“If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it’s free.” – P.J. O’Rourke

I distinctly reme...

Falls are the most common cause of injury in adults 65 years or older. About one third of adults in that age group fall at least once per year, and 5% to 10% of those falls result in a broken bone, a lace...

It’s summertime! Summer is the perfect time for swimsuits, outdoor grilling, throwing Frisbees, and c...

Obstetrician 1: Get the EEG, the BP monitor, and the AVV. Obstetrician 2: And get the machine that goes 'ping!'. Obstetrician 1: And get the most expensive machine - in case the administrator comes. -- From Monty Python’s movie “The Meaning of Life”

Heart attacks remain the number one cause of death for men and women in the U.S. Heart attacks typically feel like s...

My regular readers know that prostate cancer has been a controversial topic recently. The controversy centers around our ignorance of whether treating early prostate cancer helps patients, and by extension, whether early diagnosis is helpful. In May I wrote about the US Preventive Services Task Force’s new recommendation against s...

Americans are getting heavier and have been doing so for decades. One in three adults in the US is obese. Overweight and obese people are more likely to develop diabetes, high ...

I’m always dismayed when people try to exaggerate the health risks of certain substances by calling them “chemicals”. “We have to worry about chemicals in apple juice” they’ll warn, or “chemicals in plastic bottles”. As anyone who’s taken a chemistry class can tell you, “chemicals” is just an intimidating word for “stuff”. Calling it a chemical doesn’t tell you anything about what it is or how i...

A couple of generations ago medical culture was aloof and authoritarian. Doctors did not give advice to patients, they gave orders. Patients were expected to follow those orders. Questions might have been tolerated, but patient requests for explanations or suggestions for a different approach were considered very unusual. I thought this paternalistic model of doctoring ended long before I was tra...

Generations of patients and doctors have been steeped in the myth that any kind of cancer should be found as soon as possible and when found, removed...

The current range of options for medications for weight loss is not encouraging. The only medication approved by the FDA for long-term use for weight loss is orlistat, avai...