Public health and healthcare

Black Death in medieval culture

Black Death in medieval culture: the 1347-1351 plague's cultural impact, roughly 50% English mortality, flagellants, persecution of Jews, Dance of Death art, plague-boils imagery, labour laws, and higher post-plague wages.

Blind experiment

A blind experiment is a clinical research design that withholds treatment assignment from participants, care providers, or outcome assessors so expectations cannot bias results, as in double-blind drug trials.

Blinded randomized trial

A blinded randomized trial is a clinical trial in which chance assigns treatments and one or more parties stay unaware of assignments, minimizing bias in estimated treatment effects.

Blinding (clinical trials)

Blinding, also called masking, is the practice of keeping participants, providers, and outcome assessors unaware of treatment assignments in a randomized trial, reducing information bias.

Block randomization

Block randomization is a clinical trial randomization method that assigns participants in small blocks, each containing equal allocations to every treatment group in random order, keeping group sizes balanced throughout enrollment.

BLS-NEN-HCP trial

The BLS-NEN-HCP trial (NCT06001879) was a randomized controlled trial in Amman and Al-Zarqa, Jordan, comparing one-day simulation-based basic life support training with brochure-based training in 102 newly employed nurses.

Blue Cross Blue Shield Association

Blue Cross Blue Shield Association (BCBSA): national federation of about 33 independent Blue Cross and Blue Shield licensees covering one in three Americans; grew from the 1929 Baylor Plan, licenses marks for exclusive service areas, settled a 2020 antitrust case.

Bonnie Henry

Bonnie Henry, Canadian physician and BC's Provincial Health Officer since 2018, first woman in the role; led British Columbia's COVID-19 pandemic and overdose emergency responses; formerly Toronto SARS response lead and BCCDC executive.

Boston Children's Hospital

Boston Children's Hospital, founded 1869 by Francis Henry Brown, is a Harvard-affiliated pediatric medical center at 300 Longwood Avenue, Boston, with 485 licensed beds, top U.S. News pediatric rankings, and the largest pediatric research enterprise.

Bradley A. Malin

Bradley A. Malin is an American biomedical informatician at Vanderbilt University Medical Center who studies health data re-identification and privacy, elected to the National Academy of Medicine in 2018.

Breast-1F trial

Breast-1F (NCT06946238) is a randomized non-inferiority trial at IRCCS San Raffaele, Milan, testing single-fraction 15.5 Gy stereotactic APBI with SIB to 21 Gy versus 30 Gy in 5 fractions in 311 women with favorable early-stage breast cancer.

Brent C. James

Brent C. James is an American physician and statistician known for building Intermountain Healthcare's quality-improvement and patient-safety program; he joined the National Academy of Medicine in 2004.

Brian Christine

Brian Christine, American urologist and Admiral; 18th Assistant Secretary for Health at HHS and head of the USPHS Commissioned Corps; confirmed October 7, 2025; formerly men's health surgeon at Urology Centers of Alabama.

Brigham and Women's Hospital

Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), Boston teaching hospital of Harvard Medical School and Mass General Brigham founding member; formed 1980 from Peter Bent Brigham, Robert Breck Brigham, and Boston Hospital for Women; kidney transplant and Nurses' Health Study site.

British Thoracic Society

British Thoracic Society (BTS), UK professional body for respiratory medicine, formed 1982 by merger of the Thoracic Society and British Thoracic Association; publishes Thorax, guidelines, audits; over 5,000 members.

Broadmoor Hospital

Broadmoor Hospital, historically the Broadmoor Asylum for the Criminally Insane, is a high secure psychiatric hospital at Crowthorne, Berkshire, England, opened in 1863 and holding up to 210 male patients.

Brooke Army Medical Center

Brooke Army Medical Center (BAMC), Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio, Texas: the DoD's largest military hospital and only Level 1 trauma center, home of the USAISR Burn Center, 425 beds, founded 1879, renamed BAMC 1946.

Bruce C. Vladeck

Bruce C. Vladeck is an American health policy leader who ran Medicare and Medicaid as HCFA administrator from 1993 to 1997 and wrote Unloving Care (1980).

Bruyère

Bruyère (Bruyère Health, formerly Bruyère Continuing Care) is an Ottawa academic health sciences centre founded in 1845 by Mother Élisabeth Bruyère, operating Saint-Vincent and Élisabeth-Bruyère hospitals, long-term care, palliative care, and a University of Ottawa-affiliated research institute.

BRVB-OCD study

BRVB-OCD study (NCT02627599): prospective observational trial of the Breath Responsive Variable Bolus Oxygen Conserving Device in COPD patients aged 65-85, sponsored by StratiHealth, 35 participants, completed; OCD means oxygen conserving device, not the psychiatric condition.

Budget impact analysis

Budget impact analysis is a pharmacoeconomic method estimating the annual net cost to a health system or payer of adopting a new intervention over about 1 to 5 years.

Bundesgesundheitsblatt, Gesundheitsforschung, Gesundheitsschutz

Bundesgesundheitsblatt – Gesundheitsforschung – Gesundheitsschutz is a monthly German public health journal edited at the Robert Koch Institute, published by Springer since 1999, ISSN 1436-9990/1437-1588, Impact Factor 1.6 (2025).

Burn Units

A burn unit is a specialized hospital facility providing intensive care for burn patients, built around a multidisciplinary team for wound care, surgery, and rehabilitation.

C-STRIDE study

C-STRIDE (Chinese Cohort Study of Chronic Kidney Disease) is China's first national prospective CKD cohort: about 3,000 adults with stages 1-4 CKD at 39 centers, followed for renal, cardiovascular, and mortality outcomes.

C. Everett Koop

C. Everett Koop (1916–2013), pioneering pediatric surgeon-in-chief at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and 13th U.S. Surgeon General (1981–1989) under Reagan, known for the 1986 AIDS report, the 107-million-household Understanding AIDS mailing, and anti-tobacco reports.

CABO-LA study

CABO-LA (NCT05835635) is an observational study by Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile in Santiago evaluating satisfaction, acceptance, and quality of life in 50 virologically suppressed Chilean HIV patients switching from oral therapy to long-acting injectable cabotegravir plus rilpivirine over 72 weeks.

CAEC trial

CAEC trial (NCT03070262), The Efficacy and Safety of Caffeic Acid for Esophageal Cancer: phase 3 randomized double-blind placebo-controlled Chinese trial of oral caffeic acid 300 mg three times daily in 240 advanced ESCC patients, targeting GASC1/KDM4C; no results posted.

Calley Means

Calley Means, American health entrepreneur, TrueMed co-founder, and senior HHS adviser under RFK Jr.; ex-food/pharma consultant, Good Energy co-author with sister Casey Means, key MAHA architect.

Cancer discovery

Cancer Discovery is a monthly peer-reviewed medical journal published by the American Association for Cancer Research in Philadelphia since 2011, covering basic, translational, and clinical cancer research.