Are you writing a synopsis of what happened or a romance novel? So far it seems there are multiple thoughts, and the part about the pretty girl is pretty tangential.
689 karma · joined August 9, 2010
2. There are no FDA approved therapeutics for disease that use bacteriophage, there is only some things as preservatives for meat. Most treatments of genetic disorders are generally nonspecific - they treat symptoms and gene therapy is still a developing field. Even in that case, the delivery vector is usually generalizable - usable in many patients with slight individual modification.
3. in vivo refers to in glass, or in an experimental set-up, this is most clearly not in vivo.
1. Despite diminishing returns, medicine/health is a social/individual priority and significant resources are dedicated to this field.
2. Health is a core necessity similar to food and shelter - I find it difficult to imagine a future of substantially decreased health resources.
3. Current aims are to improve efficiency, and slow the growth of healthcare as a proportion of GDP, but it would be difficult to actually decrease its proportion of GDP, particularly if expectations for standard of living and health continue to increase.
4. Biological science is really interesting and medicine allows you to help others.
5. You get to see some really cool things that most people can't see.
6. The above reasons are things that won't be changing in the foreseeable future.
For any career, there are intangible and unquantifiable reasons and benefits. I am not, and not seeking to, make a completely objective, metric based argument for medicine. To be successful, I think you need to have a passion for your career, and I am simply trying to identify the aspects of medicine that one can find passion for. For that matter, if the decision to choose medicine is purely quantitative and pragmatic, I would advise you against medicine. We don't need physicians like that.
The broad view: First, life is precious. Our time here on earth is extremely limited, and despite our best efforts, we have only begun to improve and increase our time here. Every time I hear about stories like Ebenezer Scrooge or rich philanthropists donating their money for secure a legacy, I am reminded of our inherent mortality and life is one of the few things that you cannot buy. Any society where the basic needs of food, shelter, and entertainment are largely met, an increasing amount of money is spent on healthcare. I think it is no coincidence that the proportion of GDP spent on healthcare correlates extremely well with the GDP proper. This is in part due to extremely poor diminishing returns – hypothetically $10m spent on running water can increase the life expectancy of 10,000+ people by more than 20 years, but $10m can fund at most 100 open heart surgeries (which here the 5 year mortality benefit is only marginal). But with increases in the standard of living, expectations of health increase. Barring catastrophic changes, our emphasis on health will not diminish. If you want to work in a field of high importance, where effort will be rewarded, there are many challenges, and technology is constantly changing and improving, medicine is a good choice.
A ground level perspective: Second, medicine is difficult. Undoubtedly there are many challenges in the path to become and the practice of a physician. There are many problems in the structure of healthcare, there is decreasing independence, and the training path is only lengthening as medicine becomes more and more specialized, but there are many benefits and joys unique to the medical profession. You are privy to the breadth of human experience, from life to death, and are gifted with a perspective unparalleled in beauty and complexity. When you work with a cadaver for the first time, I hope you are overwhelmed by how inherently private and precious the gift is before you. I am convinced that are few experiences more acutely beautiful or overwhelming than helping someone overcome an illness or witnessing a birth or death. Biological science is an incredibly diverse, complicated, and fascinating field - as a physician, you can help facilitate the next big breakthrough or be part of its implementation. Technology will only facilitate and augment the physician’s ability to diagnose and treat disease – there will always be need for someone who understands and appreciates the mechanisms of the human body.
As a physician, you will be respected and will be compensated by your ability to help others. I am certain that medicine will be vastly different in ten and twenty years, but I think the things I mentioned above are constant. If you are passionate about science, appreciate the ability to help others, and willing to work hard, medicine can be a good choice. You don’t have to worry about it disappearing.
Mary M. Tai
www.ajcn.org/cgi/reprint/54/5/783.pdf
http://journals.lww.com/topicsinclinicalnutrition/Citation/1...
I can't access the article, so I can't make any comment on the actual methods, but I think it seems a little presumptuous to flippantly make broad strokes about a paper from a different field solely by looking at the abstract.
