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Latest Posts

The Problem Of Drug Extinction

Doctors are all-familiar with marketing efforts to promote new drugs, but once the new drugs displace older drugs in the medical marketplace, who serves as advocates for the continued manufacturing of older FDA-approved drugs?

In a short answer: No one.

For those of us dealing in cardiac arrhythmia management, this presents difficult challenges for patient care if people are unable to take the newer drugs due to side effects. These patients no longer have a fall-back option to turn to for medical therapy when the older drugs have become extinct on the marketplace. Read more »

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

Why A Good Childhood Isn’t About Good Grades

Spring and standardized school testing become synonymous in many areas of the country for many public school students, including for my own children attending schools in Massachusetts.

As this annual rite of passage rolls around, I’m reminded of how important it is to help our kids remember that they’re so much more than the sum of their grades, test scores, and project results. Think back on your childhood: What do you remember? Is it the grades, the teachers, the homework amount? Did you have standardized tests and, if so, do you remember the results?

I recall blips of taking tests and filling out scantron sheets for all sorts of tests throughout my educational life. I recall being in class when graded papers, projects and tests were handed back to us. But the moments I recall the most were the times I overcame a challenge or a hurdle that seemed insurmountable at the time — and grew from it in unimaginable ways. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Dr. Gwenn Is In*

An Eater’s Guide To Food

Food Rules: An Eater's ManualMichael Pollan has become one of our most important writers about human nutrition. His book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma (2006), spelled out why the almost eight billion humans on this planet had better balance what we eat — for our own health and the health of the planet.

He published a small book in 2009 (Penguin Books) called Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual. His rules are around seven words in three brief statements: “Eat Food, Not Too Much, Mostly Plants.” How simple and wise is that?

These three statements make up the three parts of this small book, with lots of practical “rules.” Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at eDocAmerica*

About Uterine Fibroids

Uterine fibroids are benign growths on the muscular wall of the uterus. They can be tiny in size (like a marble) or grow huge and fill up the entire uterine cavity. Some fibroids are as large as a five-month pregnancy. There are certain facts that women should know about uterine fibroids. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at EverythingHealth*

It’s American Stroke Month

AHA-ASA logoMay is American Stroke Month as designated by the American Heart Association and American Stroke Association. As I talk about in this video, stroke is the third leading cause of death in the United States, and every 40 seconds someone in the United States suffers from a stroke.

The key thing to recognize is that symptoms are sudden — whether it’s weakness on one side of the body, difficulty with talking, difficulty with walking, or other neurological changes. One of the important things to remember is that even subtle weakness or difficulty with speech can be an early sign. Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Doctor Anonymous*

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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