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You, like I, must have heard all the stories about how robotic surgery has revolutionzed prostate cancer surgery, or prostatectomies, and hysterectomies (allowing patients to go home the same day), and many other surgeries.  I've even written about it.  But studies now point to the scary fact that this kind of surgery may not be so safe, after all. The New York Times reports a surgery for endometriosis, where the woman was rushed back to the hospital 11 days later with a torn rectum and colon, reinstating her as an inpatient for five weeks, according to smartplanet.com.  Looks like that didn't help anyone, not hospitals trying to save money on readmissions, not the patient, not the doctor, or the surgical team.  The only one who didn't lose out? The robot. Many industry experts believe incidents like this are not reported, or are somehow "misfiled," leading to a story published in The Journal for Healthcare Quality, where researchers claim there is evidence ...

You've seen them.  The hospital rankings blasted across the covers of magazines (and probably, if she was named, your doctor's office, too). But how real are they really?  Do they just reflect good PR?  And instead of their " reputations ," shouldn't they be more proud of their decrease in number of hospital-acquired infections (HAIs)? That's a position a Wall Street Journal op-ed writers want to know. The always eagerly-awaited U.S. News & World Report list of best-ranked hospitals for 2012-2013 was released last week Ezekiel K. Emmanuel, chairman of the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania, and Andrew Steinmetz, the senior research assistant, write that the highest-ranked hospitals "are always quick to tout their rankings in hopes of attracting new patients who will pay top dollar," and, of course, many Americans will use this list when they are selecting a hospital. But what these authors...