Hsieh Forbes Column: Any Study Of 'Gun Violence' Should Include How Guns Save Lives

My latest Forbes column is now out: "Any Study Of 'Gun Violence' Should Include How Guns Save Lives".

I discuss three key principles that should be included in any kind of "gun violence" research, including:

• Firearms save lives as well take lives. 
• The value of firearms in the hands of law-abiding citizens should be measured in terms of lives saved or crimes prevented, not criminals killed.
• The right to self-defense does not depend on statistics and numbers.

Legal use of firearms in self-defense happens a lot more often than most people realize.

Any public health research that studies only the negative effects of criminal misuse of guns while ignoring the positive lawful uses misses a critically important part of the picture.

Hsieh Forbes Column: Hollywood Vs. Reality in Medicine

My latest Forbes column is now out: "How Badly Does Hollywood Distort Truth In Medical Dramas?"

I discuss some recent research on television representations of trauma and emergency medical care, and how differences between TV and reality can affect both patients and doctors.

I like a good medical drama as well as anyone, but sometimes the mistakes make me cringe.  Of course, anyone who has watched a medical TV drama with me and has had to "shush" me when I repeatedly complain about some Hollywood exaggeration already knows this.

(And don't even get me started about random x-rays being hung upside down or backwards on viewboxes in the background of an OR or ER scene.)

Hsieh Forbes Column: You Might Not Like The President, But That Doesn't Mean He's Crazy

My latest Forbes column is out: "You Might Not Like The President, But That Doesn't Mean He's Crazy".

I discuss the latest push by some psychiatrists to declare the President unfit to hold office on mental health grounds. And the response of the White House physician who examined the President, including a cognitive evaluation.

As Dr. Jeffrey Lieberman, Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, wrote in the New England Journal Of Medicine:

Psychiatry has made too many past missteps to engage in political partisanship disguised as patriotism — witness its collusion in Nazi eugenics policies, Soviet political repression, and involuntary confinement in mental hospitals of dissidents and religious groups in the People’s Republic of China. More than any other medical specialty, psychiatry is vulnerable to being exploited for partisan political purposes and for bypassing due process for establishing guilt, fault, and fact.

Hsieh Forbes Column: The War On Meat

My final Forbes column of the year is now out: "In The War On Meat, Count Me In The Resistance".

I discuss the latest idea of a "tax on meat", and why that's bad from both a medical and public policy perspective.

To (mis)quote Firefly, "I don't care. I'm still free. You can't take my bacon from me."

Happy New Year, everyone! 

Hsieh Forbes Column: Will Computers Be Reading Your Chest X-Ray?

My latest Forbes column is now out: "Will Computers Be Reading Your Chest X-Ray?"

A team of researchers from Stanford University department of Computer Science and Stanford Medical School have now created an AI system capable of diagnosing pneumonia on chest x-rays more accurately than skilled human radiologists.

The future is coming quickly.

[Image below from the original article: "Our model, CheXNet, is a 121-layer convolutional neural network that inputs a chest X-ray image and outputs the probability of pneumonia along with a heatmap localizing the areas of the image most indicative of pneumonia."] 

Hsieh Forbes Column: "Help Patients By Allowing More Telemedicine"

My latest Forbes piece is now out: "Help Patients By Allowing More Telemedicine".

I discuss the growing use of telemedicine to allow doctors to connect to patients remotely, and how we can reduce regulatory barriers to wider adoption.  This is a great use of 21st-century technology that can help patients.

Hsieh Forbes Column: "Pagers, AI, And Google"

My latest Forbes piece is now out, "Pagers, AI, And Google: 3 Tales Of Technology And Medicine".

I discuss some unexpected wrinkles with old tech, new tech, and current tech in health care.

I remember back in the 1990s, when everyone cool had one of these.

Hsieh Forbes Column: Changing Consent Rules For Organ Donation?

My latest Forbes piece is now up: "Should The Government Require Your Consent To Be An Organ Donor?"

I discuss some controversial proposed changes to loosen the consent process for organ donation, including the pros and cons.  There are a lot of passionate advocates on both sides of this debate, and I tried my best to treat each position as fairly as possible (even though I do favor one side).

Hsieh Forbes Column: Charlie Gard Case, Summarized In 30 Words

My latest in Forbes: "Charlie Gard Case, Summarized In 30 Words". Plus a glimmer of hope for the family.

Hsieh Forbes Column: Three Novel Health Care Innovations

My latest Forbes column is now out: "Three Novel Health Care Innovations".

Drones! Photosynthesis! AI!

Read more details at "Three Novel Health Care Innovations".

From one linked article:

"This medical drone can deliver an automated external defibrillator to a patient who has suffered a sudden cardiac arrest. In tests, the drone arrived more than 16 minutes faster than an ambulance had."

