Jun 1, 2021 | Nutrition & Wound Healing
I can’t decide if I am seeing more truly starving patients since I started focusing on nutrition, or if I’m just more sensitive to it. All 3 of these patients have a body mass index (BMI) of less than 17. The first patient completely healed a stage 4 pressure ulcer...
by Caroline Fife, M.D. | May 26, 2021 | Don't Miss This
This is a 37 yo man with a non-healing wound at the site of a left chest catheter port. He has non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and the port for his chemotherapy was removed 4 weeks after it was put in because it looked infected. He has had an extensive region of erythema and...
