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The Hollow Men of Hims

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Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#101

Post by zdragnar »

turnsout wrote: post #71
anonfordays wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Healthcare is one of the most regulated industries in existence. You are fundamentally incorrect.

How about supplements? Yeah…

Supplements are basically condensed food, not medicine. No supplement provider makes medical claims about what the supplements do. The closest they come is the claim that they "support" various natural functions of the body, though I suspect there's no shortage of supplements out there that are skirting the lines and grey areas of regulations that should probably be reviewed.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#102

Post by zdragnar »

hammock wrote: post #63
bickfordb wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there evidence that compounded Semaglutide from Hims pharmacies has harmed anyone?

Safe and effective. Side effects are very rare and are usually limited to soreness at the site of injection. Recommend everyone who is recommended semaglutide by a relevant authority, to get it. The obesity epidemic is a national security concern

I don't think the question was whether semaglutide was safe, but whether the version that Hims sells is safe. That includes things like being free from contaminants, stability of the compound, etc.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#103

Post by zdragnar »

parpfish wrote: post #43
wonderwonder wrote: post #25

Hims is actually very expensive. I get the same Semaglutide for far cheaper either via my hormone dr. (provides a small, reliable dose of testosterone (trt) every month and legit access to hard to get compounds via a compounding pharmacy. No hoop jumping, they have a menu, I order from it. In real life I take 2 - 3x the testosterone dose when I am on but when I am coasting its easy no stress way to get what I want de…

There’s a very vocal, puritanical anti-semaglutide crowd that thinks using the drug is a way of subverting the moral order. “You have poor willpower, you’re SUPPOSED to be fat as a punishment!” They don’t care that it helps people stick to their healthy diets and get better. They need these people to bear the stigma of the gluttony.

This is not a charitable take of the critics.

If you go on a fad diet, lose weight, then gain it back when you stop, well, you haven't really lost anything other than time.

If you go on semaglutide, lose weight, then gain it all back when you stop, you're out thousands of dollars, I'm out money when my insurance premium goes up to support the new expensive drugs, and you might have permanent health complications (rare though they might be).

I haven't heard any success stories of people keeping the weight off after they stop taking it, though I've heard plenty of people gaining everything back, and being miserable from the side effects while they were on it.

If semaglutide worked as a stopgap to help you get to the point where you could manage your weight on your own, I think it would be hard to argue with it. So far, though, I've had people tell me that it should be treated as just another vitamin supplement that you'll be on for life, albeit one that costs $12k a year or whatever the case may be.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#104

Post by PaulHoule »

culopatin wrote: post #98
PaulHoule wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? I wanted to try Cialis, primarily for my enlarged prostrate but also for the erection effects. I asked my primary care doctor, that was a $20 copayment, I fill it my local pharmacy and it costs about a $5 copayment for a month’s supply. It’s a big practice where I might have to wait a long time if I want to see the head doctor but if I don’t care who I see I can usually get in pretty quick and they do a good…

Good for you but if you think your anecdote is the case for everyone you need to leave your personal bubble and talk to people

I don't think it's all a bed of roses.

I suffered for 25 years from chronic pain that was referred TMJ. I've seen a cardiologist who is fine and all but much of his advice is the exact opposite of what I read on PubMed (and not just one paper on PubMed but 20 or 30 papers.) I've had several psych evals that I learned later were of very high quality for the their time but it took about 45 years for a book to practically jump into my hands at my university library which explained how I'm different from other people. I was annoyed as hell when a sports medicine doctor wrote NAD [1] on my chart when I was complaining about my activities being limited by knee trouble.

I work for a large employer in a state where it is illegal to offer junk insurance. My story was not too different when I was on Obamacare except I was paying what seemed an astronomical amount in premiums. I know a lot of people have it worse.

Looking at the how high the stakes are, I mean, you are all you've got, it's no wonder that people can't look at the limitations of the system with equanimity. The doctors I work accept me being a partner in understanding my conditions and my care but the moment they hear the voice of a professional fibromyalgia sufferer I bet they wish they could quit their job if they didn't have debt for student loans or to start their practice.

A lot of people seem to think "it would be allright if we just got more resources", I wish I could wave a magic wand and let them change places with Michael Jackson. Nobody is doing Elon Musk a favor shooting him up with Ketamine every week as well as other controlled substances. A lot of people just won't take help. I know people with schizophrenia who have no insight into their condition. Others with serious mental health diagnosis who refuse to take any med that isn't a controlled substance. For that matter, families where you get the kids a lot of nice and appropriate stuff for Christmas and you come back in a week and they've trashed all of it.

Having a positive attitude and just some gratitude for being here and the miracle that people have figured out as much they have and that a $10 prescription can cure conditions that were a death sentence just 100 years ago goes a long way. [2] I've personally tried to help a lot of poor people who seemed to have a bottomless pit inside them but if you look at the likes of Elon Musk, rich people can be like that too.

[1] https://www.quora.com/What-does-no-apparent-distress-mean-in...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serenity_Prayer

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#105

Post by nikkwong »

jeremy151 wrote: post #52
jackdeansmith wrote: post #7

>The real tragedy is not that Hims exists, but that it works so perfectly. Every day, thousands of people choose their compounded weight-loss drugs over FDA-approved alternatives, their combination ED pills over established single-ingredient treatments, their algorithmic consultations over actual medical care. They make these choices not because the products are better, but because the entire experience has been opti…

> If you want safe and really high quality medical care you should absolutely have a personal physician you have a personal relationship with, who understands your lifestyle, your risk factors for side effects, and your medical needs deeply. How many Americans have that? Maybe a few dozen? A bit of a tangent: I have this here in the US, through a model called Direct Primary Care. I pay $50/mo for a single provider, u…

