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The Other Half

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Re: The Other Half

#131

Post by dang »

c3534l wrote: post #102
mseebach wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not 'bizarre', it's unfortunate at best. The piece has a title that isn't very descriptive, and HN policy biases towards transparent link-sharing with no editorialising. No policy is perfect, and it has some casualties, this being one of them. But it has to be weighed against the (IMO) very strong general case benefits of avoiding editorialising.

The policy is a good policy 90% of the time. But there are edge cases where the author writes a terrible headline and then we're also stuck with a terrible headline.

This one is not a "terrible headline". The author is emphasizing what matters to him about a profound, life-altering experience. We're supposed to overwrite that because internet readers (all of us) are addicted to instant gratification? Nope, that's not how HN works. We want reflective responses, not reflexive ones, those take a bit longer and that's good. If the difference between 1 second and 10 seconds is critical to you (I don't mean you personally, of course, but any reader), HN may not be the website you're looking for. Making a little effort, poking around a little, figuring things out: those are some of the qualities we want to engage here.

I could go on about this for hours. Of all the things that make HN different and matter most, this is the one I'm surest of. However, after yesterday I think a better use of resources would be to go back to working on making HN faster. There the difference between 1 and 10 seconds really does matter.

Re: The Other Half

#132

Post by cmrdporcupine »

DanBC wrote: post #125
ginko wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Guys/gals... If there's any unusual pain in your chest cavity at all, just drop whatever it is you're doing and get it checked out. It might not even seem that bad at the time... it didn't to me and it didn't to Jason Scott... just do it. Yeah, but where do you draw the line? I guess that will sound silly, but I'm always afraid that people think of me as a hypochondriac if I ran to the doctor for every little pain,…

> Yeah, but where do you draw the line? You can search the English NHS Choices website. That gives calm mostly evidence based advice and lets you know when you should self care, or when you should see a doctor. For example, here's "chest pain": http://www.nhs.uk/conditions/chest-pain/Pages/Introduction.a... It says there are a variety of causes, but it says you must never ignore it, and gives some criteria for when y…

Yeah we have something like this in Ontario ("TeleHealth") and from my experience the calls usually end with "Go to the doctor / emergency room" because they're mostly unwilling to tell you "you're fine, it's in your head" unless it's completely obvious.

Re: The Other Half

#133

Post by emmab »

crispyambulance wrote: post #127
ginko wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Guys/gals... If there's any unusual pain in your chest cavity at all, just drop whatever it is you're doing and get it checked out. It might not even seem that bad at the time... it didn't to me and it didn't to Jason Scott... just do it. Yeah, but where do you draw the line? I guess that will sound silly, but I'm always afraid that people think of me as a hypochondriac if I ran to the doctor for every little pain,…

Don't "draw the line" anywhere with chest pains. I say this as someone who has survived PE. In my case, I had pain that was a vague persistent discomfort combined with an evolving sense of panic. I hesitated for a day but then drove myself to the hospital just in time because it had progressed in the emergency room to searing pain where I "saw stars" upon each breath. Literally the most painful experience I ever had.…

I've had PCS my entire life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precordial_catch_syndrome

Definitely not worth going to the ER for.

Re: The Other Half

#134

Post by praneshp »

chrisper wrote: post #104
athenot wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a stent, they only use conscious sedation, that's enough. It's not like they open up your chest; they go in through your wrist or your goin.

In the article he said he could see his heart on a monitor. Was he maybe referring to the camera they use when they are in your body?

My dad this operation in 2013 (and in 2007 before that), and I was allowed to watch it with his cardiologist (who was not the surgeon). They keep you awake, just insert something through the wrist. All the while you can just watch the insides on a TV. My dad reported that the only "weird" feeling he had was some sort of bubbling in his throat. He complained real time, and the doc said it's fine. Off Topic: The stent cost INR 150000 (they give you the box), but the hospital procures it for way cheaper. My dad's entire stay cost slightly less than that.

Re: The Other Half

#135

Post by adamors »

tptacek wrote: post #79
lkrubner wrote: post #70

Once again, the policy on headline titles for articles on HackerNews is a bit bizarre. The original title explained that the man almost died. This current title is "The Other Half" and does not explain anything at all. As a practical matter, the policy seems to amount to "We use the title of the original article, unless it is strongly stated, in which case we regard it as clickbait and change it to something dull." T…

That doesn't work. The submitter of an HN story doesn't own the story; stories are community property. Submitting doesn't entitle you to choose for the whole site what is or isn't interesting about a story. If you want to do that, you write a comment, like everybody else. This is one of the oldest meta-arguments on the site. Once or twice a month, perhaps, we get a story that isn't particularly well served by the gui…

I have no idea what the story is about, and frankly with a title like "The Other Half" I'm not even interested to find out more.

