Several years ago I got a full-body CT scan. It found a spot on my liver that was “statistically unlikely” to be anything serious. It also found something else that was just a typical anomaly and told me my coronary arteries were in great shape for my age. I don’t recall what else it found but it wasn’t something that changed my life. A few years earlier a relative got a full-body CT scan because of pain in his side that his doctor wasn’t taking seriously. It found kidney stones. Someone else I know got his & her body scans. What all these scans have in common was they were all direct-to-consumer, with no input from their doctors. They were also all paid for in cash.
Category: Direct Primary Care
Tuesday Links
- MLK fact of the day: black men are more likely to graduate from college than go to prison. In 2009, it was the other way around.
- Workers at 22 federal agencies plan a walk out today to protest Biden’s policies affecting Gaza.
- Last year Congress failed to reauthorize key parts of “the single-most impactful US government program ever, saving 25 million lives over the past 20 years.”
- FAA (which regulates the airlines) has a DEI policy that emphasizes recruiting and hiring people with targeted disabilities, including “hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism.”
- The University of California Los Angeles School of Medicine segregates and separates its first-year medical students based on their race, color and/or national origin. (WSJ)
- “Gas station heroin” peddled at convenience stores. (NYT)
Friday Links
- Why the federal debt grows: Spending, not taxes, explains it all.
- Newsom extends free healthcare to 700,000 Illegal Immigrants, despite record budget deficit.
- What part of the health care system does not have any organized lobby in Washington? Patients.
- What is the rate of return on exercise in terms of life extension? 5.8%
- The US has higher health care prices that other countries, but it also delivers more care than any other country.
- Rising syphilis rates linked to lack of prenatal care.
WSJ: Wearing Socks to Bed is Not Crazy. Just a Way to Sleep Better
My wife wears socks to bed because her feet get cold at night. I never wear socks to bed because my feet rarely feel cold. Plus, I do not like the feeling of something tight around my feet. Socks also grip the sheets and tug on them when I roll over. I never really thought wearing socks to bed was anything more than a personal choice by people with different attitudes about comfort while sleeping.