Health Science | ***Dave Does the Blog

Death by Willful Ignorance

Defiance of science leading to unnecessary death is not unique to COVID-era America.

James Garfield was a really cool guy.

He didn’t aspire to the presidency — he became an unexpected compromise candidate. But his Civil War record, and the high respect he had garnered in Congress for his modesty, integrity, intelligence, and dedication to the nation, made him a clear choice in 1880.

He was a strong but compassionate self-made man. He was deeply invested in opposing corruption, in protecting the civil rights of blacks, and in unifying a post-Civil War nation. He stood against the spoils system of governmental appointments, preferring a civil service that protected government from favoritism and partisan politics.

garfield assassination — James Garfield being shot in the back.

On July 2, 1881, four short months after he took office, he was shot by a disgruntled office-seeker, Charles Guiteau. One wound hittin his shoulder was relatively trival. The key gunshot, deep into his back … still didn’t kill him outright, missing any of his major organs.

Instead, he lingered on for over two months as sepsis slowly, agonizingly, claimed his body with “tunnels” of pus and blood and infection.

And that didn’t have to be the case.

Germ theory was something relatively new, the mid-19th Century work of European scientists like Semmelweis, Snow, Pasteur and Lister. But the demonstrable results of its recommendations had been widely adopted by doctors.

Doctors in Europe.

Louis Pasteur — Surely you don’t expect us to take seriously theories from some guy with a foreign name like “Pasteur” (or “Fauci”) do you?

In America, it was a fancy, newfangled, high-fallutin’, furrin’, totally nonsensical, un-American theory. Invisible creatures causing disease? We all know that’s due to bad air. After all, American doctors were the best there were, trained and hardened of the fields of the Civil War. There was nothing Europe had to teach us.

Besides … the idea of requiring doctors — professionals — to wash their hands before touching their patients? To not wear around their bloodied clothing, which demonstrated their dedication to their manly profession by the “robust stink of the surgery”? To clean their surgical instruments between uses? What sort of creepy, unbelievable, freedom-infringing, effeminate crap was that supposed to be?

So, yeah, Garfield had a serious bullet wound. But he had the finest physicians in the land coming to aid him, to investigate, to treat, to be part of the quest to save the great man’s life.

James Garfield deathbed — James Garfield on his deathbed, surrounded by lots of doctors with unwashed hands.

Exploratory surgery as we know it was out of the question. Doctors knew what to do if the wanted to find out what was going on inside someone, or find a bullet that was lodged within them.

You just stuck your fingers up inside of the body.

Your unwashed fingers, of course.

We know what we’re doing. We know better than those creepy Europeans with their “science” and know-it-all attitudes. They say we’re doing something unsafe. How dare they impose their standards on us? This nation is the greatest on Earth, and we stand for liberty!

Washing hands whenever you touched someone was bothersome. Washing surgical instruments equally so. Using disinfectants like carbolic acid was messy. American doctors treating Garfield declined to follow such namby-pamby recommendations, the so-called scientific discoveries of those Europeans be damned.

And so Garfield died a long, lingering, awful, unnecessary death.

* * *

Today there are still people insisting, against all evidence, that COVID-19 is a triviality, nothing worse than the flu. That not that many people get sick from it, that not that many who get sick actually die. That masks don’t limit the spread of the disease but are a tyrannical infringement on freedom. That vaccines are a conspiracy of foreigners and un-American people trying to force us to do things.

How many James Garfields have there been over the past twenty months, cut down before they could achieve their promise, due to the willful ignorance, stubborn stupidity, and misplaced nationalistic pride of people who reject science for what is convenient or soothing or politically comfortable?

How many more will die?

James Garfield death — What more could we have possibly done? It must have been a Chinese plot!

Do you want to know more?

Donald Trump revisits why he banned transgender folk from the military

Which is, at best, delusional. At worst, it’s simple self-justified prejudice.

