Better Health: Smart Health Commentary Better Health (TM): smart health commentary

Latest Posts

Psychotherapy And Humor

Awhile back I put up a YouTube audio that I thought was funny. A commenter didn’t like it and felt it promoted stigma. So I took a vote, and while most people were fine with it, a number did not like it, and I took the post down. We received this note, and I thought it was substantial enough to be its own guest post (with permission, of course).
——————

Hi. I am a practicing psychiatrist based in New York City. I find your blog interesting, informative, and, at times, funny. Now, can you guess which entry I’d like to comment on?

Mel Brooks once said (paraphrased) that if you slip on a banana peel and land on your butt, it’s comedy. If I fall down a flight of stairs, it’s tragedy. I’ve had a long-term interest in humor, and a brief career as an unpaid stand-up comic in L.A. (Brief because my bombing to “killing” ratio was about 15 to one.) With respect to my experience as a therapist, I now occasionally utilize humor in my treatment, but only extremely judiciously once I have gotten to know my client. I learned my lesson early.

At the beginning of my residency training, during my second session with a client, I commented that perhaps he felt like Groucho Marx when Groucho said that he “wouldn’t want to be a member of any club with standards low enough to accept [him].” I sat back, feeling as if I had made the interpretation of the century, and waited for a reaction. I got one. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Shrink Rap*

Making Circumcision A Crime?

Have you heard? First San Fransisco bans toys in Happy Meals. Now CNN is reporting there’s a  circumcision ban proposed in San Fransisco as well. 

To recap: Anti-circumcision activist Lloyd Schofield has drawn up a proposal outlawing all circumcisions, even for religious reasons (circumcision of boys is traditional in Judaism and Islam.) The punishment would be up to a year in jail or up to a $1,000 fine.

Boy, oh boy. What a hot-bed topic circumcision is. Mandating a ban against all circumcisions is like mandating a requirement that all boys be circumcised. Nobody is right. Everyone is an expert. You’re either for it or against it. But making circumcision a crime? I don’t know. Read more »

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

Meet Marcel, The Diabetic Shell

Clara Barton Camp (CBC) is awesome — this is an indisputable fact. I talk about CBC all the time when I’m at conferences, because there is something so unique and incredibly supportive about knowing that your fellow campers are also insulin-dependent and aren’t afraid to show it.

Part of what makes CBC so cool is that it makes you feel like having diabetes is…sort of cool. Almost everyone at camp has it, so if your pancreas happens to work, it makes you the odd one out instead of part of the WYOI (wear your own insulin) crowd. What’s more empowering than taking an isolating chronic illness and making it the common — and intrinsically cool — thread? 

Which is why this video — a diabetes take on the Marcel the Shell with Shoes On — is so brilliant. It takes the Marcel the Shell concept and turns it on its diabetes head. And if you’re “in the know” with diabetes, it will make you laugh. If you listen closely, you’ll hear some of my favorite diabetes lines of all time. (Including, but not limited to: “One time I licked a glucose tab and went into DKA.”)

It takes some serious (cotton?) balls to make this video. I love it. This video was created, voiced, and edited by the talented CBC team of Abby Bayer (who guest posted here), Savannah Johnson (her post is here), Allie D, and Alissa Carberry (I think it’s time for Alissa and Allie to post, since I have nothing to link to for them).  

What else can I say, other than this video had me in tears from laughing last night. Clara would be proud!

*This blog post was originally published at Six Until Me.*

A Clinical Case Game For Your iPhone Or iPad

A new iPhone/iPad game called “Prognosis: Your Diagnosis” looks like a decent attempt at making clinical case studies into a fun activity. Though it’s not clear how accurate and educational the game really is, the interface and goofy screenshots can certainly provide the foundation on which to deliver great content.

1fsd3.jpg

245788g.jpg

iTunes: Prognosis: Your Diagnosis…

Hat tip: ScienceRoll

*This blog post was originally published at Medgadget*

It’s Cold And Flu Season: SNL’s “Hibernol”

Thanks to former student Allison Miller for reminding me about this clip from the Saturday Night Live (SNL) archives:

*This blog post was originally published at Gary Schwitzer's HealthNewsReview 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…

Read more »

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…

Read more »

See all interviews »

Latest Cartoon

See all cartoons »

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…

Read more »

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…

Read more »

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…

Read more »

See all book reviews »

Commented - Most Popular Articles