- My.Trusted.MD
- Columns
- Healthy Living
- Heart Advisor
- Surgery Insider
- Medical Imaging
- Nutrition & Life
- Skin Care & Beauty
- Wellness Report
- A Patient's Journey
- Insurance Dispatch
- Medical Bill Advisor
- Medical Marketing
- Physician EMR Review
- Practice Appraisal
- Entrepreneurship
- Medical Billing
- Healthcare PR
- New Health Leader
- Quality Advocate
- RHIO Monitor
- Hippocrates
- Personal Musings
- Bloggers
- About
- Contact
A Platform For Obama And The Democrats
Featured in: Wellness Report
A wellness ethic, banner and platform as a foundation for the change we can all believe in - and vote for.| A Platform For Obama And The Democrats |
email
delicious
digg
technoratiAuthor Info
An Open Letter to Organized Medicine: Resist Calls to Regulate Medical Blogging!
Featured in: Hippocrates
Professional groups are asked to tell medical bloggers what to do. These calls must not go without rebuttal. Enough with nonsense!Two weeks ago I wrote about how the blurring of personal and professional boundaries is causing controversy around medical blogging. I commented on the survey of "medical blog professionalism" and calls for regulation.
Now, these calls for punitive regulation of bloggers are intensifying. In a recent issue of American Medical News, the study author argues that "professional groups should adopt policies explicitly addressing blogging ethics". Apparently the issue is up for grabs, as no such policies are being developed yet.
This misguided idea should not see the light of day. Why?
Author Info
Reducing the pain of Rheumatoid Arthritis
Featured in: Nutrition & Life
Some ideas that may help reduce the pain of rheumatoid arthritis, and possibly bring the disease into remission.Rheumatoid arthritis is an auto-immune disease where the body attacks itself - specifically the synovial linings of joints causing swelling, pain and inflammation, and also on occasion, various organs of the body. What causes rheumatoid arthritis is unknown, but it has been noticed that many if not most people with RA had some kind of emotional trauma in their past, which may have decreased immune function enough to allow an infection that may precipitate the disease. RA seems to be more prevalent in women, and tends to first affect people between the ages of 20 and 50. As with all diseases, I feel it is important NOT to treat the disease per se, but rather the person with the disease, by looking at what is going on with the individual. Every person would need a different treatment depending on what is found through functional-medicine testing.
Author Info
I have always been interested in what we can do to make ourselves as healthy as possible. We cannot change our genetics, but there is much that is within our control that can have an impact on whether we are healthy or whether we suffer with pain and disease.
I was the top graduating student at the University of Toronto in Physical and Health Education in 1992, where I studied anatomy, physiology, exercise physiology, nutrition and how exercise can improve health. In 1997 moved to Vancouver and started a personal-training business.
I became frustrated by my inability to help my clients through their various aches and pains, and pursued further education through the CHEK Institute in San Diego. I learned an incredible amount, and became far more effective with my clients suffering from low-back pain, but still found some clients did not respond as I felt they should and I didn't understand why.
I began to read and read. I began to appreciate how nutrition and other lifestyle factors can have a huge impact on healing or the lack of healing. It became obvious to me that there is a lot more to orthopeadic problems than simply looking at the physical. I took the CHEK Holistic Lifestyle Consultation course which solidified what I had been learning. Disease is a function of bodily systems being out of balance, and when we do what is necessary to bring the individual back into balance our health is restored.
My hope is that through this site you can travel the wellness journey with me and prevent illness, or if you are ill, you can learn some ways to become well again.
Mortality & Transparency
Featured in: Insurance Dispatch
Health care transparency now extends to actual mortality rates. Is this a good thing?Transparency in health care is a recurring theme in my columns here at Trusted.MD. While we usually discuss health care costs, it's important to note that, in the long run, "buying cheap" isn't always (or even usually) the least expensive route. So we also urge carriers and providers to be more proactive in discussing how well they do, not just how much they charge for doing it.
Recently, USA Today reporters Steve Sternberg and Anthony DeBarros provided us with some encouraging news on that front:
Author Info
A Wellness Take On The Olympics
Featured in: Wellness Report
Is there a wellness way of experiencing, assessing, enjoying and making sense of the Olympic festivities? I believe there is. Enjoy.Author Info
Move Over, Press Release: SEC Approves Blogs for Official Disclosure
Featured in: Hippocrates
PR industry alert: Recent rulings by SEC establish blogs as an official communication channel for corporate disclosures.Blogs continue their inexhorable march towards mainstream. The latest milestone is a ruling by SEC, blessing their use for official corporate disclosure. This brings to an end the monopoly of press releases and newswires.
This decision has been awaited for almost two years. Back in 2006, Jon Schwartz, the CEO of Sun Microsystem and the first major CEO blogger, asked Christopher Cox, the SEC Chairman to modernize Reg FD disclosure rules. I mentioned this in my post on the role of blogging in public health.