Oh, you British press. You don’t sweat over whether you’ll be invited to the next US Presidential Press Conference, so you’re free, free, to ask irritating questions …

On his trip to the UK, Donald granted a single interview. It was to Piers Morgan (a one-time “Celebrity Apprentice” contestant), who actually raised some difficult issues for Donald to answer. While his farcical answers about climate change drew the most national press attention, I found his answers about transgender folk in the military to be even more indicative of … well, something unpleasant.

Morgan pressed Trump about his self-trumpeted support for LGBT* folk, in the face of multiple actions against that community, in particular transgender people, and specifically booting them out of the military.

'You have to have a standard and you have to stick by that standard.'
The POTUS defends his decision to ban transgender people from serving in the military.@piersmorgan | #GMBTrump pic.twitter.com/heBUjhwiUH
— Good Morning Britain (@GMB) June 5, 2019

Trump trotted out a singular reason — the incredibly high cost of dealing with transgender folk in transition. The problem is, not only is that not what his administration argued in court about the ban, it’s also simply not true.

Quoth Donald:

Because they take massive amounts of drugs — they have to — and also, and you’re not allowed to take drugs, you know, in the military, you’re not allowed to take any drugs, you take an aspirin. And they have to, after the operation, they have to, they have no choice, they have to. And you have to actually break rules and regulations in order to have that.

When Morgan noted that the costs of hormone therapy were relatively small, and less than the amount the Pentagon spends on Viagra prescriptions, Trump went on:

Well, it is what it is. Look, massive amounts, and, also, people were going in and then asking for the operation, and the operation is $200,000, $250,000, and getting the operation, the recovery period is long, and they have to take large amounts of drugs after that, for whatever reason, but large amounts, and that’s not — the way it is. I mean, you can’t do that. So, yeah, I said, when it came time to make a decision on that, and because of the drugs, and also because of the cost of the operation, people were going in —

Morgan noted the number of transgender folk who had served with distinction. Trump replied:

Well, I’m proud of them, I’m proud of them, I think it’s great, but you have to have a standard, and you have to stick by that standard. And we have a great military, and I want to keep it that way, and maybe they’d be phenomenal, I think they probably would be. But, again, you have very strict rules and regulations on drugs and prescription drugs and all of these different things and — they blow it out of the water.

How many ways is this inaccurate? Let me hit a couple, speaking in the context of having a transmale son who is going through treatment, etc., at the present time.

Actively serving military personnel are, in fact, “allowed to take drugs” that are prescribed. To take a simple case, military personnel can be diabetic and still serve, even as they have to take insulin.Indeed, the Trump Administration’s own self-justifying re-study of transfolk in the military found that “roughly three times more cisgender men want testosterone supplements than transgender patients.” And, of course, most famously (and as Morgan points out), the Pentagon spends significantly more on Viagra for serving personnel than it has ever spent on hormone treatment for trans folk.
Speaking anecdotally, the required hormone treatment is not “massive,” and is, in fact, not even all that frequent. It’s certainly less obtrusive or regular than insulin shots.
In no world except, perhaps, high fashion is gender reassignment surgery — “the operation” — a six-figure number, even a low six-figure number. That’s an order of magnitude higher (based on the Pentagon’s own numbers) than even full-blown surgery, something that not all transgender folk go in for.
The idea that transgender folk are enlisting in the military in “massive amounts,” just to get gender reassignment surgery — which doesn’t remove from them the obligation to serve, potentially in combat zone — seems … a bit far-fetched. Okay, it seems like a paranoid delusion.On the other hand, is it any different from someone saying, “I’m going to join the Army so I can get trained for free in XYZ … and so that I get access to VA benefits for the rest of my life”?

The other point worth noting is that this is only a small fraction of the arguments previously raised by Trump’s Administration in court as to why they couldn’t possibly have trans folk serving (even though they’ve been serving with distinction). Those arguments included:

Arguments about “unit cohesion” in the face of transwomen being grouped with ciswomen (or transmen being grouped with cismen) — an argument a federal judge noted echoed arguments as to why blacks couldn’t possibly serve alongside whites, or why women couldn’t possibly be admitted into the military.
Arguments (based on debunked studies) about whether trans folk were mentally or emotionally stable.

