Each year, more than 4.5 million dog bites occur in the United States. Despite what you might assume, most of these incidents don’t happen when an unfamiliar dog attacks someone in a park or another outdoor location. Instead, most dog bites are inflicted by a pet dog in a home. Here’s advice for avoiding these…
Picture this: you’re with friends in an unfamiliar forest using only a map and a compass to guide you to an upcoming checkpoint. There are no cell phones or GPS gadgets to help, just good old brainpower fueled by a sense of adventure as you wind through leafy trees and dappled sunlight. This is not…
Editor's note: Health inequities have long been an issue for people in the LGBTQ+ community. We're pleased to share a post from our colleagues in Corporate Learning at Harvard Medical School focusing on solutions that health care leaders can champion. Health care business professionals can improve patient outcomes and reduce health inequities by championing the…
If you spend time outdoors — which we all should do, for all sorts of reasons — you are likely to encounter biting bugs. Most of the time the bites are just a nuisance. But besides the fact that sometimes they can be painful or itchy, bug bites can lead to illness — like Lyme…
Drug side effects are common, and often quite troublesome. Major side effects, such as severe or even life-threatening allergic reactions, require immediate treatment and discontinuation of the drug. More minor symptoms may be tolerable when weighed against drug benefits. And sometimes, these go away on their own as the body gets used to the drug.…
When you live in a coastal area, preparing early for potential hurricanes is a must. Storms can develop quickly, leaving little time to figure out where you’ll be safe or which items to pack if you have to evacuate. And health care necessities, such as medications or medical equipment, are often overlooked in the scramble.…
You’ve probably heard the news: Cicadas are coming. Or — wait — they’re already here. And are they ever! Due to an unusual overlap of the lifecycles of two types (or broods) of cicadas, trillions of cicadas are expected to emerge in the US by the end of June, especially in the Midwest. If you’d…
When cancer patients are treated with radiation, it’s possible that the therapy itself may cause new tumors to form in the body later. Radiation kills cancer cells by damaging their DNA, but if the treatments cause genetic damage to normal cells near the radiation target, there’s a small risk that these secondary malignancies may arise…
It’s undeniable: modern medicine offers ever-expanding ways to heal and prevent disease. But it’s also true that health care can cause harm. One analysis found that about 6% of health care encounters caused preventable harm, leading to thousands of deaths each year. And it’s not just errors that cause trouble. Highly skilled health care providers…
Americans love their ultra-processed foods, whether they come as cereal (like Cap’n Crunch, a favorite of mine as a kid), snack foods (like Cheetos), entr’es (like hot dogs), or desserts (like Twinkies). Sure, loading your plate with vegetables, fruits, fish, healthful oils, and grains in a Mediterranean-style diet boosts heart and brain health. But if…