The Center for Closing the Health Gap in Greater Cincinnati has honored Alvin H. Crawford, MD, with the Lifetime Achievement Award, according to an AAOS Now report.

Mir Ali, MD, has joined Morris, Ill.-based Rezin Orthopedics and Sports Medicine, according to a News Tribune report.

Here are six things for spine surgeons to know for Thursday, June 13, 2013.

Domagoj Coric, MD, is a spine surgeon at Charlotte, N.C.-based Carolina Neurosurgery & Spine Associates, and he serves as the chief of neurosurgery at Carolinas Medical Center also in Charlotte. He is a member of North Carolina Spine Society and North America Spine Society. He has also held leadership positions with both the American Association of Neurological Surgeons and Congress of Neurological Surgeons.

This article was written by Dick Pepper, a medical marketing specialist who blogs at VoxMD.com and can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

I recently heard someone say "Facebook is dead." I thought this was quite a profound statement, but it was from a very smart client, and I run their social media strategy. Needless to say, I looked into where this idea may have come from. It turns out there are articles online claiming this. They're mostly quite old and biased to other online services, or written from the angst-riddled perspective of college kids who don't like the rise in Facebook usage by adults. According to Pew Internet (http://bit.ly/11TWk01), the most cited and trusted source of online usage, 69 percent of all online adults, representing more than half of the entire adult population of the United States, use a social networking site. No authoritative source says Facebook, or any other social media, is dying, but many point out a few key social media mistakes that can negatively affect your orthopedic and spine marketing:

The Alliance of Specialty Medicine recently submitted a testimony to the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health about sustainable growth rate reform.

Retirement might be far away or right around the corner, but all spine surgeons should have a retirement plan and money put away annually for their golden years. How much to put away and where to put it really depends on individuals and their goals for the future. Here are eight points on how surgeons should be saving during their years in medical practice to plan for a comfortable retirement.

Here are seven things for spine surgeons to know for Thursday, June 6, 2013.

Richard Kube, MD, and Brian Gill, MD, discuss how their spine practices are affected by reimbursement issues.

Becker's Spine Review has named the recipients of the Annual Spine Leadership Award 2013. Recipients were selected based on their noteworthy contributions to their practice and the spine community, entrepreneurial skills and influence in business and leadership.