Hsieh Forbes Column: The Promise And Perils Of New Apple Watch Medical Technologies

My latest Forbes piece is now up: "The Promise And Perils Of New Apple Watch Medical Technologies".

Hsieh Forbes Column: How Licensing Laws Harm Mothers, Infants, And Lactation Consultants

My latest Forbes column is now out: "How Licensing Laws Harm Mothers, Infants, And Lactation Consultants".

I discuss the new law in the state of Georgia mandating licensure of lactation consultants, and how that harms minority and low-income mothers and babies.

Fortunately, the Institute For Justice is on the case, fighting this unjust law.

More details at, "How Licensing Laws Harm Mothers, Infants, And Lactation Consultants".

Hsieh Forbes Column: Why The Idea Of Single Payer Heath Care Won't Die

My latest Forbes column discusses how "single payer" health care keeps being rejected at the state level — often by Democrats.

Yet it keeps coming back, like a political zombie: "Why The Idea Of Single Payer Heath Care Won't Die."

Related piece by Steve Forbes: "Only Free Markets Will Save — And Strengthen Healthcare".

Hsieh Forbes Column: Doctors Need To Shut Up More

In which I put on my Grumpy Old Man hat and complain about other doctors, "Doctors Need To Shut Up More". My latest in Forbes.

#GetOffMyLawn #HLMenckenIsMySpiritAnimal

Hsieh WSJ Column On Doctors And Guns

I am honored and delighted to have been invited by the Wall Street Journal to write a column on the topic, "Should Doctors Routinely Talk to Patients About Gun Use?".

They invited two physicians to take opposite sides, with Dr. Megan L. Ranney of Brown University taking the "yes" side and myself taking the "no" position. Many thanks to all who helped provide quotes!

(I know that some readers might not be able to read the full piece because of the paywall. I'll see if I can post screenshots or excerpts of my piece later. You can often read the full text of the piece by searching for the title on Twitter and then viewing the piece through the Twitter link -- for example via this Tweet by Ari Armstrong.)

The link to the pair of pieces can be found here.

Hsieh Forbes Column: "Pelvic Exams On Anesthetized Women Without Consent: A Troubling And Outdated Practice"

My latest Forbes column is now out -- "Pelvic Exams On Anesthetized Women Without Consent: A Troubling And Outdated Practice".

Many doctors think this is "no big deal" and "good for society", whereas many patients consider this a violation.

Ultimately, the patients' wishes should prevail.

Hsieh Forbes Column: That Time The CDC Asked About Defensive Gun Uses

My latest Forbes piece is now out: "That Time The CDC Asked About Defensive Gun Uses".

I discuss some recent work by criminologist Gary Kleck on unpublished CDC data on defensive gun use, and how that may support the case of gun rights advocates.

Some of the statistical evidence is still in question, however, and Kleck has withdrawn the original version of his paper pending further analysis.

Ultimately, individual rights are not validated (or refuted) by statistics. But real-world evidence can help affirm the underlying principles.

I also wanted to note one good response I received from Ari Armstrong, responding to a point I made in my piece: "I think there are probably fewer defensive gun uses than in the '90s, simply because violent crime has gone down so there's less need for defense."

For more details, see the full text of "That Time The CDC Asked About Defensive Gun Uses".

Related articles:

"Any Study Of ‘Gun Violence’ Should Include How Guns Save Lives" (Paul Hsieh, 3/20/2018)
"Criminologist Gary Kleck on Guns, Crime, and Their Study" (Ari Armstrong, 11/7/2015)

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.”