Tired of just politics?
Head over and read a bit about health care at this week’s Grand Rounds or, as Shrinkette calls it, the Carnival of the Caregivers.
Well, you won’t escape politics entirely….
Health Care
Be Prepared
That motto takes on ever more expensive trappings. The completists among you can now add the Philips HeartStart Home Automated External Defibrillator (AED) to your tool kit. As OneMansOpinion notes:
You need one of these — to satisfy your ER jones during the off-season, perhaps.He has a bit more to say about Philips products as well.
You early adopters start buying now! I want to see the price come down a grand from the Amazon price….
What You Need to Know to Lose Weight
Taught by a physicist!
Richard Muller, Professor of Physics at UC Berkeley, teaches first:
Want to lose weight? Easy! Just remember the first law of thermodynamics: conservation of energy. Oh, and you’ll have to not mind being hungry.
And, second:
…breathe more. And the only effective way to breathe more is through increased activity.
And, you will probably feel a lot better after a few months of eating less and breathing more.
Finding the Cure
Health care emulates life
I called Dr. Hammami with the news of the final diagnosis and asked why it had been missed by all the doctors the patient saw before arriving at his hospital. He thought for a moment before he answered. ”It’s difficult for a doctor to say, ‘I don’t know,”’ he said. ”The patient doesn’t want to hear it, and the doctor doesn’t want to say it. But in medicine you can’t know everything; you just have to know how to get the answer. I was certain the eosinophils would get us there.”The rest of life is similar. We don’t know everything and finding solutions to personal, work or social challenges requires a willingness to put in some work and a willingness to look beyond, to step outside of the current framing of a situation.
Via DB’s Medical Rants.
Save $, Stay Healthy
Just ignore the antibacterial cleaning products:
A study by Dr. Elaine Larson at the Columbia School of Nursing called into question the usefulness of antibacterial products for the home. In New York, 224 households, each with at least one preschooler, were randomly assigned to two groups. One group used antibacterial cleaning, laundry and hand-washing products. The other used ordinary products.Yep, wash your hands and refrigerate spoilable food.
For 48 weeks, the groups were monitored for seven symptoms of colds, flu and food poisoning – and found to be essentially the same. According to Dr. Gerba’s research, an active adult touches an average of 300 surfaces every 30 minutes. You cannot win at this. You will become obsessive-compulsive. Just wash your hands with soap and water a few times a day, and leave it at that.