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CAM vs. Traditional Medicine: Handle With Scientific Care

Here’s some advice I have given teenage boys who are going toe-to-toe with their mothers about a health issue:

Don’t go toe-to-toe with your mother; it’s a no-win situation.  Either you are right, and you are looked at as a “smarty-pants” or you are wrong, and have given her a huge “I told you so.”  If, on the other hand, you keep quiet and listen to what she’s saying, it’s a win-win: either she’s right and you learn something, or she’s wrong, and you have been vindicated.

Fathers often pipe in that this applies to wives as well.  Mom’s don’t seem to disagree (for some mysterious reason).

While this may be sound relational advice, it also needs to be heeded by the medical community in its relationship to “complimentary and alternative medicine” or CAM.  I am not saying we shouldn’t be angry and frustrated with the CAM purveyors who are harming and even killing people (such as the anti-vaccine movement).  I am not saying that we should embrace CAM and put it at anywhere near equal footing with our profession.  What I am saying is that in our enthusiasm to win the argument, we can undermine our own credibility. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Musings of a Distractible Mind*

Sports Injuries In Kids On The Rise

Several studies presented this week at the Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons reported that in spite of a dramatic rise in pediatric sports injuries, there is still a lack of education, awareness and early treatment.

More adolescents are participating in year-round sports without seasonal breaks and are playing on multiple teams simultaneously, leading to a growing number of musculoskeletal injuries – both traumatic and from chronic overuse.

Kids’ bodies are still growing and they are just as susceptible to overuse and traumatic joint and extremity injuries as adults. The rate of injury suggests that we might be pushing kids too hard and the damage could last a lifetime. Read more »

This post, Sports Injuries In Kids On The Rise, was originally published on Healthine.com by Nancy Brown, Ph.D..

Eating Healthy: Try A Mediterranean “Wonder Food”

By Barbara Ficarra, RN, BSN, MPA

Last week, I returned from Italy — Florence (Firenze) to be exact (a magical city in Tuscany) — only to realize how much I miss the delicious Mediterranean food. Trattorias (little informal restaurants) can be found along the cobblestone streets through the narrow alleyways. The trattorias boast magnificent Mediterranean cuisine — it’s healthy and ingredients are simple. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Health in 30*

Got Milk AND Heart Disease?

Mmmm. I just discovered non-homogenized milk — the kind with the thick layer of cream on top and more watery milk below. You have to shake it up before each serving, and the little flecks of buttery cream never quite disappear. Non-homogenized milk can look alien at first, with tiny chunks of floating cream fooling the mind into thinking the stuff’s gone rancid. But the taste is far superior to homogenized milk. Think milk with a hint of butter.

This is the old-fashioned kind, available to humans for 10,000 years until the 1930’s when homogenized milk became widespread. Homogenization of milk is accomplished by a series of filtration steps under high pressure that squeeze milk and its relatively large fat globules through tiny tubes, breaking the globules into microscopic pieces which are then prevented from coalescing by the casein already in the milk. This process makes milk look homogenous — uniform in consistency and tasting evenly creamy. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at The Examining Room of Dr. Charles*

Alcoholism In Families: A Universal Loss

This is a repost of my reflections on my father who passed away 13 years today. It took me 12 years to write the following eulogy and remembrance. While quite personal, I posted it here last year because I felt that my experiences were quite universal, shared by the families of the ten or twenty million alcoholics in the U.S. and the hundreds of millions worldwide. Moreover, I wanted to provide a face for my colleagues who work in the area of substance abuse and a reminder for my clinical colleagues of the people behind those they may dismiss as drunks and junkies.

In becoming one my most most highly-read and highly-commented posts, I thought I would share it again this year, especially for the new readers who’ve come on board in the last twelve months. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Terra Sigillata*

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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