How to Handle Stress? It is all in Your Mind.
The neuroscience of stress management. These days it seems everyone is stressed. Studies in most countries seem to (similarly) report that almost a third of populations report feeling stress. Covid restrictions, cost-of living crises, and crime appears to be taking its toll everywhere. Record number of people are also leaving healthcare workforces such as medicine […]
An Aspirin a Day May Not Keep The Doctor Away
Aspirin has been long considered the proverbial magic pill—useful to treat headaches and fevers or used to prevent heart attacks and strokes. Not long ago were health systems—including in the UK and NZ—considering a polypill that included aspirin alongside statins and blood pressure pills that was to be given to everyone over 55! (The exclamation […]
Breast Cancer and Dairy: Biology or Blasphemy?
Do cow products like dairy and beef increase the risk of cancers and MS? Almost 50 years ago, the prestigious Lancet journal asked if cervical cancer was a sexually transmitted infection? Medical professionals and the public knew that nuns rarely, if ever, developed cervical cancer and the risk of cervical cancer was increased in individuals […]
Maladies and Melodies.
New genetic research lays bare the genius of Beethoven. Ludwig Van Beethoven breathed his last in 1827, almost 200 years ago. He was 56. The Ninth Symphony was Beethoven’s last work. It was completed and performed, together with movements from the Missa Solemnis and the overture from Opus 124, with great appreciation at the Kärntnertor […]
How Should We Be Thinking About New Zealand’s Crime Epidemic?
Crime seems to be everywhere in New Zealand – shootings, stabbings, ram raids that even made an embattled government declare the latter—essentially retail crime—a “special crime.” With elections imminent, we see the malice play out in parliament, and discussed in workplaces. A society that values blunt aggression in sport finds itself shattered by criminal activity […]
Do You Really Need to Drink 8 litres of Water a Day?
Myths and truths about nature’s own drink This week I had a patient ask me how much water we needed to drink a day for good health and skin. I told her that I would be writing this blog especially for her, so here it is: Firstly, almost everyone has heard that we need 8 […]
Dr Google, ChatGPT, and Me.
How does the internet and AI compare with a skin doctor? Obviously, Google—the biggest and best-known ubiquitous search engine—has revolutionized the internet. Everyone searches Google for something. Of course, now Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the new computer kid on the block, and everyone is talking about ChatGPT. Therefore, I thought I would look at both […]
Plastic Fat-astic.
The Hidden Health Risks of Food Labels and Wraps. Our societies are getting fatter. Some people see this adiposity as a health issue, some as a cosmetic one. But truth be told, our metabolic processes are more mysterious than we realise. Last year, the prestigious Nature Journal reported that plastic is still one of the […]
Getting under the skin: Coca-Cola, cocaine and the cutis.
Skin (Latin: Cutis) is our largest organ and therefore is also naturally the source of most diseases. Skin diseases can be complex to diagnose. They can be manifestations of underlying illness, or something strange deforming skin itself. Humans know what they want or don’t want to happen on their skin. Skin itself couldn’t care less. […]
Secrets of beating the health risks of bad sleep?
Can exercise help to counteract the effects of poor sleep? A few years ago, I was in Spain in the province of Toledo. I visited the Museo-Casa de Dulcinea, the house of Doña Ana Martínez Zarco de Morales, who is supposed to be the person who was fictionalised by Miguel Cervantes as Don Quixote’s love […]