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I Now Have a Cardiologist

joecieplinski.com

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Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#131

Post by rswail »

Tharkun wrote: post #119
maxgee wrote: post #8

> resting heart rate being in the 113-120 bpm That seems insanely high

It's not "insanely" high. And blanket statements like this can cause undue alarm. If you're worried about an elevated resting heart rate, go get an ECG done. Don't let random people on the internet talk you into health anxiety.

The average person's resting heart rate is 70 bpm. The "maximum" heart rate is roughly 207 - 2/3 of your age.

So for someone who is say 30, your maximum rate is ~187. But a rate over 90 when resting is considered outside normal levels.

If you have no history of cardiac disease and aren't taking any medications that would cause an increased rate, if your resting rate is 113-120, you need to be checked.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#132

Post by tejtm »

dwhit wrote: post #7
laurencei wrote: post #4

If you put a popular device, with a medical detection tool into the wider population, it would be logical that the device would pick up on patients who would other not notice the symptoms (at least initially, if any). So then the question becomes what other daily device(s) could be made to do automatic health checks of certain specific indicators, which would give an early indication to the possible condition, thus i…

A toilet that monitored urine and stool samples would be a major lifesaver.

Continuing the ancient tradition of plumbers saving more lives than doctors (without even needing a Hippocratic oath).

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#133

Post by Gibbon1 »

underwater wrote: post #130

> It’s also worth noting at this point in the story that Atrial Fibrillation is extremely rare in men my age. Less than two percent of people in my demographic have it. Go figure. When I do something, I go big I guess. This is looking at it backwards. How many serious health problems have similar rates of affliction? If there are 50 different potential health problems then he has a 2 in 3 chance of having at least on…

This reminds me of Lupus and Guillain-Barre syndrome both rare diseases. But I know half a dosen people with lupus and four people that had Guillain-Barre and suffer lingering effects.

So if you're a doctor it's really unlikely that you patient has either of those. But start adding up all of those rare syndromes and it starts getting scary.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#134

Post by barry-cotter »

sgift wrote: post #128
barry-cotter wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not arguing over affect, I’m arguing over truth claims. The article leads with the facts and then argues that despite being a poor use of money we should still pay for preventive medicine for the warm fuzzy feelings it gives us. Pay attention to the facts, not the argument that we should ignore the facts for the warm fuzzy feelings. If we’re going to spend huge amounts of money we should spend it better than on p…

> I’m not arguing over affect, I’m arguing over truth claims. The article leads with the facts and then argues that despite being a poor use of money we should still pay for preventive medicine for the warm fuzzy feelings it gives us. Pay attention to the facts, not the argument that we should ignore the facts for the warm fuzzy feelings. That's a very disingenuous summary born out of a "economics trump everything" m…

Humans are more important than money; that’s why we should spend the money on saving human lives in the developing world, not making the lives of already healthy, wealthy first world inhabitants slightly more comfortable, why we should spend it on investments in the future not hideously wasteful consumption in the present. If we’re going to spend the money that inefficiently give people a tax cut instead. There are many better ways to spend the money than a tax cut but preventive health care isn’t it.

If we want to improve health outcomes we could do many things more effective than increasing preventive care. Nurse practitioners cost half as much as doctors and are just as effective at primary care. That’s a genuine huge bang for the buck intervention that could be done and isn’t. Never mind preventive medicine. Do something that actually works instead.

Primary Care Outcomes in Patients Treated by Nurse Practitioners or Physicians: A Randomized Trial. JAMA : the journal of the American Medical Association. 283. 59-68. 10.1097/00132586-200012000-00026.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#135

Post by dreamcompiler »

tapland wrote: post #108
dreamcompiler wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the car could also self-drive itself to a hospital I think you're onto a good idea, except for the above quote. It would be a much better idea to have the car automatically pull over to the shoulder, stop, engage the flashers, and call 911. Paramedics can keep you alive en route to the hospital with drugs, cardioversion, and CPR. Your car cannot.

The problem is response time. If you are currently on the road it's probably faster to head to the hospital than to wait for an ambulance.

Which hospital is nearest? Which can be reached within the self-driving capabilities of the car? Which has Advanced Cardiac Life Support staff and equipment? Which is still open? Which is not already handling another cardiac emergency? Which route has the least traffic?

Paramedics and EMTs can work these questions quickly and they have lights and sirens to get through traffic. Your car will probably google "hospitals" and (slowly) take you to the nearest one, which might be a closed methadone clinic.

In most cities, an ambulance is going to get to your car much quicker than your car would get you to an appropriate hospital. A modern ACLS rescue unit is effectively a heart hospital on wheels. So calling 911 brings the hospital to you, without putting anybody else on the road in danger from your car's not-yet-quite-ready-for-unsupervised-operation autopilot software.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#136

Post by antirez »

Here in Italy in order to subscribe to a gym you need to bring your ECG (not mandatory by law but a number of gyms will ask for it), and every year you need to make a new one, so I would say that the percentage of "active" population that is not regularly checked is small. How is this matter in the rest of the world?

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#137

Post by fredsanford »

itissid wrote: post #27

While this is great for Afib detection it's its very rare CDC says 2.7-6 Million people[1]. Still great for those people! I still think we need to do much better. High BP and hypertension is way more important to measure since they can be diagnostic in a larger percentage. My dad is a triple bypass heart patient. ECG and stress tests did diddly squat to detect it, until it was too late and it was diagnosed by a CT An…

Have your kidney function checked after contrast is used on you. It can put you in kidney failure. Happened to me, had to be on dialysis for a short time. Dialysis SUCKS. You'll know exactly how an orange feels after it's juiced.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#138

Post by simonebrunozzi »

tapland wrote: post #108
dreamcompiler wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the car could also self-drive itself to a hospital I think you're onto a good idea, except for the above quote. It would be a much better idea to have the car automatically pull over to the shoulder, stop, engage the flashers, and call 911. Paramedics can keep you alive en route to the hospital with drugs, cardioversion, and CPR. Your car cannot.

The problem is response time. If you are currently on the road it's probably faster to head to the hospital than to wait for an ambulance.

Let a human being remotely take control of the car and drive it to the hospital.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#139

Post by underwater »

dis-sys wrote: post #83
xs83 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly find this baffling that there is a "limit" on how much treatment you can have done based on an arbitrary $ cost. Australia generally has great "free" healthcare but even then it is complicated with rebates and gaps etc, its not completely "free" but there isn't exactly a limit on what you can have done under Medicare. If you have private medical insurance (an option not a requirement) then you can get a ni…

> Australia generally has great "free" healthcare No, the Australian medicare system is not remotely close to being great. When a simple CT scan/MRI can take 4 months waiting time [1], I wouldn't jump up and defend such a failed system. It is not great, it is the complete opposite of that. Ever tried to do some dentals using that "free" healthcare you mentioned or ever tried 12-18 months elective surgery waiting time…

Dental and optical are two areas that Medicare punts on, and yeah, they are expensive and suck. That seems like a testimony for the rest of the system rather than a damning.

I don't know if you can hold up that 2GB article as anything conclusive. The plural of anecdotes not being data and all that.

I've lived under the UK, AU and US systems. Ours isn't the best, but fuck living under the nightmare that is healthcare in the US.

Re: I Now Have a Cardiologist

#140

Post by simonebrunozzi »

> "Since I don’t have a “job job,” I pay roughly $500 a month for “health insurance” out of my own pocket"

Tangential question, related to the above: I am currently paying for COBRA, and the amount paid is outragerous. Anyone has suggestions for a cheaper, good enough alternative?

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