Tag: health-care
-
International, Multilingual Eye-test Chart, 1907
At the turn of the twentieth century, in San Francisco, German optometrist George Mayerle created and published the “international” eye-test chart: “an artifact of an immigrant nation—produced by a German optician in a polyglot city where West met East (and which was then undergoing massive rebuilding after the 1906 earthquake)—and of a globalizing economy”. Running…
-
Medicine, Specialism, and the Scientific Education
In the commencement speech he delivered to the graduates of Stanford’s School of Medicine earlier this year, Atul Gawande eloquently (as ever) examined the state of modern medicine (in the U.S. specifically, the world generally), the problem with specialism, and the problem of specialists trying to fit into a system not necessarily designed for it.…
-
Personal Responsibility and Our Irresponsible Behaviours
Even though we may be reluctant to pay a premium for our insurance because of others who engage in irresponsible behaviours (for example: smoking, overeating and health insurance), Sandeep Jauhar, M.D. reminds us of some pertinent results from the health care field. Jauhar provides evidence that “punitive measures to force healthy behavior” do not work;…
-
The Health Care Debate To Date
For the health care debate that has been raging in America of late, I have subscribed to the same philosophy as Ben Casnocha: I’ve decided I’m just going to read it about once it’s resolved. You can’t keep up with everything. Rather than lightly follow along and skim articles and pretend to be informed, I’m…