During this time when everyone is preoccupied with the coronavirus pandemic, it’s difficult to think about anything else. But many Americans continue to seek medical care for other, less urgent afflictions, and thousands of them will be given prescriptions for drugs they’ve never taken before. If that applies to you or a loved one, then…
Few professionals in our lives have more influence on us than our doctors – yet many of us probably spent very little time doing our homework before choosing the doctor we’re presently seeing. Oftentimes we pick a doctor based on location, or referral, or online reviews, and we never change until we’re forced to by…
As if there weren’t enough to worry about in the arena of personal privacy, now comes one more red flag. We first alerted you to this article on the Politico website last year. The exposé reveals that companies are secretly gathering your health care information and selling it to doctors, hospitals and insurance companies, all…
“There’s a deadly virus spreading from state to state,” the recent Kaiser Health News article warns. “It preys on the most vulnerable, striking the sick and the old without mercy. In just the past few months, it has claimed the lives of at least 39 children.” Is this the frightening coronavirus out of Wuhan, China,…
Many people probably know that there are specific signs in the brain that indicate the presence of Alzheimer’s disease. Doctors look for telltale evidence in the form of deposits called plaques and nerve clusters called tangles – “the fingerprints of Alzheimer’s disease” – that, when discovered, should mean cognitive decline is imminent, if not already…
It’s hardly news that the U.S. is suffering from a shortage of geriatricians – physicians who are board-certified experts in the health care needs of seniors. We’ve been reporting on this problem on the AgingOptions blog for many years, as this 2016 article will attest. Now comes this recent New York Times article on the…
A study of more than 1 million women in Great Britain has shown a significant link between obesity in middle age and later development of Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia. That’s according to this article from the HealthDay website published just a few weeks ago. The article, written by reporter Dennis Thompson, provides…
If you’ve listened to Rajiv Nagaich for any length of time, you’ve heard him talk about the need for preventive health care. “Most insurance plants do a pretty good job of caring for you once you’re sick,” he often states, “but most of them do a terrible job of keeping you from getting sick in…
Alzheimer’s disease remains the biggest fear many of us have about growing older, but for most people with dementia, the symptoms did not show up all at once. Instead they started appearing gradually, often in the form of what physicians refer to as MCI, or mild cognitive impairment. This condition, regarded as a precursor to…
It’s a respiratory condition that you may never have heard of. This condition is not especially common – about 200,000 cases per year – but once contracted, it can cause lasting lung damage unless treated. And while this condition does not specifically affect seniors more than younger people, knowing about it may explain why someone…