Despite Donald’s expressed sentiment that trans folk would be “phenomenal” in the military, despite fact checking by the interviewer, despite the noted track record of openly trans folk serving in the military … Donald just won’t have it.

Which raises the question: is it simply because he personally thinks trans folk are icky and deluded and unfit (no matter what he says publicly)? Or is it because he feel he can score points among supporters who think trans folk are icky and deluded and unfit (no matter what he says publicly)?

Neither says much about the coherence of Donald’ statements or his moral leadership.

Do you want to know more?

Breakfast of Champions!

Pizza is a better morning meal than a bowl of cereal, says at least one nutritionist.

Pizza! Breakfast of Champions! https://t.co/iovqMJqNnC #health #pizza
— ***Dave Hill (@Three_Star_Dave) May 30, 2019

Pizza! Breakfast of Champions! https://t.co/iovqMJqNnC #health #pizza

Sure, it has more fat than a bowl of cereal (even with whole milk). But it has a lot fewer carbs, less sugar (no mid-morning crash), more protein (feels more filling), and is a wash as to calories.

Just … heat it to a decent temperature, please. We’re not barbarians.

Heading toward the last Roundup?

Monsanto’s weed-killer is, ironically, bringing down its new corporate owner.

Monsanto (now owned by German pharma giant Bayer) took a huge hit in court last week, with a jury finding that its star product, Roundup, is a carcinogen.

On Wednesday afternoon, German chemical giant Bayer sustained another costly legal defeat related to Monsanto, the US seed and pesticide giant it subsumed last year. A US District Court jury in San Francisco awarded plaintiff Edward Hardeman $80.3 million—including $75 million in damages—after ruling that Monsanto’s blockbuster glyphosate-based Roundup herbicides had caused his case of non-Hodgkin lymphoma.
[…] On Thursday, yet another glyphosate trial opened in the Superior Court of California for the County of Alameda. The plaintiffs, a married couple named Alva and Alberta Pilliod, claim long-term exposure to Roundup herbicide caused them both to develop non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Theirs is the first of more than 250 Roundup cancer cases consolidated before Superior Court of California Judge Winifred Smith.

Roundup is highly valuable to Monsanto, not just as a remarkably effective weed-killer, but by letting it sell Roundup-resistant seed, which makes weed-free farming terrifically easy (plant your seeds, spray it all with Roundup, and just the stuff you want grows). Monsanto has earned oodles of money that way — which is why Bayer’s stock has taken such a hit.

The company’s share price has plunged nearly 25 percent since the phase-one verdict on March 18, and by more than 40 percent since mid-August 2018, when a California Superior Court jury awarded school groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson $289 million in damages after ruling that Roundup exposure had caused his non-Hodgkin lymphoma. (The award was later reduced to $78 million—roughly equal to the damages decided in the Hardeman case.)

As a home gardner, I love Roundup as much as anyone. But increasing evidence that its got some nasty effects led me to stop using it at home. Which doesn’t mean that the replacement weed killer I’m using won’t cause me to grow a second head, but that’s a story for another lawsuit.

Do you want to know more? The Latest $80 Million Cancer Judgment Is Just the Beginning of Roundup’s Woes – Mother Jones

Researchers move ever-closer to a hormonal male birth control treatment

Now if only they could find a pharmaceutical company with any interest.

A means of sharing the birth control burden with men (other than through condoms) has been a long time coming, and researchers working with a testosterone / progestin gel (dabbed anywhere on the body daily) seem to be coming close to an answer.

A bigger problem seems to be that pharmaceutical companies think there’s little to no market for such a thing, meaning the research isn’t exactly well-funded. Apparently they believe that men either are happy to fob off the responsibility for contraception to women, or that somehow they will be “un-manned” if they aren’t spraying copious sperm in all directions.

I disagree with their pessimism, but that may just be my own twisted sense of personal responsibility and lack of chest-thumping insecurity.

