“Dealing with a chronic is miserable”

Meredith Goldstein is a journalist for the Boston Globe. She covers “everything from nightlife to New Kids” with “her eyes peeled for celebrity juice”. So, naturally, when the Globe’s editors decided they needed someone to destroy their readers’ lives, Meredith was the obvious choice: Q: … I have been in a relationship for about four [...]

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Thu, August 13 2009 » Uncategorized » 3 Comments

Look good, feel good

Kairol at Everything Changes is a bit skeptical of efforts to make fashionable hospital gowns: Despite my loathing for hospital gowns, I recognize that those fly-away openings and simple, barely-there closures exist for easy access. In the end, forget designer garbs, I’d rather docs be able to access my body – especially in case of [...]

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Wed, May 13 2009 » Uncategorized » No Comments

The adventure begins!

So, having written the last post, I decided to try out some of the links and tools Dr. Chen mentioned in her column. The first thing I did (yesterday) was schedule an appointment with my primary care provider, using the medical group’s online tool. I specified that I wanted to meet with my established PCP. [...]

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Fri, January 9 2009 » Uncategorized » 4 Comments

Well researched

As if to redeem herself for her prior column on the subject, Pauline Chen, MD has included a lengthy list of links in her most recent column about how patients can research and choose their medical care. (Most of the links are on page 2 of the article.) This is timely for me, because I [...]

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Thu, January 8 2009 » Uncategorized » No Comments

Tips for the damned

In nearly any other country, this would be a bizarre joke: Laid Off? 10 Health Care Tips. Sadly, in our great nation it not only makes sense, but is actually necessary.

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Mon, December 15 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments

10 lessons of (x)

NY Times editor Dana Jennings offers 10 Lessons of Prostate Cancer, but it’s striking how generic his lessons are. You don’t need prostate cancer – or any cancer – to know that not all techs are created equal, or that humor is all around you, or that nurses can be tremendously helpful. Any serious illness [...]

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Tue, November 25 2008 » Uncategorized » 1 Comment

Capable and revised

This is a revision of an earlier post, because some people get too hung up on sex (“ewww”) to appreciate the main idea. The original post is still valid, but this should help clarify the essential ideas. So, anyway. The question of a right to health care is related to another problem: our health care [...]

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Fri, November 14 2008 » Uncategorized » 2 Comments

The things I carried

I feel a sudden urge to turn from controversy towards something more useful. I never intended this blog to be given over to complaining about docbloggers – it just happened that way – but I do want it to helpful, especially to sick people. With that in mind, a little backstory: in 2006, I was [...]

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Thu, November 6 2008 » Uncategorized » No Comments