Harm Reduction

Why do teaching hospitals feel the need to write articles justifying why they are better? What secret fear? Certainly not the rightfully discredited belief that the arrival of the new class of interns heralds a spike in hospital deaths.

Surgeons prescribe pain medications, makes sense; pain is a frequent “adverse” effect of surgical care. And with the drumbeats of concern over opioid addiction, physicians have reassessed our prescribing habits.

To become a Board Certified surgeon, you must have completed a five to six-year approved training program and then run the gauntlet of two examinations.

Last week, I spoke at the 9th European Beer and Health Summit in Brussels,* an academic conference that discusses the latest research into the effects of moderate alcohol consumption on health.

Teenagers are rebellious and they do stupid things. This is a fact of life that we have to accept, whether we like it or not.

Time for a riddle: Q: What is the difference between Pez and Juul?

Surgical risk is a here and now proposition; you get the outcome of your surgical management right away; the acuity of the timing makes it difficult to claim an adverse result was solely due to the disease or the patient.

It is a given, at least in healthcare involving procedures, that more experience results in better outcomes.

It is not one world, culturally or economically. For many in the developing world, indoor air pollution comes from the open fires and solid fuels they use to cook.

Reprinted with permission of the author and the Cato Institute. Dr.