Do you want to know more? Male Birth Control Could Actually Happen. But Do Men Want It? | WIRED

So now aspirin is not recommended to avert stroke and heart attack. Kinda. Sometimes.

Medical guidelines change. That doesn’t mean they are useless.

So a few things to know about health science.

Science as a whole is complicated and rarely conveyed well through half-glimpsed headlines. Popular media uses flashy headlines and forceful stories to assert stuff; stories that say that there are new indications of hints of trends of possible explanations for future consideration either don’t get written or are punched up to be read as more definitive.
Health science is really complicated, largely because we frown on human experimentation and therefore have to observe things much more indirectly and over time. Further, there’s no such thing as perfect health (no matter how many people want to sell you a pill or diet for it), just trying to optimize the battle against biological entropy.
There are few absolutes in health science, because every individual case has variations — genetics, lifestyle, environmental factors, medical history. The recommendation to “talk with your doctor” isn’t just advertising-speak; it’s an acknowledgement that broad truisms and “guidelines” only go so far, and that everything is a speculative cost-benefit exercise. It’s like tax advice, only a zillion times more complex.
Science in general is an ever-evolving body of knowledge. It’s not that things are “true” one day and “false” the next, or that scientists are constantly changing their minds, it’s just that what is known, what connections are made, is constantly advancing, the picture becoming less unclear over time.

So over the weekend we got blaring headlines saying “Doctors now say don’t take aspirin to avoid strokes, heart attacks.” Which can lead people to either roll their eyes at how “those doctors are always changing their minds,” or else a panic that “I’ve been doing it wrong and now I’m going to die!”

Neither is the case.

Even digging just a bit below the headlines indicates that the reason the guidelines have changed. Low dosage aspirin, for example, has always carried a certain level of risk (from bleeding, for example), but (as health science is always about compromises) that risk was considered offset by incremental reductions in risk of stroke and heart attack.

But now there are identified better and less-risky ways of addressing those stroke and heart attack chances — a preference for exercise and diet, use of statin medications, etc. Given that, taking an aspirin a day becomes less beneficial compared to its risks, in some cases, and so, in some cases, is no longer recommended.

It’s really about that simple.

And even that’s not an absolute. The guideline changes are for older adults without a history of or a high risk for heart disease. Doctors previously, for that population, might have suggested a children’s aspirin daily just to avert future problems. Now they probably won’t. But they might still if there are existing or potential conditions — past strokes, heart attacks, stents, open-heart surgery — because, again, the risk equation is different at that point, with the observed benefit for those populations outweighing known aspirin risks.

These are also not tablets (so to speak) passed down from the heavens; these are recommendations from the American Heart Association and the American College of Cardiology. Guidelines from other organizations may (and do) vary.

So, don’t lose faith in the medical profession; for all its flaws and human characteristics, it’s still the best game in town. Read past the headlines for more information than has been thrown out there to gather clicks and eyeballs. And, of course, “talk with your doctor” before making any sort of change (though maybe don’t bug them Day 1 of new guidelines coming out, because they’re still trying to digest and evaluate what it all means, too).

Do you want to know more? Daily low-dose aspirin no longer recommended as heart attack preventative for healthy adults – CNN (which, in all fairness, is not a bad headline to sum it all up)

Everybody gets tetanus shots, right? Wrong.

I grew up in a family paranoid about tetanus. If there was any sort of potentially infection injury or puncture (especially, but not exclusively, the proverbial rusty nail), records were consulted as to when I got my last tetanus shot. Nobody ended up growing a second head, and nobody got tetanus, and it all seems perfectly natural to me.

But I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that anti-vaxxers include tetanus shots in their holy regimen of Not Getting Vaccinated For Nuthin’.

Still, I suppose I have to admire this particular anti-vaxxing family’s dedication when, after having seen their kid nearly die of tetanus, with treatment including a month in the hospital, a tracheotomy so that he didn’t suffocate, and another month of rehab … they still refused to administer a tetanus shot for him.

Unlike measles anti-vaxxers, this isn’t going to infect anyone else. On the other hand, the hospital stay cost over $800K, and someone (i.e., other insurance holders, one way or another) will end up paying for it.

