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Recent Posts
- Sugar, Sugar
- Friday Medical Comedy Relief
- Enter the Consumer
- Safe Travels?
- Are You Still Working On That?
- Vision Without Execution is Hallucination
- Not Quite a No-Brainer
- Study the Boomers! An Xconomy Report on Education
- Where The Boys Are…And Not The Girls: Tales from the 2012 JP Morgan Healthcare Conference
- Where in the World is Lisa Suennen?
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Category Archives: Health and Wellness
Sugar, Sugar
Last week there was a report about a patron of the Las Vegas-based Heart Attack Grill suffering a massive heart attack while consuming the restaurant’s famed “Triple-bypass Burger.” It would be funny if it weren’t so awful, but it is clearly the height of irony. I have written a few articles about the Heart Attack Grill (see here and here) mainly tongue-in-cheek but with a serious bent; but when you see an article like this, it is hard to say anything other than, “coulda seen that coming.” That issue of personal responsibility is a huge theme when it comes to poor eating behavior. Typically, others look at the offender and say, “well, they shoulda known….they shoulda controlled their eating habits, serves them right…now pass the French fries.”
From an academic standpoint, however, that issue of diet-related personal responsibility is in question. Well-known physician and researcher, Robert Lustig, a leader in the UCSF Department of Pediatrics and the Director of the UCSF Center for Obesity Assessment, Study and Treatment believes there is more to the story. This is a guy who has made a career of studying and treating … (read the rest)
Posted in Consumer Engagement, Health and Wellness, Healthy Eating, Preventive Health, Uncategorized
Tagged claire brindis, daniela jakubowicz, dessert for breakfast, diabetes, healthy eating, heart attack grill, high fructose corn syrup, mars inc, obesity, psilos, robert lustig, soda tax, sugar, sugar regulation, toxic truth about sugar
2 Comments
Enter the Consumer
I was in Newport Beach last week to chair IBF’s Consumer Health and Wellness Innovation Summit. It was a very interesting event with about 100 people from many different segments of the health and wellness industry—a very eclectic crowd. There were people there from healthy food purveyors (Nestle, Kelloggs), provider organizations (MDVIP), health insurance firms (United Health Group, SeeChange Health) and even the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. There were also a plethora of entrepreneurs representing a variety of emerging wellness and preventive health companies and, of course, the venture firms that they love and hate. 10 years ago you could not fill a room with people to talk about consumer health; now it is becoming a mainstream topic.
The consumer, aka the patient, has been largely absent from the healthcare discussion for far too long. Yet recently, a harmonic convergence of events has put the consumer center stage in the healthcare discussion. Those events include:
- The devastating human and financial toll of chronic illness. CDC estimates that 50% of Americans over 18 have one or more chronic illness. At the event I had the wonderful
Posted in Consumer Engagement, Health and Wellness, Healthcare, Healthy Eating, Preventive Health, Uncategorized
Tagged consumer engagement, hartman group, health and wellness, health insurance exchange, healthy eating, ibf health and wellness, mark murrison, mdvip, preventive health, richard migliori, seechange health
6 Comments
Safe Travels?
I am writing this from seat 13F on Southwest’s flight to Orange County, CA, headed to my role as chairman of this year’s IBF Conference on Consumer Health and Wellness Innovation. Ironic, I think, as I have become increasingly confident that air flight is the antithesis of health and wellness. Some people believe that the most dangerous place on earth is Somalia or Syria or the inside of Newt Gingrich’s brain, but in terms of places I am likely to go, I think that the inside of one of these flying tubes ranks right up there.
As I read my notes for the conference while standing in the line to board the plane, I noticed that the sign at the plane’s door informs you that the jet fuel fumes that permeate the jetway are known to cause cancer and birth defects. That was, of course, the first note of irony in my day, as I was reading about the kinds of activities individuals can and should do to minimize the risk of such afflictions as diabetes and cancer. The lists always includes eating broccoli and getting proper sleep, but no … (read the rest)
Are You Still Working On That?
This week humorist Andy Borowitz sent out a Tweet on Twitter (I still feel like an idiot when I say Tweet with a straight face) which said, “Waiters say “Are you still working on that?” because Americans treat eating like a career.” As with all things Andy Borowitz, it was meant to be be funny but with the hard ring of truth. By the way, if you want to laugh until you snort your Starbucks order out through your nose, follow Borowitz’ coverage of the US Presidential campaign, which you can get HERE. You’re welcome.
But back to the point at hand. Americans spend more time thinking and talking about their next meal than do the Ethiopians, and that’s saying something. God knows what percent of TV commercials are for junk food, but it’s a healthy number (or unhealthy one as the case may be). I haven’t seen the 2012 Super Bowl yet, but I’m going to wager that at least 1/3 of the high priced ads are going to be for things that you really want to eat or drink but really but shouldn’t. The other 2/3 of … (read the rest)
Posted in Consumer Engagement, Health and Wellness, Healthcare Policy, Healthy Eating, Preventive Health, Uncategorized
Tagged baconator, bobby deen, healthy eating, healthy food, healthy food sports arena, hostess bankruptcy, iPhone healthy eating apps, obesity and school lunch, paula deen, psilos, snowballs cakes, unhealthy eating
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Not Quite a No-Brainer
I just read an article entitled 25 Things You Didn’t Know About the Human Brain. As a lay-person who works in the medical field, I love these stories that attempt to turn the true mysteries of science and medicine into pop culture style information digestible by the masses. While some of the facts in the brain article were more to the structural (the brain has 100,000 miles of blood vessels in it), others were more intriguing and got my imagination wandering.
