Mobile health skepticism, fuzzy health reform math, and Texas amputations: The ReportingonHealth Daily Briefing

Here's what we're reading today:

Outliers: A cautionary tale for health journalists: GoozNews' Merrill Goozner details how an error of adjustment in the Dartmouth Atlas skewed media coverage of supposedly sky-high leg amputation rates in McAllen, Texas.

Mobile Health: NetworkWorld's Paul McNamara takes issue with a new survey showing that 40 percent of us would pay for health care apps or services on our mobile devices.

C-sections: Nathanael Johnson details how he reported his California Watch investigation of c-section rates at California hospitals. (For related how-to's, read Antidote blogger William Heisel's two-part Q&A with Johnson on his investigation of maternal death rates).  

Cholesterol: Why are so many Americans on statins? A flawed classification system for measuring cholesterol-related disease risk may offer some clues, according to Pharmalot's Ed Silverman.

Health Reform: As a federal judge prepares to hear arguments that new federal health reforms are unconstitutional tomorrow, some recent White House stats on the cost savings of health reform may involve fuzzy math.