language · healthcare · buddhism

Half of longevity gains are due to healthcare

Sat, 25 Aug 2012 13:51:55 -0700

Half of longevity gains are due to healthcare:

Here’s a cool bit of literature review (yes, I deliberately wrote “cool bit of literature review”) by economist Austin Frakt in response to a previous infographic I posted on this blog.

Charting a Staggering Excess of Health Data

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 08:06:37 -0700

Charting a Staggering Excess of Health Data:

Kaiser Fung shows that less can be more when it comes to visualizing complex data. If you show too much, none will read or understand; better to sacrifice a little detail for the sake of clear communication.

Austin Frakt shares this chart to illustrate an important point:...

Mon, 09 Jul 2012 08:54:00 -0700

Austin Frakt shares this chart to illustrate an important point: cancer deaths are not plummeting. As you may notice in the chart, cancer diagnoses soar while mortality rates plateau, but that contrast is another issue not address in his post.

What’s wrong with this infographic? Check out Austin...

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 09:10:32 -0700

What’s wrong with this infographic? Check out Austin Frakt’s thoughts.

Realigning Health with Care

Thu, 24 May 2012 22:55:00 -0700

Realigning Health with Care:

This article has been on my to-read list for what feels like a burdensome amount of time, so I’m going to try to take a stab at lunch tomorrow.

A Prostate Screening Picture Worth A Thousand Words

Thu, 24 May 2012 19:15:09 -0700

A Prostate Screening Picture Worth A Thousand Words:

This graphic, from WBUR’s Common Health blog, originally comes from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development, which further based the graph on epidemiological data from a 2010 BMJ paper.

Hat tip to Austin Frakt.

What would be the worst pie chart ever?

Wed, 23 May 2012 18:50:49 -0700

What would be the worst pie chart ever?:

Kim Rees imagines the horrific answer to be a Venn diagram made with pie charts. And it turns out there’s an app for that.

No, higher US cancer spending isn't worth it

Thu, 17 May 2012 19:13:19 -0700

No, higher US cancer spending isn't worth it:

It’s great to see experts and reporters dig down into methodology. I recently posted on a critique of a study which suggested that higher US cancer spending drives superior outcomes. (At least, that’s how I read it.) Faced with significant criticism, the authors of the study published a response on the HealthAffairs blog. And now Dr. Aaron Carroll has written a lengthy response to that response on the Incidental Economist blog. It’s a good post you should check out. But I’ll give you the punch line anyway: based on the evidence, it doesn’t look as though the United States’ higher spending on cancer care is buying us any better outcomes.

Is high spending on US cancer care worth it?

Fri, 11 May 2012 08:24:00 -0700

Is high spending on US cancer care worth it?:

I’m delighted to see Reuters report on the sometimes confusing nature of cancer statistics, and how these numbers can sometimes mislead (otherwise well intentioned) researchers.

Atul Gawande on Two Hundred Years of Surgery

Tue, 08 May 2012 19:02:40 -0700

Atul Gawande on Two Hundred Years of Surgery:

I was drawn to the article by this parenthetical anecdote posted by Austin Frakt on the Incidental Economist: “Liston operated so fast that he once accidentally amputated an assistant’s fingers along with a patient’s leg, according to Hollingham. The patient and the assistant both died of sepsis, and a spectator reportedly died of shock, resulting in the only known procedure with a 300% mortality.”

Two Amazing Healthcare Charts

Wed, 02 May 2012 19:03:01 -0700

Two Amazing Healthcare Charts:

I love great charts. A great chart tells a story with a balance of clarity, beauty, and parsimony. Kaiser Fung (@junkcharts) shares two such charts on the relationship between national per capita health expenditures and life expectancy. These data aren’t new, but they are beautifully presented here to tell a very clear story with such elegant simplicity.

I wish I made more charts like these. It is their simplicity which makes them so artfully compelling.

Taishanese on your Windows Phone

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 10:03:00 -0700

I ran across a Taishanese mobile app. It’s 99¢ for a list of vocabulary terms and common phrases. The app publisher, WAGmob, lists 39 other language apps with the same vocab lists, simple quizzes, and flashcards.

I haven’t tried out the Taishanese app, but based on the screenshots I saw, it would be hard for me to recommend it. The app follows a generalized phrasebook template, and leaves out some very important information for the language learner (such as tones!). That’s not to say the basic course on my blog or the more detailed information at Taishanese Chop Suey are true alternatives. None of these resources is a tried-and-tested Taishanese course.

The app is the first attempt I’ve seen at a Taishanese learning resource on a mobile platform. I’m curious to see how strong its sales are.

Pay Gap Between Women and Men

Sat, 28 Apr 2012 10:21:46 -0700

Pay Gap Between Women and Men :

This is an amazing interactive chart by Nathan Yau. Women RNs make 4% less than men. For pharmacists the difference is 5%. For techs it’s 9%. The largest gap is for physicians, where women make 21% less than their male counterparts.

Vesak

Fri, 27 Apr 2012 23:44:00 -0700

It’s been nine years since the University Buddhist Association first held a Vesak celebration at UCLA. If there is a universal Buddhist holiday it would be Vesak, which commemorates the Buddha’s birth, enlightenment, and death. From a more practical and cross-cultural standpoint, Vesak’s recognition by the United Nations makes this celebration something of a lowest common denominator Buddhist holiday even in locales where the Buddha’s birth, enlightenment, and death are historically commemorated on different dates and under different names.

For the students of the University Buddhist Association at UCLA, this celebration is the single largest event that the student group puts together—and they only do so once every three or four years. Buddhist student groups across Southern California take turns hosting Vesak; the last year this event was held was at UCLA was 2009. I was invited this year to lead a discussion circle about how to get involved in the Buddhist community after graduation. It struck me that it has been long enough since I graduated from UCLA that I had forgotten what it was like to be fresh out of school and cut off from the campus resources I took for granted. It’s been a great journey, and so it’s always a delight to be able to give back to this community by sharing my own experiences and observations.

For newly graduated young Buddhists, my advice was simple: be curious, adventurous, respectful, helpful, and open-minded. Life is full of opportunities and surprises, but it’s up to us to make the most of them.

Meditation Workshop at UCLA

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 16:02:00 -0800

On Tuesday I led a workshop on meditation and relaxation for UCLA SEACLEAR and the University Buddhist Association. I gave five tips for relaxation: stretch, think happy, be mindful, focus on the breath, relax & release. These exercises aren’t anything new, but it was good to get the support of a big group to encourage individual students to step back and relax a little. I certainly needed it!