I got myself into a bit of tussle on Twitter today. In a provocative piece on the newsletter Persuasion, Dr. Sally Satel argued for caution in the matter of doctors becoming political activists. I retweeted it below: Most of the replies express extreme disagreement. One question stood out as worthy of a longer reply than […]
Deeper Worries in America
I worry about the coronavirus. It’s already killed more than 100,000 Americans. The recent protests have created a nerve-wracking public-health situation for the next weeks. I really worry about racism. Not only racism in police systems but more systemic racism in our culture. My friend Dr. Andrew Foy sent me this slide and post showing […]
More on COVID19 Testing and How This Virus Makes Us Use Our Noggins
My friend Anish Koka, a cardiologist, wrote a beautiful review of COVID testing over at the HealthCareBlog. The great pandemic is wreaking havoc, we are told, because the nation is not testing enough. The consensus from a diverse group that includes public health experts, economists, and silicon valley investors is that more testing will allow […]
Can We Discuss Flatten-the-Curve in COVID19? My Eight Assertions
On Telehealth, an older couple asked me a tough question about COVID19. They asked whether this virus would either be gone or less dangerous in 6 months to a year. It was a curious question. I replied, Why do you ask? Doc, we have a big family with many children and grandchildren, most of whom […]
2020 Mandrola Update
Many things have changed in my life. I still practice electrophysiology full-time in Louisville. I still write. And I still love endurance exercise. You haven’t seen many blog updates because my writing has taken different forms. One is academic writing. In 2019, I co-authored 21 academic papers. Here is a link to the papers on […]
Missing an Obvious Cause of Medical Overuse
This post introduces my latest column over at Medscape. I hope you go read the full piece. Medical overuse bothers me. Consuming medical care that does not improve outcomes makes you poorer, and puts you at risk for being harmed. I think a lot about why Americans consume more healthcare than our peers in other […]
We get what we tolerate…
Richard Fries, a cycling-safety advocate in Boston, uses the phrase we get what we tolerate to describe the dire situation of drivers killing cyclists and pedestrians. Many humans die from these collisions because we tolerate it. An inattentive driver kills a person on a bike; then nothing changes. The phrase applies well to other dubious […]
Uplifting book — The Rosie Project
Good book alert: This holiday weekend I read The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion. Simsion sets the story of a nutty genetics professor in Melbourne, Australia. The book is sweet, funny and uplifting. It’s a perfect escape from the mean-spiritedness of today’s news cycle. An Australian electrophysiologist who I had dinner with during the recent […]
Changing the mind of a doctor — Not an easy matter
Changing one’s mind is hard. Changing the mind of doctors is even harder. Doctors are supposed to be the medical experts. Often we are. But sometimes I wonder whether our attachments to old ideas gets in the way of seeing the obvious. I am reading Michael Lewis’s book The Undoing Project. Learning how Kahneman and […]
Politics and Understanding the Human Condition
I recently received this message: This is not the first time I’ve been scolded for straying from medical topics. Last October, during the Lown Institute’s RightCare Action Week, I wrote about our ailing healthcare system. This prompted a different reader to send a similar message: Stick with topics about atrial fibrillation–went the gist of that […]
Right Care — There is always something to do
Some of my most poignant moments in medicine happen after the ablations and devices are finished. That’s when I go visit with patients up in the medical wards. My legs are fried from standing all day. So I sit, a key move because then you are ready to listen. One good thing about computers in […]
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