Do you want to know more? Anti-vax: Unvaccinated child with tetanus fights for life in Oregon

Yeah, apparently “catching up” on sleep over the weekend … doesn’t really help

A lot of us (ahem) get less sleep than we should during the week. But, hey, there’s the weekend, amirite? Sleep in on Saturday, maybe even Sunday, catch up on those Zs, feel all better, right?

Well, you may not be yawning as much Monday morning, but your body’s still a mess.

In the small study, Colorado researchers demonstrate that getting only five hours of sleep each night is associated with health consequences like eating more after dinner, weight gain, the delayed release of the sleep-linked hormone melatonin, and reduced whole-body insulin sensitivity. More importantly, these effects don’t go away after a weekend of sleeping as much as you want if your unhealthy sleep patterns resume after the weekend.

Oops.

One particular item might catch your eye:

Most of the health consequences they observed are commonly associated with disrupted sleep, but eating more after dinner might sound a little strange. The researchers explain that consuming more calories at the wrong time of day is associated with metabolic disruption, and so the fact that the sleep-deprived group ate almost 500 more calories after dinner than the well-rested group suggests that insufficient sleep messes with multiple pathways associated with metabolism.

Not just metabolic mess-up, but, one might hypothesize (ahem) additional opportunity to snack might play a role.

(In case you’re wondering as you read the article, ad libitum means “as much or as often as necessary or desired,” in translation “at one’s pleasure” or “as you desire”. It’s where we get the phrase “ad lib” from.)

Anyway, that’s kind of disheartening. I mean, I know I should get more sleep than I do, but I know I also treasure my evening hours consuming media and blogging and other stuff that the workday doesn’t allow. That it means I’m causing other problems than just yawning fits isn’t good, especially when that whole “500 calories” thing kicks in. And, worst of all, it seems I can’t even count on the weekend to make up for it.

Sigh.

Well, regardless, TGIF (in a couple of hours). Time for bed.

Because now is the PERFECT time to expand vaccine exemptions

In apparent reaction to the measles epidemic going on in the Pacific Northwest — caused, it seems, by enough kids being opted out of measles vaccines that herd immunity has been compromised — the bold GOP leadership of the state of Arizona is acting courageously and forthrightly on the matter: by expanding opt-out exemptions for vaccines.

Disregarding warnings by public health officials, an Arizona legislative panel on Thursday endorsed three bills that critics say will erode immunization coverage among Arizona schoolchildren. The House Health and Human Services Committee approved all three bills in contentious 5-4 votes that were split along party lines, with Republicans favoring the measures and Democrats voting in opposition.
[…] One of the measures — House Bill 2470 — not only expands vaccine exemption categories in Arizona, it gives parents additional leeway by removing the requirement that they sign a state health department form to get a vaccine exemption. “When a parent only has a government statement that they have to sign in order to qualify for an exemption that they don’t agree with, that is coercion. This allows them to either sign that or make their own statement,” said committee chairwoman Rep. Nancy Barto, R-Phoenix, who sponsored all three bills. “We are talking about a policy decision now for parents and we should attribute the best expectations on parents, not the worst.”
[…] Barto maintains the three bills she sponsored are about parental rights and freedom, and not about making any kind of a judgment on whether vaccines are good or bad. “We are here to acknowledge vaccines have a place, but it’s every parent’s individual right to decide the vaccine’s place in the child’s life,” Barto told committee members.

Which would be all fine and good if the choice to vaccinate only affected the kids in question. But that decision affects everyone — every child, baby, adult, especially those with compromised immune systems — that child will come in contact with.

Barto said the bills are about patients and she’s upset that some people who choose not to vaccinate their children, or who question vaccines are being bullied. “We shouldn’t have that type of attitude towards one another,” she said. “It’s not a one size fits all option for every child. … We need to look at the data, look at the science and recognize that there’s research on both sides. That’s my aim here, to strike that balance.”

