When a nuclear bomb explodes, the damage it inflicts does not occur solely at the point of impact. Even more insidious are the shock waves and emanating fallout, which seep, cancer-like, into the surrounding soil and air, gradually poisoning and eroding the earth and sky for miles past the smoking crater. In Washington, DC, we […]
My friend Dan was a guy full of energy; when he was stressed out, he retreated to the woods for hiking and healing. Nature was his sanctuary until the day he was bitten by a deer tick. In a week, a circular rash appeared and fever set in. He brushed it off, only going to […]
Feeling virtuous, you order a spring greens salad at the new vegan restaurant. After some sparkling mineral water and fruit sorbet, you’re off for a mile-long stroll in the fresh air. What could be healthier? But within hours, you are doubled over with cramps and go racing for the bathroom. Oops! You have just become […]
“No great mind has ever existed without a touch of madness.” Aristotle Beethoven suffered from severe depression and had been self-medicating with alcohol for many years before he died of liver failure in 1827. Vaslav Nijinsky was considered the greatest male dancer of his era. His innovative modern choreography in ballet bordered on heresy, once […]
Before lab tests, before xrays and even before thermometers, people got sick, and someone had to figure out what was wrong with them. Diagnostics have always been an important step in healing. So how did people do it in days of yore? The earliest records of medicine are from the Ancient Egyptians. The Edwin Smith […]
Doctors have been regarded as superheroes and omnipotent beings, as trusted saviors and givers of life. The doctor has also been reviled as a blood-sucking pill pusher with a luxury lifestyle financed on the back of inflated fees. The truth is that physicians are as varied as the patients they treat … and today, the […]
One of my favorite literary quotes is from Stephen King’s, Cell, a gory tale in which most of the US population is turned into zombies by a frequency transmitted via their cell phones. Shortly before getting her brains bashed in by a lurching humanoid, one of the few remaining survivors says, “Don’t ever assume. ASSUME […]
Most of us who are making resolutions this year have already made the same promise at least once, possibly many times. So why do we keep falling back into the same rut over and over again? Because personal change is really freakin’ hard, and navigating that particular mine field it is not a subject we […]
Today, a friend of mine was told that he has diabetes. It’s a story that is becoming all too familiar. For perspective on this creeping plague, I went browsing in the Diabetes Atlas. It was a real eye opener. I had no idea diabetes was such a global killer. In 2015, AIDS-related illnesses killed 1.2 […]
It’s getting harder and harder to tell the difference between the real presidential debates and “Saturday Night Live’s” satirical version of them. The election has crossed a line. We are not watching a political exchange any longer; we are watching a new reality show that has somehow managed to carry a braying donkey into the […]