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Our Senatorial Christmas Gift

As the Senators vote to pass their bill to extend insurance to thirty million more people while failing to address malpractice or physician payment reform, we can all only hope and pray that it’s worth it in the end.

On thing’s for sure, 2010 is shaping up to be one heck of a year.

Merry Christmas.

-Wes

Chart source.Musings of a cardiologist and cardiac electrophysiologist.

*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Wes*

How Cigarette Nicotine Affects The Brain

I was recently asked to review a new textbook on Nicotine Psychopharmacology, containing 18 very thorough chapters describing the latest evidence on the effects of smoking and nicotine on the brain and behavior. Much of it, though interesting, was a very heavy read. But it occurred to me that it might be useful to try to summarize what the 544 pages in this new book suggests about the effects of nicotine and the reasons smokers get addicted. So here is an attempt to describe how nicotine addiction works, in simplified terms.

When a smoker inhales nicotine from a cigarette, the drug is carried to the brain in highly concentrated form within around 10-15 seconds. The drug then Read more »

This post, How Cigarette Nicotine Affects The Brain, was originally published on Healthine.com by Jonathan Foulds, Ph.D..

Merry Christmas From Better Health

Blogging will resume tomorrow. We send our warmest wishes to all those celebrating today.
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Christmas And The ‘Begats’ Of The Emergency Department

Often as not, the miseries of our friends, patients,  co-workers or family began with other miseries.  The Bible is full of ‘begats.’  Abraham begat Isaac, Isaac begat Jacob, Jacob begat his 12 sons.

Pain is similar; abuse begat depression.  Loss begat alcoholism.  Loneliness begat PID.  Ridicule begat drug abuse. Ignorance begat incapacity. Infidelity begat sorrow. Fatigue begat anger. Neglect begat rage. Abuse begat indifference.

On the other hand, love begat happiness. Children begat purpose. Knowledge begat excellence.  Concern for humanity begat medical science.  Love for others begat long call nights and long surgeries.

Love for country begat sacrifice.  Love for wives, husbands and children begat fidelity.

Love for mankind begat Jesus in the manger, Jesus on the cross.

Life is a series of ‘begats.’

Edwin

*This blog post was originally published at edwinleap.com*

What’s The Most Dangerous Day Of The Year?

With 365 days a year, one would think the law of averages would win this battle.  And you would be wrong. Because there is a deadliest day of the year?  It’s none other than Christmas.  Who would have thought that?  Why would Christmas be the deadliest day of the year.

Researchers examined 53 million natural deaths between 1973 and 2001.  What they found was cardiac and non-cardiac deaths peaked during Christmas and New Year’s (between 4-5% higher than expected).  They also found that the proportion of holiday deaths was increasing with time. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at The Happy Hospitalist Blog*

Latest Interviews

IDEA Labs: Medical Students Take The Lead In Healthcare Innovation

It’s no secret that doctors are disappointed with the way that the U.S. healthcare system is evolving. Most feel helpless about improving their work conditions or solving technical problems in patient care. Fortunately one young medical student was undeterred by the mountain of disappointment carried by his senior clinician mentors…

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How To Be A Successful Patient: Young Doctors Offer Some Advice

I am proud to be a part of the American Resident Project an initiative that promotes the writing of medical students residents and new physicians as they explore ideas for transforming American health care delivery. I recently had the opportunity to interview three of the writing fellows about how to…

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Latest Book Reviews

Book Review: Is Empathy Learned By Faking It Till It’s Real?

I m often asked to do book reviews on my blog and I rarely agree to them. This is because it takes me a long time to read a book and then if I don t enjoy it I figure the author would rather me remain silent than publish my…

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The Spirit Of The Place: Samuel Shem’s New Book May Depress You

When I was in medical school I read Samuel Shem s House Of God as a right of passage. At the time I found it to be a cynical yet eerily accurate portrayal of the underbelly of academic medicine. I gained comfort from its gallows humor and it made me…

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Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book

I am hesitant to review diet books because they are so often a tangled mess of fact and fiction. Teasing out their truth from falsehood is about as exhausting as delousing a long-haired elementary school student. However after being approached by the authors’ PR agency with the promise of a…

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