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Health And Wellness Programs: When Faith Overtakes Reason

October 12th, 2011 by Michael Kirsch, M.D. in Opinion
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There’s a new term that has entered the medical lexicon. The word is wellness. Hospitals and medical offices are incorporating this term into their mission statements, corporate names, business cards, medical conferences and other marketing materials. The Cleveland Clinic Foundation has appointed a Chief Wellness Officer, an intriguing fluffy title that does not clearly denote this individual’s role and function. This is deliberate, as the word wellness is designed to communicate a ‘feel good’ emotion, not a specific medical service.

Just a click or two on Google will lead you into the wellness universe. Here’s a sampling:

• Institute of Sleep and Wellness
• Wellness Institute of America
• Naturopathic Wellness
• National Wellness Institute
• Physicians Health and Wellness Center
• Physicians Wellness Group

There’s even a sponsored ad on Google where one can Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at MD Whistleblower*

Diabetes Advocate Asks PR Companies To Stop Exploiting Patient Bloggers

January 12th, 2010 by KerriSparling in Better Health Network, Medblogger Shout Outs, Opinion, Patient Interviews
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Quick post to the PR professionals in the healthcare sphere:

When someone dies, it is terrible tragedy.  That person leaves behind a family, loved ones, and – especially when they die young – their future.  If someone dies as a result of diabetes, or due to complications from diabetes, or from something else entirely but they happened to have diabetes, and you decide to exploit their death to gain pageviews for your website?  (See also:  Brittany Murphy, Casey Johnson)

Come on.

There’s a difference between passing on information that could help people improve their lives, and then there’s pure, TMZ-style exploitation.   Read more »

*This blog post was originally published at Six Until Me.*