No, really, there’s not “research on both sides.” Vaccinations work, the risks the carry are minimal, and the lives potentially saved are not just the kids being “protected” by anti-science parents, but the lives of everyone they touch.

Bad Words for Good Health!

To the extent that swearing is cathartic, it makes perfect sense that doing it can relieve stress and make you more calm and lead to positive health outcomes.

Unless doing it causes your mother to inflict blunt force trauma about your head and shoulders. So consider that health factor, too.

Swearing has more benefits than you may think — from improving your workouts to bonding with your coworkers
Americans curse about five times every hour. But there can be some benefits from swearing, from improving your workout to bonding with your coworkers.

Original Post

The germiest place in the airport? The security line

All those hands and germs and sighs and growls and stuff make those buckets of x-ray baggage pretty viral, and not in a popular way.

And how often do you think those touched-by-everyone buckets get cleaned?

I might keep my eyes open for a Purell station after going through my next TSA checkpoint. Except that won’t wash off my wallet, my luggage, or whatever else was sitting in those buckets.

(Other high-virus places in the study: any sort of payment keypad; stairway railings; passport counters.)

The dirtiest place at the airport is in the security line, study says |

Original Post

And once again, “normal” turns out not to be

We all know that a “normal” temperature is 98.6°F (37°C), right?

Uhhhhh, no, not so much.

That number was based on German research done 150 years ago, with a thermometer that wasn’t well calibrated and used a less reliable method of taking body temps. Not only does the average “health” temp appear to be different than that, but it even varies at different times of day, by gender, height, weight, and, heck, probably by phase of the moon.

Of course, we stick with a single, standard number because, well, that’s easy. We don’t have to think about it. And for most purposes, it’s correct enough to be useful. Plus, it’s what comes pre-printed on all the fever thermometers out there.

But it’s worth remembering that easy, simple, universal answers usually aren’t, and characterizing something as “normal” is almost always asking to have that characterization challenged.

98.6 Degrees Is A Normal Body Temperature, Right? Not Quite | WIRED
Fever is a more flexible concept than people assume, as new crowdsourced data helps show.

Original Post

One solution for the opioid epidemic: legalized pot

Locales with legalized marijuana (recreational or medicinal) appear to have lower opioid overdose rates, and lower rates of opioid prescriptions.

Places with legal marijuana issue fewer opioid prescriptions, large studies find
An analysis of more than five years of Medicare Part D and Medicaid prescription data found that after states legalized weed, the number of opioid prescriptions and the daily dose of opioids went way down.

View on Google+

The Rise and Fall of Margarine

We were very much a margarine household when I was growing up in the 60s-70s — soft margarine in tubs was a convenience, as well as being (per the accepted wisdom of the day) healthier than all that milk fat.

Today, I’m more than happy to deal with regular butter (just as spreadable when not kept in the fridge, which isn’t necessary if you eat it on a regular basis).

Reading the history of margarine — why it was actually such a useful idea, the fight against its spread (so to speak) in the US, and how it peaked then fell — is an interesting glimpse into food fashion and how things were not always as they are today, and won’t be tomorrow, either.

I can believe it’s not butter: The rise and fall of margarine
You may not have seen the commercial in years, but you’d recognize the setup instantly. Sweeping chords play and a day-dreaming, bespectacled housewife sighs as the screen does that fuzzy flashback fade. There are quick shots of vaguely fairy tale locales—an Italian palazzo, stately fountains, a rose garden straight out of Beauty And The Beast—and our suburban soccer mom reappears in flowing gown and sparkling jewels. Then we pan to the best gem …

View on Google+

Brainwave syncing, aging, and forgetting stuff

A change in how certain brainwaves sync up during deep sleep seems to be associated with getting memories to stick around for the long term. The challenge is, normal brain changes during aging interfere with this very process.

Older Adults’ Forgetfulness Tied To Faulty Brain Rhythms In Sleep : Shots – Health News : NPR

View on Google+

The Budget Words That Dare Not Speak Their Names

Officials at the Center for Disease Control and Protection (CDC) have been informed that certain terms must not, never, ever be used in their budget proposals.