He does make a good point about overeager premeds (and for good reason), but this post seems to be more airing out grievences and stereotypes than an argument about education or differences between diciplines.
I'm not saying this approach is a panacea to all of education's problems, I'm just saying this is a step in the right direction. I think the question this approach answers is the disconnect between effort and reward in education.
Also, I think there are fairly generalizable development timelines for children. While standardized testing can never be a gold standard in determining progress, I think we can both agree such testing does measure a worthwhile metric. I would definitely agree that there are edge cases, both in terms of individual students and in terms of school districts, but linking pay with progress seems on face value to be a good idea. That, plus independent school districts, is system-based evolution. Such selection depends on creating the right relationship between effort and reward.
Then, I don't think its a coincidence that this is on the news. He probably kept complaining and got picked up by local news.
At first glance, I am not sure what your target audience is. Is the idea to blog about all new ideas related to medicine? I see descriptions of everything ranging from toothbrushes to new imaging modalities. There are tags to sort through the different posts, but not as pronounced or obvious as it could be.
Secondly, what are you trying to achieve by attracting clinicians to your website? My impression is that you are simply looking from traffic (regardless the type), and trying to monetize with ads? Is that correct? Personally, I would say clinicians are slightly more skeptical about new inventions/techniques, and although not disinterested in new findings, would be reluctant to turn to a blogs for such information. This is especially true when it seems like a lot of the posts are rehashes of individual companies PR and there are a lot of ads. I would ask what additional value does the website add or function does it fulfill?
As a general rule of thumb, I think it is easier to attract viewers if there is a sense of community or two-way communication. My guess is that to attract more clinicians, there needs to be more value added. Maybe talk about things that interest physicians (how such a device impacts reimbursement or saves time, interesting cases and how those devices prevented some complication) After a long day at work, I doubt clinicians would be interested in learning about a new one-purpose use device that marginally improves outcomes in a specific population of patients. HN works because it combines technical information with both interesting social commentary and discussion.
Yes, especially healthcare reform. As you can imagine, it's a game-changer and there is significant discussion on how they will be impacted. I think the general conclusion I've gotten is that the situation is still very fluid, and most people in medicine are as confused/uncertain of its effect as most laypoeple.
> Could you estimate in rough percentages, if at all: Of your peers in medical school, how many of them are interested in becoming a doctor for purely altruistic reasons?
I think there are a variety of factors and influences that cause an individual to want to become a doctor and most medical students aren’t seeking to become martyrs (ie. not purely altruistic). It would be just as simplistic as to say Facebook was founded solely because Zuckerberg wanted create something. While the ability to help people is important factor, the amazing complexity and beauty of the human body, the opportunity to work in a constantly changing, dynamic environment, the ability to apply science, and the respectability of the profession are also motivators. I would say, in many ways and to most med students, these factors outweigh the financial rewards (if that's what you meant by non-altruistic reasons).
> How many defaulted to med school because it is something appropriate for intelligent people and pleases their parents?
I think that is an incredibly difficult question to answer, but I will try to rationalize my non-answer. It is slightly difficult (no exaggeration :P) to get into medical school – if a person is not motivated or passionate, it is difficult to simply default into medical school. That said, this question goes back to the previous question about motives and incentives. I would say a significant proportion of my classmates have a significant experience with physicians – either as a patient or having relatives who are physicians. Whether having physician parents and that it might “please their parents” is an important factor, I wouldn’t know as I did not have that kind of background.
I personally do not think that “defaulting” is a common occurrence because at my school, there is a large proportion of non-traditional applicants who have had previous careers. With classmates ranging from former investment bankers, Olympic swimmers, opera singers, and park rangers, I imagine they methodically thought about the opportunity cost of changing careers. Too bad we don’t have many former developers. :) For better or worse, medicine is a desirable profession, and I would venture to guess that a lot of people will at least try or consider a career in medicine. Without then actually developing passion or interest, medicine is a tough path to continue.
