“Is Information Always A Good Thing?” – Medical Care
Shutterstock There are some sad truths about being an aging male. Your muscle mass usually declines. You start feeling tired more easily. And there’s a good chance either you start losing interest in sex, or start experiencing a decline in sexual performance. Here’s another truth—your testosterone level probably ain’t what it used to be. Which…
Shutterstock I have just given you $78. (I’m a generous guy.) Now I’m giving you a choice: you can enter a lottery where you have a 75% chance of losing that $78 and a 25% of keeping it, or you can hold on to $20 and avoid the lottery all together. Quick—tell me what you…
Here is a great graphic from the Center for Science in the Public Interest laying out how supermarkets lay out food to encourage impulse purchases: So much for “free” markets!
It’s not an easy time to be a small, rural hospital. Insurance companies aren’t willing to pay generously for your services, given your measly market share. You are increasingly forced to compete against large integrated healthcare systems – conglomerations of urban, suburban and rural providers armed with big marketing budgets and specialized (generously reimbursed!) services….
There are promising ways to manage chronic pain so people, when they do feel pain, aren’t so bothered by it. In fact, a creative study led by a neuroscientist, Susanne Becker, uses insights from Ivan Pavlov to show the possibility of uncoupling the sensation of pain from the experience of pain. More here
Shutterstock Cancer screening can save lives: Mammographies reduce the chance women will die of breast cancer; and colonoscopies reduce the chance people will die of colon cancer. But should my 93-year-old father receive a screening colonoscopy? The test is uncomfortable, carries risks, and costs money. Even more importantly, my dad probably won’t live long enough…