“vulnerable”
“entitlement”
“diversity”
“transgender”
“fetus”
“evidence-based”
“science-based”

Budget item proposals that mention those terms in them are having them sent back for correction.

It’s not clear if it’s just that these words might upset people higher up the food chain (like the President), or whether by forbidding the words it might mean that CDC work can’t be done in those areas (which seems a bid feeble, to be honest), or whether it’s to keep GOP big donors from getting irked (which feels a bit of a stretch).

It’s just weird, in an odd quasi-Orwellian way. Which, I guess, shouldn’t be a surprise, but it just feels a little less blunt than the usual Trumpian surprise.

CDC gets list of forbidden words: fetus, transgender, diversity – The Washington Post
Agency analysts are told to avoid these 7 banned words and phrases in budget documents

View on Google+

On the Introduction of Diet Coke

While a bit self-congratulatory in places, this history of the development and roll-out of Diet Coke has some interesting trivia tidbits (the lower case “d” in the name was both a branding and legal decision) that make it worth a read.

The Extraordinary Story of How Diet Coke Came to Be
The original Diet Coke team tells the story of how they created, launched and marketed the number-one rated diet soda brand.

View on Google+

Comic books and dyslexia

Comic books are often recommended for dyslexics for training in reading, as the smaller chunks of text and illustrations can help make meaning clearer. There are typographic ways that comic book letterers could make that even more so, but aesthetics and tradition don’t necessarily make that the highest priority.

How Comic Books Can Get Even Better for Dyslexic Readers
While the medium is relatively accessible for people with reading difficulties, its lettering norms are still leaving some behind.

View on Google+

Iron Lungs

Iron Lungs are breathing assistance devices that were used to enable polio victims to survive. As polio recedes into memory here in the US (enough so that a lot of people have stopped vaccinating their kids for it, which might mean a sudden epidemic could bring it back big time), the number of people using iron lungs here has dwindled to just a tiny handful.

Here are some of their stories.

The Last of the Iron Lungs
Martha Lillard spends half of every day with her body encapsulated in a half-century old machine that forces her to breathe. Only her head sticks out of the end of the antique iron lung. On the other side, a motorized lever pulls the leather bellows, creating negative pressure that induces her lungs to suck in air.

View on Google+

Practicing medicine without … a computer?

So this initially heart-tugging tale of a rural doctor who’s been practicing medicine in Maine since 1968, has never bought (or learned how to use) a computer, now being forced out of medicine by the state … has a few more dimensions to it.

1. Not to go all ageist, but should an 84-year-old doctor consider retirement?

2. The state’s issue is that there’s supposed to be reporting from doctors into a database tracking opioid prescriptions. That’s not for nothing, and there’s likely related things a doctor might be asked to report in for public health reasons. If the physician cannot (and will not) do that — is it _un_reasonable for the state to prevent them from practicing?

3. If the doctor in question never touches computers, and has never bothered to learn, does that imply anything about the accessibility to up-to-date information and training that a doctor should be assumed to have? Are they actually keeping up with medical advances?

4. If the only “high tech” the doctor has is a landline phone, how are records for individuals sent to hospitals as needed? Hand-carried? Snail-mail? Is that a concern?

5. If we say, “Well, the doctor works in some poor rural community that desperately needs a doctor, and doesn’t need someone with all the latest-greatest information and databases and toys,” are we also saying that rural communities should have second-rate medical care, or that we’re happy if patients just get the treatment they need 80% of the time, or that our only societal choices for that community are to either have no doctor or have one that doesn’t measure up?

6. People (esp. tax-sensitive people) tend to pooh-pooh the idea of broadband access as a human right. If that’s a (legal, if not also medical) necessity for a doctor to practice in a community … that begins to sound like a human right, or at least societal obligation, to provide such service.

It’s a more interesting story in its implications than at first blush.

Elderly doctor: I lost my license because I don’t know how to use a computer | Ars Technica
Doc says her paper records are just fine—state medical board disagrees.

View on Google+