That said, I think pre-studying and post-studying immediately before or after class is really, really helpful - regardless whether notes are taken. The only challenge is that it takes much more time and a lot of effort. This is another clear example of the relationship between effort and reward.
The fact is that humanities and other classes are often easier than science and engineering classes, and when classes are standardized (usually 3 credits), there can be no meaningful scale in respect to difficulty or time spent studying/learning. This, coupled with the differences in rigor across institutions make such a construct difficult to determine or enforce.
Transferring credits from a local college during time in high school to my eventual undergrad, I have seen that the number of course credits/hours is meaningless. The important transfers were for equivalent classes that were major requirements, regardless of how many hours they were. Without transfer for credit of equivalent classes, credit hours is worthless - it does not signify process towards degree and is simply a GPA boost.
This concept also is carried across to medical school, which is kind of ridiculous. If I spent 60 hours in the hospital a week, does that mean I have 20 course credits? I am willing to guarantee I work harder for those 20 hours (plus much more time outside of the hospital), than 20 hours of classes I had in undergrad.
Then again, I'm not even sure it's reasonable or relevant to regulate credit hours. This is just a BS bureaucratic way to try to standardize education. I'm sure anyone who visits HN regularly would recognize such institutional approaches are bunk. You learn as much as you want, and it depends entirely on self motivation.
I would say that these are two distinct acts. You do not help someone by setting another dollar on fire. Rather, the comparison would be giving someone your last 10$ vs. giving 10$ when you are a billionaire. I think in some ways, perhaps unquantifiable, that it is more 'noble' about acts that are not in self interest. Businesses are not the same as non-profits, even if they functionally provide the same service.
> Helping someone in a way that produces extra wealth--perhaps enough for you to profit from it--is best of all.
I don't know if this was intentional, but this implies a higher order magnitude of help. I would personally balk if I hear of a charity that donates only 50% of what they receive to the intended audience.
1. Help someone when it benefits you.
2. Help someone when it is easy/neutral to you.
3. Help someone when it is costly/time-consuming/harmful to you.
I'd hate to say the emperor has no clothes, but this does not seem revolutionary in any sense. In fact, there seems to be more counter-examples than examples when we look to the fact that the Middle East, India, China, and North America does not fit the pattern. The Middle East was technologically advanced in the 1500s, China was cited as a counter-example, and there was not much development in North America. In fact, the movement of people and ideas seems to contradict the authors thesis.
This conclusion also fails on closer examination. Superficially, this might work when comparing Europe as a whole vs. Africa as a whole, but Finland is also noted as a previous technological backwater with high GDP now. I'm skeptical of any predictive power of this model.
On the other hand, the author is relatively eloquent. I like the line: "There's a Thomas Edison born every minute. We just have to help them turn the lights on." Just not particularly insightful.
Although it is hard to compare impact values across disciplines, I would venture to guess this is not the best journal in the world.
http://www.sagepub.com/journalsProdDesc.nav?prodId=Journal20...
1. There is more than one argument for speed limits.
2. Just because it is true at any lower limit does not invalidate the statement. This just means that there needs be a balance between efficiency (higher speeds) and risk of collision (lower speeds). This is regulated, abet subjectively, through speed limits.
3. I doubt that it is true at 'any' lower limit. My guess would be that it is bounded. An accident when you are driving at 5mph is not much less deadly than an accident at 10mph. The chances that you are not the cause of the accident is much higher at lower limits.
http://www.simplyhired.com/a/salary/search/q-(rockstar+OR+%2...
That's not to say the website's information is accurate or indicative of what people each of these categories actually make.
Salaries probably not a normal distribution, and the real high earners wouldn't be captured by guesses based on mean income. I would rather make the argument that the graphics displayed and information provided are really bad metrics. They are at best confusing, at worst misleading.
I think the question is still what is the best allocation of resources, and sometimes it's easier to focus on doing one thing well than to have too many fingers in too many pies.
rather a lack of ability, perhaps this indicates a lack of regard.