Dignity

What is dignity?  It seems a simple question.  Merriam-Webster calls it the quality of being worthy, honored, or esteemed, also seriousness of manner, appearance, or language.    So dignity is something a person has, and something a person can be treated with.  What gives a person dignity?  Who should be treated with dignity?

The Business of Health Blogging

Healthcare is a big business in the US, and getting bigger all the time.   The internet and social media have entered the action in response to consumer demand for information as part of a healthy desire for, well, more health.  For the venture capitalist this means opportunity with a capital O.    

  This consumer demand is as old as mankind.  Through the ages, communities around the globe have depended on their shamans, clerics, or medicine men.  Science and evidence base led to startling new developments beginning in the nineteenth century.  As the science of medicine has evolved, the now infamous snake oil salesmen emerged with it.  Travelling across the country, they pawned off Aunt Elmira’s secret miracle health tonic as the cure from everything from hangnail to heart disease. 

Points of Interest, vol2, #2

    Well, I’ve done it.  I’ve shook off the winter blahs long enough to find all that is praiseworthy and of good report in the blogosphere specifically as it pertains to the mind, soul, and body.  I am excited to announce I have a real doctor job this summer, but I am afraid this has meant I just can’t seem to focus on blogging.  At the very least you can count on me to find elsewhere to focus on for you, the reader.

Inaugural Grand Rounds

    Over at MedPage Today, Dr. Val presents a very special Inauguration day Grand Rounds, giving our new president some pointers and principles by which he might guide health care reform with wisdom and virtue.  It is very well done, not the least because my post was featured.  Check it out for some great thoughts on the state of medicine today.

      The Gene Genie carnival is out at Genetic Future, with its finger on the pulse of our genes and the future, Encephalon is out at the Mouse Trap for those looking for the neuroscience slant, and a very fine Surgexperiences landed some neurosurgeon named Gupta to guest host/distract from the drama of the OR at Vagus Surgicalis aka Monash Medical Student.  Enjoy.

From the Archives: Daring to Take Jesus at his Word

In honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the holiday we celebrate today, I am reposting my two cents, first published June 13, 2008.

 43 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.

 44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

Matt: 5:43-44

  What would the world be like if Christianity as a whole really took this seriously? 

     While these words certainly sound nice, and few disagree in Sunday School, it seems to me that very few actually live these words.  Our nation was touched and somewhat perplexed at the compassion of the Amish a couple of years ago after a gunman killed 5 small Amish girls before killing himself.  The entire community forgave him, turned up in droves to his funeral, offered his widow condolences and the Nation generally approved.   I wonder if there was any controversy within the Amish community themselves.  Five years earlier, a cowardly civilian attack performed by hijacking airplanes and flying them into skyscrapers launched a cry of retribution leading to two wars with millions of casualties, the relaxing of civil rights and Geneva convention protocols, and lifting the torture ban regarding prisoners. 

   When other countries asked not to jump into war, to slow down, we derided them.  When Singers spoke out against the idea of war they quickly became Pariahs and were decried as unpatriotic, complete with burning of albums and death threats.  In short, most of America acted the way the natural man does, we returned violence and intolerance for violence and intolerance, loving our neighbor and hating our enemy.  At my own peril, I am going to take a journey down into politics and war, a subject fraught with contentious traps, and explore the possibilities of nonviolence and loving our enemies.

 

Point of interest, vol 2, #1

And we’re back.  With this blog now in its second year, I am resetting the counter for points of interest, my irregularly irregular romp through all things mind, body and soul on the internets.  I waited on this oune until the weekend when I have usually put these out and as such had too many great posts to include.  Sheesh, slow down bloggers.  If only my muse were so kind.  Anyway, without further delay, I present the best I could find-

Sci-fi special

Grand Rounds is out with a Science Fiction flare at the In Sickness and Health blog.  The nursing perspective is also out with Change of Shift up at Crzegrl: flight nurse.  Remember,

      Doctors save lives, Nurses save doctors and lives.

                                                            -Happy Hospitalist

Also, the voting for the first annual People’s Health Blogger awards has been extended through the end of the month for those who were discouraged by the long waits.  Click on the upper left hand button to give me a boost and join my untold legions of fans. 

That is all.  Enjoy.

Arguing your very right to exist.

Harriet McBryde Johnson 1957-2008

     Last December 24th, in the New York Times, Dr. Peter Singer eulogized one Harriet McBryde Johnson.  This was a tribute to their 2003 head to head meeting, in which they sat on opposite sides and engaged in the single most fascinating debate on human rights that I have ever read.