Medical gaslighting is the term used when patients feel their doctors dismiss their symptoms as minor or psychosomatic. Women complain doctors are prone to blame symptoms on such things as weight and mental health. Women presenting with symptoms of heart disease are twice as likely to have their medical condition dismissed as mental illness than men with similar symptoms.
Author: Devon Herrick
Would you see a dental therapist rather than a dentist?
About 60 million Americans live in “dental deserts” with little access to dental care. Those of us who live in a “dental oasis” often find dental care is expensive (OK, I made that last term up). Here I wrote about traveling 2,500 miles to Costa Rica for specialty dental care, but there are easier ways to access routine dental care. I could go to Minnesota and see a dental therapist, for example.
Price Gouging 101: How a medical flight cost $500k
In late 2020 an unemployed North Carolina bartender and his wife were visiting relatives in Wyoming when the man fell seriously ill. He was quickly airlifted to the University of Colorado Hospital outside Denver, where he was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a form of blood cancer. His insurance paid that air ambulance bill, from Wyoming to Colorado, deeming it medically necessary.
Read the article in Kaiser Health News
The US Tried Permanent Daylight Saving Time in the ’70s (and the ‘40s)
A bill recently passed the Senate that would make Daylight Savings Time (DST) permanent, observed year around. It would do away with Standard Time. This is not the first time Congress has flirted with making DST year around. On December 14, 1973 Congress voted to make DST year around for two years. President Nixon signed the bill on December 15. The United States also tried year around DST during World War II. Supposedly people hated it.