I hear this question virtually every time I see Alan, an extremely healthy, energetic man in his forties who could easily pass for someone in his twenties. He comes to the office once a year for a check-up (he’s always just fine), but since we cross paths at our health club I’m reminded about his “case” fairly often.
I Think My Mind Is Going
It’s fairly common, actually. You walk into a room suddenly befuddled, wracking your brain, desperate to remember just why you came to this room in the first place. Or you’re telling someone about a movie you just saw the night before, really enjoyed, and now you’re clawing at your cerebral cortex trying to extricate the title, the actor, the name of the theatre.
Welcome Casey Kelley, MD
Finding Dr. Casey Kelley has been an 11-year project for me. That’s how long I’ve been scanning the horizon for the perfect holistically oriented MD associate. And believe me this project was no walk in the park.
Overall, newly minted MDs avoid primary care specialties (family practice, internal medicine, pediatrics) because by choosing one of them they’ll earn barely enough to pay off their medical school loans. Each time I’d actually locate a well-trained primary care physician, I’d quickly discover that while he or she might “like” the idea of integrative medicine the number who’d actually be willing to devote their professional career to a holistically oriented practice was excruciatingly small.
Lady Gaga, Madonna, Andy Warhol, and Me
There’s an exhibit opening next month at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London entitled “Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990.” You’re puzzled, I’m sure, by how a subject as confusing as Postmodernism could relate to a health tip, but it actually does, in a big picture sort of way.
La Vie Francaise
With the World Health Organization ranking the United States 37th in “quality of healthcare to its citizenry,” a notch below Costa Rica but thankfully edging out Slovenia, perhaps it crossed your mind, as it did mine, how health care is delivered in the top-ranked country, France.
Empty Nose Syndrome
Never heard of it? Neither had I. Sounded more like a Sherlock Holmes story than a “condition” somebody could have. But there it was, written by the patient himself in the Reason For Visit section of our intake form. Before he actually walked into the examining room, I made a quick obeisance before my PC, fingers flying across the keys, summoning the all-powerful Wiki gods for some quick education on empty nose syndrome.
The Extraordinarily Persistent Patient
Despite my admonishments to stay well if you want to avoid the multifarious problems of our health care system, sometimes–and through no fault of your own–you’ll get sick.
Your best chance of emerging unscathed from whatever ails you is having what’s called a “self-limiting condition,” namely, one that goes away by itself, with or without doctoring. With any condition that brings the phrase “if symptoms persist, see your doctor” to mind, well, best of luck. Most of the time, the gods will be on your side, your doctor will figure out what’s wrong, and you’ll do just fine.
Physicians as Morons
I do know that title sounds judgmental, perhaps even harsh, but sometimes you wonder if there might not be a bevy of physicians who received their education online at the University of Phoenix, or their medical licenses by having a relative in Springfield.
More Sleaze from Big Pharma
I can appreciate you might be fatigued with this topic, but let’s face it: for virtually everyone, health care today means going to the doctor and coming home with a prescription.
Charcoal Grilling and Cancer: How to Reduce Your Risk
First it was smoking (then asbestos and DDT) and now charcoal grilling. One after another, life’s little pleasures are yanked from us by their statistical associations with increased cancer risk.
By now everyone’s heard about the significant connection between colorectal cancer and regular consumption of red meat (beef, pork, lamb) and processed meats (bacon, ham, sausages, cold cuts, hot dogs).
Can You Get Fried By An Airport Scanner?
Ever since 2009, when that guy smuggled plastic explosives in his Jockey shorts and tried to blow up a plane on its way to Detroit, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has been pushing for full-body scanners at all airports.
Belly Fat! New Research Reveals…
Between the print and TV ads and the pop-ups scuttling like mice from the four borders of your computer screen, belly fat seems to have surpassed global warming as our next great anxiety.
It’s clear these ads are aimed at women, some of whom fall for the hucksterism of what is for many little more than an annoying physiologic change occurring during a perfect storm of dietary indiscretion, genetic predisposition, and stress. As one patient laconically remarked, “My divorce from hell took a solid year. I finally got rid of him, but in the process…” (patting her tummy with both hands) “I got myself…this!”
Return of the Hundred Million Dollar Pen
Last week, pocket calculator panting from exhaustion, I explained how my humble pen, along with the pens of the other 899,999 physicians in America, was responsible for paying out about $2.24 trillion every year to thousands of health care “providers.” That’s the amount the US spends annually on our essentially mediocre healthcare system.
My One Hundred Million Dollar Pen
I’ve got to introduce you to this pen of mine, just a run-of-the-mill pen, but oh the story it has to tell. Understanding the power of my pen is a useful lesson in health care, and by the end of this two-part piece what you learn might make you healthier. No kidding.
But first, let’s make you a little sick.
The Fox Guarding the Hen House
I apologize for another health tip on troubling trends in the healthcare industry. I know you prefer articles about supplements that can melt away your love handles, firepower your libido, or transmogrify your skin to the smoothness of a baby’s behind, but these professional secrets will have to wait.
Overweight? Blame Your Car
The endless and usually irritating “which is better?” debate between city dwellers and suburbanites came to a grinding halt in 2003 when a study was published showing suburbanites were on average several pounds heavier than their urban counterparts.
Europe Bamboozled by Big Pharma, Part 2
Last week we talked about the new European Union laws banning hundreds of herbal remedies. Since a favorite saying of many Europeans is “The problem with you Americans is…” I feel no compunction giving you my opinions about the entire continent getting itself so thoroughly blindsided by corporate-political footsies.
Europe Bamboozled By Big Pharma
Stories like the one I’m going to tell you this week and next make me proud to be a Chicagoan. Nobel prize winning Chicago author Saul Bellow said that we reside in the “contempt center of the USA” and, you know, I’ve got to agree. We take to such chicanery as well-placed bribes, cronyism, no-bid contracts, and politicians hay-tumbling with big corporations as naturally as naive folk worldwide take to breathing.
Evil Health Insurance Tactics
Time for another appalling health insurance story. Today we’ll discuss an invention of theirs called Step Therapy, allegedly created “for your safety and to control health care costs.” It won’t surprise you that its real purpose is to generate massive revenues for their bottom line. Unfortunately, you, the patient, virtually always suffer unnecessarily in the process.
The Carrot and Your Longevity
Well, not only the carrot. The sweet potato, too, and also the squash, greens (collard, turnip, and mustard), apples, green beans, cantaloupe, broccoli, and tomatoes, a colorful list you can etch into your brain and learn more about by clicking here.