My favorite factoid in the article was this: your brain generates between 10 and 23 watts of power at rest, enough to power a light bulb. I wonder if this is what led to the convention of showing a light bulb above the head to connote the formation of an idea. Perhaps this is a revelation that might lead to a solution to our nation’s demand for clean energy (excepting those with dirty minds, I suppose). Is there any way to harness the wattage of sleeping people to power their iPads and iPhones for tomorrow’s business day? Just think: no more slumming at Starbucks to use the free … (read the rest)
Posted in Health and Wellness, Random Thoughts of the Day, Uncategorized
Tagged brain, brain science, gelology, human brain, laughter, psilos
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Study the Boomers! An Xconomy Report on Education
Xconomy, an extremely informative and smart web publication, today released a special Report on the Future of Education They compiled the content of the report by canvassing their Xconomists—whom they refer to as some of the world’s leading innovators, entrepreneurs, and investors—for their thoughts on what students should study to be prepared for the future. The specific question they posed was this: What should students be studying now to prepare for 10 years from now?
Twenty-two of Xconomy’s advisors, these so-called Xconomists, gave a variety of interesting responses. Fortunate to be among the esteemed list of people whose opinions were included, my answer was this: Study the Boomers! The article below was the substance of my specific response, which can also be found on the Xconomy website by clicking HERE.
Study the Boomers!
The Who once sang, “I hope I die before I get old.” Despite their best efforts to exit the planet early, most of them didn’t. They and their fellow Baby Boomers represent the greatest technology and business opportunity of the 21st Century.
It is typical for each of us to be drawn to areas for … (read the rest)
Where in the World is Lisa Suennen?
Warning: shameless self-promotion today—will be back to more thematic ideas next week if my feet and I survive the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference and Circus, which is occurring this entire week in San Francisco. Pretty much the entire healthcare world shows up for this, which means you see old friends and new, as well as people you hoped you might not have to see again. If you wanted to “Occupy Healthcare,” this is the place to do it. In any event, It always an interesting experience full of insight, deal-making, cocktail therapy and blister treatments. So for now, with time somewhat limited for committing deep-ish thoughts to paper, I thought I’d put a plug out there for a few conferences at which I have been fortunate to be invited to speak.
The first is The Personalized Medicine World Conference (PMWC), which bills itself as the only fully integrated conference to examine the advances and challenges of Personalized Medicine through a practical lens. PMWC brings together the thought-leaders of business, government, healthcare-delivery, research and technology into one information-rich, two-day conference and offers a really interesting agenda looking at the ideas of personalized medicine … (read the rest)
Posted in Girls Rule!, Health and Wellness, Uncategorized, Women in Venture Capital & Private Equity
Tagged Business of Healthcare Conference, Haas school of business, healthcare conference, IBF Health & Wellness Innovation Summit, Lisa Suennen, Personalized Medicine World Conference, professional business women of california, psilos
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Come Forth into the Light of Things
Come forth into the light of things, let nature be your teacher–William Wordsworth
So here it is, the last day of my winter vacation, and I am sitting inside watching people play ball outside at the Rose Bowl. It might not seem so crazy to those of you who either love football or live in a cold climate that one would spend January 2nd indoors; but where I live it is about 60 degrees and sunny. While I do love watching football, there is no legitimate weather-related excuse for being indoors, particularly since I have TIVO.
In addition to watching large men smash into each other on TV, I also used today to catch up on old magazines that are currently forming a looming architectural structure in my home that is getting large enough to require a light to alert approaching airplanes. The fact that I am staring into a screen (while my daughter is next to me playing Temple Run on her iPhone) and not frolicking out in nature became particularly poignant as I finally got to a November 7th Newsweek article entitled “Don’t Let the … (read the rest)
Croaking in a Winter Wonderland
If you are reading this, you have already dodged 2/3 of the bullet.
I read a sobering statistic this week that heart attacks are more prevalent in December and January than any other time of year in the U.S. More specifically, if you are seeking to experience the full religious effect of Christmas, you have a great chance of seeing God personally on that day since December 25th is one of the three most common days of the year to die of a heart attack. If the heart attack doesn’t kill you on Christmas proper, don’t despair; you will have an equally good chance to watch year-end football from inside the Pearly Gates since the next two most common heart attack death days are December 26th and New Year’s Day. Place your Rose Bowl bets early and hand the ticket off to a loved one just in case. Prediction: Badgers make Oregon quack like a duck.
Doctors don’t have a full understanding of why the heart decides not to go on during these specific days, but they have several hypotheses. Much to my surprise, none of them include:
- The
Age is a High Price to Pay for Maturity
Age is a high price to pay for maturity—Tom Stoppard
So it’s my birthday this week and each year it is getting just a little harder to be excited (yay! It’s my birthday!) vs. horrified (oh crap, am I really that old?).
As I perused my nearly age-appropriate issue of AARP Magazine this week I noted that one of the articles in it said that cultivating feelings of gratitude can lead to physical changes that improve health (and therefore, I am sure, lead you to feel younger). I must admit, I have a tough time feeling grateful about those lines around my eyes. Maybe it’s just because my memory has become so age-impaired that I can’t remember to feel grateful about having the opportunity to get older. Whenever someone says to me, “Getting older isn’t so bad, it beats the alternative!” I want to beat them to death with a pair of dentures. Mark Twain once said, “Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been,” but he’s dead so what the hell does he know?”
I guess there must be some people out there who revel in their aging process. … (read the rest)