Occam’s razor is a well-known logical principle often applied in medicine. It states that the simplest explanation for a complaint or symptom is usually the correct one. Most of the time, Occam’s razor serves the diagnostician well, but when the actual problem is complex or unexpected, patients can be sent down expensive and even life-threatening diagnostic rabbit holes.
A friend of mine is an 80-pack-a-year smoker. He was complaining of shortness of breath, worsening over a couple of months, and his primary care physician sent him to a pulmonologist. The assumption was that the shortness of breath was related to COPD from his chronic smoking — and that indeed would have been the most likely explanation. Read more »
Life sometimes gets in the way of daily posting. Specifically, the treadmill of life sometimes roars too fast.
But as I strolled through the hospital this morning, there was a plain piece of white paper taped to the wall around the nurses station. Although I’m not overly religious (and even highly conflicted about which rituals are the right ones), these words from a pastor/celebrity stopped me for a moment:
Attitude
The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life. Attitude, to me, is more important than facts. It is more important than the past, than education, than money, than circumstances, than failures, than success, than what other people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance, giftedness or skill.
It will make or break a company, a church, or a home. The remarkable thing is that we have a choice every day regarding the attitude we will embrace for that day.
We cannot change the past, we cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is plan on the one thing that we have, and that is our attitude.
I am convinced that life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent how I react to it. And so it is with you. We are in charge of our attitudes.
As a cardiologist programmed to “alert” most of the time, words such as these help me. I haven’t seen the studies yet, but I’m guessing that positive attitudes reduce inflammation, which is good for our atria, and our arteries.
JMM
*This blog post was originally published at Dr John M*
There’s an endless list of bad things about being sick. But what happens to the relationships you have with people around you when you become ill?
Let me tell you about a man I know. I will call him Bill, even though that’s not his real name.
Bill is a vital man in his 60s with two grown daughters. A few years ago, he was diagnosed with a serious illness. His illness isn’t going to kill him right away, but it has profoundly affected his ability to work and enjoy all the things he used to enjoy. Worse, he has had a difficult time with his doctors figuring out what exactly is wrong and the best way to proceed.
But all of this isn’t really the hardest part for Bill. The hard part for Bill is how his friends and family have reacted. Read more »
*This blog post was originally published at See First Blog*
Here’s a gimmick “As Seen On TV,” on which you should save your hard-earned money.
The neckline slimmer claims to reverse the effects of aging without cosmetic surgery. Simply hold this gadget to the chin area and it will exercise your neck muscles to reduce those jowls or sagging fat under your chin. Just two minutes a day should do the trick, according to the commercial.
Unfortunately the effects of aging and loose skin cannot be reversed by jiggling the head or pressing the fat upward. Weight loss can slim the face, but sagging jowls probably need cosmetic surgery.
Personally, I prefer candlelight and light dimmers.
“Short people have higher heart risk” screams the headline on CNN.com, treating it as a statement of fact. “Shortness Boosts Heart Disease, Death Risk” is the headline in a HealthDay story seen on BusinessWeek.com.
Wrong.
Such a study as the one being described can only establish association — it CANNOT prove causation. So it’s wrong to say short people have higher risk. It is wrong to say shortness boosts risk.
Blogger and cardiac electrophysiologist Dr. Wes Fisher beat me to the punch by blogging about the continued journalistic confusion between association and causation. He wrote:
“About the only thing that can be concluded from this so-called “analysis” is nothing more than maybe we should consider studying if this association actually exists.”
Tell ’em, Dr. Wes. And tell ’em, Randy: “Short people got no reason” to worry — at least not yet — from this study.
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Here’s a gimmick “As Seen On TV,” on which you should save your hard-earned money.
