health

Article

A Brief History of Dubious Dieting

Most of the world seems to think that America invented obesity sometime in the last century, but the truth is, fat has always been a part of life (witness Hatshepsut, one of the great ancient Egyptian queens who reigned in the 15th century BC—despite her svelte sarcophagus, modern archeologists believe that she was pretty obese and may have suffered from diabetes). So it stands to reason that dieting has been around just as long. Some historians credit William the Conqueror with starting the... READ ON

List

10 iPhone Apps to Help You Survive the Holidays

As you settle down with family and friends this holiday season, be prepared: load up your iPhone (or iPod Touch) with applications to get through common holiday disasters. We've got a complete roundup here -- from fun photo moments to actual medical emergencies, these apps will get you through the holiday season intact...but your journey will be perilous. Read on, if you dare! 1. Save Grandpa's Life The family is settled in for a feast. The wine is flowing, there's a large bird to be consumed,... READ ON

Article

My Sleep Apnea: CPAP

In previous entries, I've talked about my initial adventure with sleep apnea and my subsequent sleep study. The gist of those entries is that I was diagnosed with "severe" obstructive sleep apnea, with an AHI (Apnea-Hypopnea Index) of 48. This number means I had an average of 48 sleep interruption "events" per hour -- these events range from blood-oxygen desaturation to a complete closure of the airway. There are lots of people out there with worse cases than mine (including readers of this blog!), so I... READ ON

Article

My Sleep Apnea: The Sleep Study

In last week's article I talked about my initial experience with sleep apnea: going to a sleep disorders clinic and being evaluated for risk factors. After going through that process, I was prescribed a one-night sleep study operated by a local university hospital. In this entry, I'll share some specifics about that study -- if you're considering going in for one, I hope to allay some fears and give you some tips. First off, what is a sleep study? The technical term is a Polysomnogram, and it's... READ ON

Article

My Sleep Apnea: The Beginning

It's time for a new occasional feature! Rejoice! In this column, I'll talk about my personal experience being diagnosed with sleep apnea, what treatments are available, the science behind the condition, and (hopefully) my miraculous improvement after being treated. For this first entry, I'll talk about the experience leading up to my sleep study. In future columns I'll reveal the diagnosis and treatment, and you can follow along as I try to catch some sleep. Before we begin the narrative, let's get a... READ ON

Article

The Power of Itch

In the most recent issue of The New Yorker, Dr. Atul Gawande delves into the mystery of itch, that most curious of sensations that rides the boundary between pain and nuisance. Following the story of an anonymous chronic itch sufferer (referred to as "M."), Gawande explains how bad itch can get -- and a word of warning, it gets very bad! Gawande proceeds to examine itch throughout history -- a fascinating read. Here's a taste: The internist prescribed a medicated cream, but it didn't help. The urge... READ ON

Article

The Height Gap

We've blogged about the relationship between height and pay before, as well as height and electability, but I've just come across a four-year-old New Yorker article on height and how it's changing around the world. In The Height Gap, reporter Burkhard Bilger explains anthropometric history -- the study of the history of human height, and what factors contribute to it. From Bilger's article: Tall men, a series of studies has shown, benefit from a significant bias. They get married sooner, get... READ ON

Article

Ray Kurzweil's Pill Habit

Ray Kurzweil is probably best known for his 70's era reading machines -- early speech synthesizers that could optically scan printed words, recognize them (despite being in multiple typefaces), and speak them back. (We had one of these gizmos at my public library when I was a kid -- it was an amazing piece of gear.) He's also famous for inventing music synthesizers, and it's not unusual to see the name Kurzweil emblazoned on a digital piano. These days he's typically referred to as a "futurist"... READ ON

Article

How You Put Yourself To Sleep

I think we all have nights where sleep won't come -- despite flipping the pillow and persistent rolling over, it just doesn't happen. What do you do when this happens? Personally, I've developed only one good way to get to sleep: audiobooks. Now, I love audiobooks during the daytime, but sometimes I'll buy a book that's super-boring. For example, take the audiobook of Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire -- immensely difficult to focus on during the day...but PERFECT for snooze inducement... READ ON

List

5 Famous Missing Fingers

You can do a lot with less than the normal complement of fingers -- including becoming a guitar legend! Here are five famous examples of people achieving fame despite missing some digits! 1. Jerry Garcia Grateful Dead frontman Jerry Garcia lost two-thirds of his right middle finger as a child, while steadying wood his father was chopping. (A similar scene was shown in The Royal Tenenbaums to explain Margot's prosthetic finger.) Despite the accident, Garcia went on to play a mean guitar, and often... READ ON