Hsieh Forbes Column: 3 Big Questions About AI-Guided Medicine

My latest Forbes piece is out, continuing last month's theme on artificial intelligence in medicine. It's entitled, "3 Big Questions About AI-Guided Medicine".

In particular, the three questions are:

1. Who will control (and have access to) individual patient data?

2. Will we know how the AIs arrive at their diagnoses and recommendations?

3. What will the AIs optimize for?

For more details on each, see the full text of "3 Big Questions About AI-Guided Medicine".

Hsieh Forbes Column: "AI In Medicine: Rise Of The Machines"

My new Forbes column is now out: "AI In Medicine: Rise Of The Machines".

If current trends continue, medical care change over the next 20 years just as much as internet has changed life between 1997 and today.

Hsieh Forbes Column: Doctors Should Not Record Immigration Status Nor Gun Ownership

My latest Forbes column is now out: "Doctors Should Not Record Immigration Status Nor Gun Ownership In Patient Charts".

Patients routinely disclose sensitive personal data to their physicians. Doctors can and should be mindful of information that might someday be used against their patients by unscrupulous government authorities.

In particular, with increasing use of electronic medical records that can be data-mined by those with access, physicians can help protect the doctor-patient relationship by leaving some information out of the records.

Related earlier piece, “Why Doctors Should Not Ask Their Patients About Guns.”

Hsieh Forbes Column: People Confound Experts: Three Paradoxes Of Health And Human Behavior

My latest Forbes column is now out, "People Confound Experts: Three Paradoxes Of Health And Human Behavior".

I discuss three counter-intuitive or paradoxical results from recent health policy research, in which patients don't respond in the way that experts might have predicted.

For example: If you have a serious heart problem, you might do better if the top cardiologists are out of town.

For more details, see the full piece, "People Confound Experts: Three Paradoxes Of Health And Human Behavior"!

Hsieh Forbes Column: Health Freedom For Everyone, Not Just Women

My latest Forbes column is now out, "Health Freedom For Everyone, Not Just Women".

My basic theme is that free-market reforms (not government-run health care) will best protect our medical freedoms.

From the article:

I support abortion rights and reproductive freedom rights. I love that many participants in the marches don’t want the government dictating which medical procedures women may or may not receive.

I also hope that people recognize that government-run health care will inevitably mean government controlling which medical procedures patients may or may not receive. Whenever “somebody else” pays for your health care, inevitably “somebody else” will decide what health care you do (or do not) receive.

For more details, see the full text of "Health Freedom For Everyone, Not Just Women".

The Evolution Of Radiology

Dr. James Chang: "The evolution of radiology".

Yup, this seems about right! (Click on image to see full size version.)

Hsieh Forbes Column: No, The Government Should Not Provide Health Insurance For All Americans

My latest Forbes piece is now out, "No, The Government Should Not Provide Health Insurance For All Americans".

I discuss a proposal from conservative health policy analyst James Capretta in which he argues, "The GOP Should Provide Health Insurance for All Americans". And I propose some alternative free-market approaches that we can start implementing in 2017.

For more details, see the full text of "No, The Government Should Not Provide Health Insurance For All Americans".

And Happy New Year to all our supporters and subscribers!

Hsieh Forbes Column: UK Vs US Aortic Aneurysm Deaths

My latest Forbes pieces is now out: "Patients With Aortic Aneurysms More Likely To Die In The UK Than The US".

I discuss a recent New England Journal of Medicine study which showed that if you have an abdominal aortic aneurysm (aka "AAA") in the US vs the UK, the UK patients have to wait longer for surgery, and the aneurysms don't get repaired until they are larger (and more at risk of rupture.)

The researchers conclude: "Rates of aneurysm rupture and aneurysm-related death were significantly higher in England than in the United States".

I also cover three natural follow-up questions:

1) Were US surgeons jeopardizing their patients by operating more aggressively than UK surgeons?

2) Did the UK nationalized health system contribute to the lower rates of appropriate surgery in the UK?

3) Will US government policies incentivize American surgeons towards more — or less — appropriate treatments?

For more details, read the full text of "Patients With Aortic Aneurysms More Likely To Die In The UK Than The US".

Hsieh Forbes Column: How Your Doctor's Politics Affects Your Health Care

My latest Forbes piece is now out, "How Your Doctor's Politics Affects Your Health Care -- And What You Can Do About It".

I discuss the latest research indicating the doctors' own personal political biases can affect the advice they give patients in three areas -- abortion, gun ownership, and marijuana use. And strategies that patients and doctors can adopt to minimize inappropriate physician bias in the exam room.

Hsieh Forbes Column: No, There's No 'Smoking Gun' in Clinton's Doctor Letter

I have a new short Forbes piece out now, discussing a couple of issues related to Hillary Clinton's health: "No, There's No 'Smoking Gun' in Clinton's Doctor Letter".

tldr; Clinton's opponents should concentrate on her bad public policy positions, not her medical record.