Get Cancer. Lose Your Job?
The harsh reality is that people who have had cancer treatment are sometimes perceived as a burden on a working group
“The Dallas Buyers Club” Takes on AIDS, Peer Patients, and Not Taking “No” for An Answer
Published trials can be flawed. Even if they’re well-analyzed, the findings can be hard to interpret when it comes to a single patient’s course and well-being. What’s a dying man to do?
Should People With Health Problems Talk About their Conditions?
Do you need to explain to the person on the checkout line or, say, a mother organizing a bake sale, why your back hurts? Or why you need a seat on the bus?
Can Anyone Be a Patient Advocate?
Can a good doctor, or a nurse, or a physical therapist, or any other person employed by the health care system, serve as a patient advocate?
On Sheryl Crow’s Report that She Has a Meningioma, and Singing Loud
Fortunately the LATimes and People magazine got the story right. Their headlines, and text, emphasize the benign nature of Crow’s newly-diagnosed condition, a meningioma.
Illness is Not Discrete. On Feeling Sick, and Not Knowing What’s Next
A broken arm, a low-stage breast cancer that’s treated and done with, a bout of pneumonia – these are things that a career can afford, an editor can handle, friends can be supportive. But when you have one thing, and then another, and then another, it gets scary, it weighs you down.
New Article on Mammography Spawns False Hope That Breast Cancer is Not a Dangerous Disease
Few forms of invasive breast cancer warrant no treatment unless the patient is so old that she is likely to die first of another condition, or the patient prefers to die of the disease….“Mammograms Spot Cancers That May Not Be Dangerous,” said WebMD, yesterday. This is feel-good news, and largely wishful.
Why I Support Health Care Reform
Profit is not what medical care is about, or should be about. What we need is a simple, national health plan, available to everyone, with minimal paperwork and, yes, limits to care.
A Good Personal Health Record is Hard to Find
Over the weekend I developed another bout of diverticulitis. Did the usual: fluids, antibiotics, rest, avoided going to the ER, cancelled travel plans. One of my doctors asked a very simple question: is this happening more frequently? The answer, we both knew, was yes. But I don’t have a Personal Health Record (PHR) that in […]
Thoughts, on Getting My Photo Taken at a Medical Appointment
A funny thing happened at my doctor’s appointment on Friday. I checked in, and after confirming that my address and insurance hadn’t changed since last year, waited for approximately 10 minutes. A worker of some sort, likely a med-tech, called me to “take my vitals.” She took my blood pressure with a cuff that made […]