Re: The Other Half

#136

Post by MetallicCloud »

emmab wrote: post #133
crispyambulance wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't "draw the line" anywhere with chest pains. I say this as someone who has survived PE. In my case, I had pain that was a vague persistent discomfort combined with an evolving sense of panic. I hesitated for a day but then drove myself to the hospital just in time because it had progressed in the emergency room to searing pain where I "saw stars" upon each breath. Literally the most painful experience I ever had.…

I've had PCS my entire life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precordial_catch_syndrome Definitely not worth going to the ER for.

Wow, thank you so much! I've had this my entire life, but never knew what it was, and never met anyone else who also got it. It's nice to be able to put a name to it.

Re: The Other Half

#137

Post by matt4077 »

Dangeranger wrote: post #48

This story and the comments make me curious as to how many hard charging project leaders have, or would, work through a heart attack. These words stuck out to me: > I was fucking annoyed – I felt like I was just super tired and needed some energy, and energy drinks and caffeine weren’t doing the trick. He then went on to keynote a conference and live for what seems like at least two more days without seeking medical…

I'm not completely sold on the relationship of stress and heart disease. I spend some time working in politics, and almost all principals worked 18h-days with less than 5h of sleep during the week. Yet life expectancy is higher than average.

There are obviously ots of competing factors at work: they have plenty of opportunities to eat healthy, and the discipline that makes them get up at 5am also makes them go for a run at 5:30. Then again two of my bosses had to retire after run-ins with the crystal meth law they themselves passed...

Considering the limits of willpower, I'd rank it Smoking/Exercise/Food/Sleep/Stress.

Re: The Other Half

#138

Post by crispyambulance »

emmab wrote: post #133
crispyambulance wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't "draw the line" anywhere with chest pains. I say this as someone who has survived PE. In my case, I had pain that was a vague persistent discomfort combined with an evolving sense of panic. I hesitated for a day but then drove myself to the hospital just in time because it had progressed in the emergency room to searing pain where I "saw stars" upon each breath. Literally the most painful experience I ever had.…

I've had PCS my entire life https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precordial_catch_syndrome Definitely not worth going to the ER for.

OK, but you can say that because you happen to KNOW what it is, and that's fine.

People drop dead too frequently because they wait too long to get help when they have unexplained chest pains that [they think] couldn't possibly be a heart attack.

Re: The Other Half

#139

Post by catshirt »

ginko wrote: post #81
pmarreck wrote: post #4

I sat on a "weird pain" in my chest for a few days. Basically it was uncomfortable to sleep on my left side, and I felt a bit short of breath. Turns out I was suffering from a double pulmonary embolism , and that the only reason I wasn't doubled over in pain is because by an odd fluke of nature, the interior of the lungs do not have nerve endings (only the exterior) and had I waited any longer I could have died. At t…

>Guys/gals... If there's any unusual pain in your chest cavity at all, just drop whatever it is you're doing and get it checked out. It might not even seem that bad at the time... it didn't to me and it didn't to Jason Scott... just do it. Yeah, but where do you draw the line? I guess that will sound silly, but I'm always afraid that people think of me as a hypochondriac if I ran to the doctor for every little pain,…

hey man, there is a reason shortness of breath will get you rushed past the ER.

almost lost a buddy once to a brain tumor around 25. he was light headed with slight pain for a 3 days. checked himself in on day 4 for slight but persistent pain. rushed into surgery immediately. wouldn't have lasted another day.

don't take a chance. would rather be a hypochondriac than dead. a good doctor will respect that.

Re: The Other Half

#140

Post by ganley »

tombone12 wrote: post #114
pmarreck wrote: post #4

I sat on a "weird pain" in my chest for a few days. Basically it was uncomfortable to sleep on my left side, and I felt a bit short of breath. Turns out I was suffering from a double pulmonary embolism , and that the only reason I wasn't doubled over in pain is because by an odd fluke of nature, the interior of the lungs do not have nerve endings (only the exterior) and had I waited any longer I could have died. At t…

"What’s the biggest single factor that puts you at risk for ignoring your health? Being a man. Sociologist Lisa Wade, interviewed in New York Magazine, says that 'some scholars argue that being male is the single strongest predictor of whether a person will take health risks.' Men like risk it turns out. Most of them also hate putting lotion on their skin (too girly) and being afraid of things (not manly). They are a…

About a decade ago, I got a physical after having not set foot in a doctor's office in about 12 years. The doctor asked what made me come to get a physical after so long, and when I said nothing in particular, he pretended to write on his clipboard "Wife made me come here."

He said middle-aged guys with no obvious health problems pretty much only come to the doctor for one (or both) of two reasons: Their wife made them, or they want Viagra.

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