Critical Consumer

Most Doctors Don’t Recommend Their Own Profession

Dan Abshear Lately in the media, others have said and expressed concern about the apparent shortage of primary care doctors, most notably. Typically, the main reason stated for this shortage is lack of pay of this particular specialty compared with others chosen by potential physicians. Yet considering the additional attention of shortages of students in [...]

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How To Choose a Good Psychotherapist

By Deborah Serani, Psy.D. It is a difficult, yet brave and courageous moment when someone makes the decision to pursue mental health therapy. But more difficult than the decision to go to therapy is the decision of who to go to for therapy. So, how does someone find a good therapist? Types of Therapists First, [...]

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Why Smokers Do and Don’t Quit Smoking

My father-in-law is in his 70s and still smokes every day. He’s tried to quit before, but in the recent years has decided that he was old enough to live his life however he wanted, and that included smoking. Nevermind the fact that he has had a quadruple bypass operation for his clogged arteries (and [...]

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How Work-Life Imbalance Makes You Sick

Dr. Sheldon Cohen‘s keynote presentation at the 8th International Congress of Behavioral Medicine was published in International Journal of Behavioral Medicine (2005 Vol 12 No 3, 123-131). Cohen summarized 20 years of research on psychosocial influences on infection susceptibility. Cohen also debunks these pervasive myths of stress and disease: Myth: Infectious disease-causing agents is wholly [...]

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RLS Anti-Ad Video is as Bad as Drug Company DTC

A Consumer Reports video of the Requip DTC ad (another drug used to treat RLS, manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline) has been published. Let me first state that I’ve seen the Requip ad in question many times when I watch TV, and each time I have the same negative reaction to the ad. This means I have [...]

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