Month: January 2016

A Friend? Must You Have…

airport2

My wife and I had planned a three day trip to celebrate our anniversary. 

Extended family was in town to watch our boys over the long weekend while we were going to be away. And, yes, it’s always challenging getting out the door.

I’m not talking about the often bizarre scenarios that befall my private-practice patients in the hours leading up to any scheduled vacation. I’m really just talking about parenting.

If you’ve been there… you know. You just know.

The school lunch supplies must be lined out and ready to go. Clothes have to be washed. Instructions for this and that must be given for the extended family. I really thought I stressed about these things far less than other parents, until I saw my kitchen completely covered with post’em notes.

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Cancerous Beliefs On Screening

cancer_screening2

Cancer screening has NEVER been shown to save lives.

That’s the eye-catching title of a recent article emanating from Academic medicine.

I liked it.

I’ve known for some time that we bother too many patients with absolutely no symptoms of disease under the guise of Evidence Based Medicine (EBM). So, of course, I started reading it.

The lead author has been involved with other discombobulating publications of statistical mumbo-jumbo. So, naturally, I wondered what sensible and non-sensible use of statistics I’d encounter.

It didn’t take long for me to find both.

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Just Passing Time

football

We got the urge to play catch with the football today.

My oldest son is eight.

We weren’t interested in football before this season. But, we recently started watching a few games on television together. We now check the scores of them every day.

I told my son that it’s not like baseball. You have to wait a week between games. But, that doesn’t matter to him, he checks the scores anyway. As if they might change. For Dallas Cowboys’ sake, I’ve been hoping they will.

Rather than watch an entire game, I often encourage that we go outside and play at some point. We usually do. I even suggest a few potential activities–ride a bike, swing a bat, throw a frisbee, you get the point. Playing catch with the football, however, has just never been what he wants to do.

Until today.

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