Len Zwelling

It’s Still All About Money By Leonard Zwelling          As if anyone at MD Anderson needed to be reminded of the primacy of money in any discussion about health care, Reed Abelson wrote a piece in the NY Times on August 13 that reports how this fact is undermining any benefits derived from ObamaCare. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/13/business/cost-not-choice-is-top-concern-of-health-insurance-customers.html?_r=0 […]

What Is It About Conflict Of Interest They Don’t Get?: Trump, Clinton, DePinho Et Al By Leonard Zwelling          To my limited intelligence, this seems like a simple concept. If, in one’s mind, there are competing interests where what is good for one interest (more money) may not be good for the other (fulfilling a

Is Pediatrics At MD Anderson Coming To An End? It’s Possible By Leonard Zwelling          Amid all the Sturm und Drang that has been the last few weeks at MD Anderson over trying to figure out what to do about a financial shortfall that is not a crisis, a true crisis has developed in another

Extreme Vetting: A Trump Idea That Makes No Sense In Some Contexts And Lots Of Sense In Others By Leonard Zwelling          Of course the idea of some sort of profiled clearance of Muslims to allow their entry into the United States is ridiculous. I am assuming that the US government clears everyone similarly for

Driven To Suicide By Leonard Zwelling          In an exquisitely concerning article in the NY Times on August 11, Geeta Anand and Frederik Joelving describe a system of high pressure sales promotion in the Indian drug market. Executives at Abbott Laboratories press the sales force to run “health camps” where the sales reps test patients

Homeostasis, Allostasis, And The Truth: What Explains The Persistence Of Hypertension, Cancer, And Nonsense By Leonard Zwelling          When I cared for the ill for a living, I was a firm believer in disorder in homeostasis as an explanation for malfunctions of the body. Hypertension, for example, was a response to internal stress that re-establishes

Kakistocracy: Government By The Worst Persons By Leonard Zwelling          In Saturday’s Wall Street Journal (AUG 6-7, p. A13) Peggy Noonan, my Republican voice of rationality, wrote a piece called “The Week They Decided He Was Crazy.” Obviously, this was an essay about Donald Trump and the seemingly endless missteps, misspeaks, and mistakes he continues

Cupping and Doping Alive Alive O (for Andrew) By Leonard Zwelling          I was encouraged to write this one by son the younger. You see, I get cupped every week, so can actually comment on the controversy surrounding some of the Olympians and their large purple pocked shoulders. There is really nothing all that dramatic

EXTRA: The Truth About Immunotherapy From the NY Times this week: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/09/opinion/cancer-drug-ads-vs-cancer-drug-reality.html?ref=opinion&_r=0 http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/08/opinion/new-approaches-to-fighting-cancer.html?partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Prostate Cancer Surgery: Even A Robot Can Do It, But Is That Necessary By Leonard Zwelling          It made the NY Times (http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/07/28/robotic-surgery-for-prostate-cancer-may-offer-no-benefits-over-regular-surgery/?_r=0). In an article published in The Lancet (http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(16)30592-X/fulltext) surgeons in Australia and New Zealand have reported that for patients with early stage prostate cancer who opt for surgery as initial therapy, the