Category: HEALTH

  Flu is early this year and has killed at least 10 in California as of mid-December; these people were younger than 65. Flu shots protect most of us from the 4 deadly flus predicted to hit th

  A new study showed that spirit alcohols (tequila, gin, whiskey, vodka…) are more likely to cause aggression. The study had nearly 30,000 subjects who were asked about positive and negative e

Several studies confirm that exercise is a treatment and prevention for depression and anxiety. One to two hours a week is the minimum. It doesn’t have to be super-intense. My understanding is that yo

Based on a Danish study of 70,000 using databases. Of course, this wasn’t a double-blinded, randomized trial—who would agree to drink this amount or less or more each week consistently for many years!

A study showed that those with HIV are at higher risk of mental decline if they had poor kidney function (eGFR <50, ask you provider). Less strong association was having no more education than high

Since having HIV increases the risk of heart attack or stroke by factor of 1.5-2 maybe we should test them earlier than HIV negative people. The risks are from having chronic inflammation even if the

I am at the Loma Linda Hospital in Malawi for a couple of weeks substituting for the regular internist and family medicine physicians who are on vacation in Southern California. So this is my yearly M

Apart from the conference, for a research paper I am writing, I found an article which showed that fisting is associated with transmission of more syphilis and HIV. Maybe there are more tears of the r

I recently attended the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections with 4000 other HIV specialists and researchers.  Here are some things I learned.   LONG ACTING INJECTABLE AN

GETTING THINGS DONE WITH MUSIC A former intern of mine writes a column on Medscape in which he describes the boost to work that music can give. He states that classical music puts him to sleep and

This is the conclusion for years by many published articles, including mine. There isn’t strong enough evidence for many of the uses recommended by bud tenders and articles with weaker evidence. The p

FROM THE CAMPAIGN: WEIGHT DISCRIMINATION—PUBLIC FAT SHAMING One of the candidates brought to light that many have a bias against those who are overweight. Making fun or bullying of someone overweig

24,000 patients were followed for an average of 12 years and the cardiovascular complications were less in those eating this diet. This is a prospective trial, meaning they enrolled people and told th

ANIMAL EXPOSURE IS GOOD FOR YOUR HEALTH A study showed that there was more allergic-type diseases in Amish (who have farm animal contact on small family farms) compared to Hutterites (who use machi

HEPATITIS C TREATMENT FOR ACTIVE DRUG USERS? Zepatier® treated Hepatitis C patients successfully even though they were on methadone or buprenorphine as treatment for chronic heroin/opiate use. Z

As of this writing, the LA Times reports 19 cases of meningitis so far in 2016, and more than half are in gay men. It is transmitted by saliva (not through the penis), so sharing a cup or kissing may

Ask The Doctor WRITING FROM MALAWI The power is out and the generator overheated. We are out of many medications and lack a heart monitor and a vaporizer for asthma treatments. But we still can