How is this SEC ruling significant?
Author Info
Stress reduction through heart coherence
Featured in: Nutrition & Life
“When the emotional brain is out of order the heart suffers and wears out. Proper functioning of the heart turns out influence the brain as well.”Dr. David Servan-Schreiber, MD, PhD goes on to say that “Some cardiologists and neurologists go so far as to refer to a “heart-brain system” that cannot be dissociated.” The brain and the heart are connected via the autonomic peripheral nervous system, which is not under conscious control and regulates organ function. As I’ve discussed in many other posts, the sympathetic branch (fight or flight), raises heart rate, blood pressure etc. whereas the parasympathetic branch slows heart rate, lowers blood pressure etc. The goal for optimal health is to have the two branches balance each other, rather than have one branch (usually the sympathetic one) racing out of control. It is now known that the heart produces some of its own hormones, and actually has its own perceptions, which can influence the function of the whole body including the brain. It sends messages back to the brain via direct nerve connections also, creating an interconnected loop. So, learning how to control the heart can make a huge difference in our ability to come to peace with the emotional brain.
Author Info
I have always been interested in what we can do to make ourselves as healthy as possible. We cannot change our genetics, but there is much that is within our control that can have an impact on whether we are healthy or whether we suffer with pain and disease.
I was the top graduating student at the University of Toronto in Physical and Health Education in 1992, where I studied anatomy, physiology, exercise physiology, nutrition and how exercise can improve health. In 1997 moved to Vancouver and started a personal-training business.
I became frustrated by my inability to help my clients through their various aches and pains, and pursued further education through the CHEK Institute in San Diego. I learned an incredible amount, and became far more effective with my clients suffering from low-back pain, but still found some clients did not respond as I felt they should and I didn't understand why.
I began to read and read. I began to appreciate how nutrition and other lifestyle factors can have a huge impact on healing or the lack of healing. It became obvious to me that there is a lot more to orthopeadic problems than simply looking at the physical. I took the CHEK Holistic Lifestyle Consultation course which solidified what I had been learning. Disease is a function of bodily systems being out of balance, and when we do what is necessary to bring the individual back into balance our health is restored.
My hope is that through this site you can travel the wellness journey with me and prevent illness, or if you are ill, you can learn some ways to become well again.
Open Source Software and Patents: An Uneasy Journey of Discovery and Understanding
Featured in: Quality Advocate
Answers the question: Can software patents exist in the free open source world?Over the past three months, I've been communicating at length with several leaders in the Open Source Software (OSS) community about how best to license software patents in a way that supports the goal of OSS developers, users, and distributors. I've learned a great deal along the way about the uneasy relationship between OSS and software patents.Â
Author Info
Dr. Steve Beller is a clinical psychologist, author, researcher, software inventor, President/CEO of National Health Data Systems, and a principal of the PHIN Consortium, a group of I.T. vendors and health consultants offering innovative healthcare products and services. His life goal is to work with others to help re-direct the course of humankind, so we don't have to be ashamed of the world we’re leaving our children.
Toward that end, Dr. Beller spent the past 25 years in creative pursuits, including inventing unique software systems, writing about the healthcare crisis and cures, and developing close personal and professional bonds with fine individuals across the globe.
Dr. Beller's current activities are devoted to (a) consumer empowerment through comprehensive mind-body-environment health assessments yielding deep understanding, “information therapy” supporting self-maintenance and knowledgeable decision-making, and guidance from collaboration with health professionals & peers; (b) continuous improvement of sick-care and well-care safety, effectiveness and efficiency through use of evolving evidence-based guidelines; (c) international efforts to improve the health and well-being of the elderly and impoverished; (d) establishment of cost-effective RHIO architectures using disruptive technology; and (e) supporting first responders and trauma department staff in pandemics, disasters and terrorist attacks.
For more, please see his extended bio here.
A WELLNESS TAKE ON SEX
Featured in: Wellness Report
Why are women not encouraged to have more sex? Why isn't everybody so prompted? All is explained.|
Sex is a thermonuclear topic, one that interests everyone but is avoided in polite society and in church, unless of course it's a Catholic church, in which case it is not avoided in the least -- it is consistently denounced. Yet, we all love sex, some unconsciously. |
Author Info
Contrasting Personal vs. Professional Uses of Social Media: The Case of Healthcare Blogging
Featured in: Hippocrates
Where is the boundary between personal and professional use of the Internet? What does this mean for healthcare social media?I was planning to write a post on the differences in "personal vs. professional" uses of blogs and social media for a while, but wanted to wait for some good material to analyze before hitting the "Publish" button.
The recent study in Journal of General Internal Medicine, called Content of Weblogs Written by Health Professionals (full-text PDF hosted by Pharmalot), looks at habits of an "average" medical blogger and tries very hard to paint them in a negative light, questioning their "professionalism".
This sets the stage for drawing personal vs. professional contrast:
Author Info
Syndicate