How could this possibly work out for her financially? To make 120k a year, she would have to be doing this with.. 200 patients; and I think the average GP makes a bit more than that in the US. That doesn't like a good bargain on her end.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#106

Post by parpfish »

genocidicbunny wrote: post #77
parpfish wrote: post #30

> The genius of Hims lies in understanding that consumers will pay almost any premium to avoid the humiliation of discussing erectile dysfunction or hair loss with an actual human being. Does the telemedicine appeal to people because they want to avoid embarrassment, or because they know that traditional doctors will schedule you for an appointment three months out just to say “have you tried getting better sleep, lo…

It's a little of column A, little of column B, but in a mixed way. A lot of doctor visits for basic health issues are ones that can be dealt with over a phone or video call. Routine stuff like updating your medicines, changing dosages, showing a bruise or dealing with a mild fever don't require you to be physically present at the doctor's office. Having to deal with insurance, scheduling, waiting times, driving to th…

I always lol at “reduce stress” as medical advice. May as well tell depressed people to “work on your attitude, turn that frown upside down!”

If people could just “reduce stress” on a whim, they would. Having a doctor tell you reduce stress will actually increase stress.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#107

Post by throw10920 »

kragen wrote: post #47
turnsout wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

An oligopoly colluding to push the price of easily produced products into the stratosphere isn't a product of deregulation . In a deregulated or under-regulated market, thousands of cottage-industry insulin producers would be competing to shave pennies off the prices of their insulin. You might have a hard time finding safely produced insulin, but you wouldn't have a hard time finding cheap insulin. Oligopolies collu…

To reinforce your point, here's a quote from the article:

> but these enforcement efforts feel perpetually behind the curve in an economy where regulatory complexity has become a competitive advantage

The only way for "regulatory complexity" to become a "competitive advantage" is for there to be very high levels of regulation.

I think that the solution isn't specifically more regulation, or less regulation, or more regulators (which would just compound the problem), but better regulation. Law should be treated like code - as a liability (not an asset), but one necessary to accomplish a purpose, and so written as carefully and simply as possible.

Where's our team of pen-testers looking to find holes in the draft of a new law? Our Unix-philosophy-adjacent lawyers proclaiming that "less is more" and striving for composability in separate laws instead of bundling everything together? Our git forge for legal documents where the public can view and comment on the legal system (even if actually making changes is more complicated)?

Software engineering and the law could learn so much from each other - it's a shame there's so little cross-pollination.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#108

Post by secabeen »

parpfish wrote: post #30

> The genius of Hims lies in understanding that consumers will pay almost any premium to avoid the humiliation of discussing erectile dysfunction or hair loss with an actual human being. Does the telemedicine appeal to people because they want to avoid embarrassment, or because they know that traditional doctors will schedule you for an appointment three months out just to say “have you tried getting better sleep, lo…

I think it's both. Hims doesn't really even do the telemedicine bit all that well, and Hims customers know what they're there for. This is isn't a "by the way" conversation at the end of an annual physical, nor is it a dedicated full-cost office visit to discuss ED, Weight Loss, or Hair Loss. It's a quick website visit, and then maybe 5 minutes zooming with a doctor in another state you will never see again and who will never remember you among the thousands of patients they "see".

There's a lot of shame in society around all of these issues, and it's really appealing to a lot of Men to be able to spend an extra $100-200 to not have to have a conversation that embarrasses them with a Doctor who may know their wife, friends, or otherwise may be part of the community. That's the value proposition of Hims; a $200 fee to maintain the illusion of their inherent virility and masculinity. A lot of Men will happily pay that, and have the disposable income to do so.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#109

Post by aiforecastthway »

nikkwong wrote: post #105
jeremy151 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want safe and really high quality medical care you should absolutely have a personal physician you have a personal relationship with, who understands your lifestyle, your risk factors for side effects, and your medical needs deeply. How many Americans have that? Maybe a few dozen? A bit of a tangent: I have this here in the US, through a model called Direct Primary Care. I pay $50/mo for a single provider, u…

How could this possibly work out for her financially? To make 120k a year, she would have to be doing this with.. 200 patients; and I think the average GP makes a bit more than that in the US. That doesn't like a good bargain on her end.

I do not think I have ever spent more than an hour per visit actually in the room with my GP. I have an annual checkup. For a while there my GP was world class and also a blood relative.

200 patients at one hour per is a bit more than a month of 9-5s.

If I visited my GP once per 1.5 months I’d be paying a fuckload more than $50/mo in copayments alone, in addition to my incredible premiums.

Healthcare becomes pretty affordable when you’re not paying for actuaries and other scammers.

Re: The Hollow Men of Hims

#110

Post by const_cast »

parpfish wrote: post #30

> The genius of Hims lies in understanding that consumers will pay almost any premium to avoid the humiliation of discussing erectile dysfunction or hair loss with an actual human being. Does the telemedicine appeal to people because they want to avoid embarrassment, or because they know that traditional doctors will schedule you for an appointment three months out just to say “have you tried getting better sleep, lo…

When it comes to Men's health, doctor's really don't give much of a fuck. Their primary concern is are you actually sick, they don't care about how you feel, or your self-image, or your sense of masculinity.

Hair loss is sucky, sure, but in the grand scheme of medicine it's nothing. Erectile dysfunction sucks, but are you old? That's just the name of the game.

I lost my testicles to cancer (yippee) and you would be shocked how difficult it is to just... get testosterone. My fundamental bodily functions no longer exist, but I'm technically fine so... I guess that's okay? Like I'm not dying, and quality of life is in the eye of the beholder or something. Never mind I'm literally castrated, like physically. And they'll talk your ear off about side effects.

Side effects? What about primary effects? Man, I have no balls! Everything sucks and I wake up feeling like I've been run over by a truck!

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