CSH Associates

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• Who are Low Germans and why do they matter to public health?

  The best part of my job is that I’m always learning something new. Recently, I was employed by a health department inOntarioto do some lit reviews and one of the topics concerned “Low Germans”, more formally referred to as those who are Low-German-speaking. Of course I knew a bit about Mennonites and the Amish (the … Continue reading »

• Is healthcare biased against men? The case of PSA testing

  My husband has a cadre of male friends that I refer to as his “pub buddies.” They’re great guys and range from retired professionals to tradesmen. Little moss grows on any of them. Lately, hubby came home with the message that he and his pub buddies had decided that the policy about PSA testing in … Continue reading »

• As Kenny Rogers said, you’ve got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ‘em

  I’ve been writing a fair bit about motivation and different strategies that have been proposed for helping people stay on track. But there’s another side to the issue that is often overlooked: knowing when to give up. As Kenny Rogers sang, you’ve got to know when to hold ‘em and keep trying but you also … Continue reading »

• It’s not what you think – when health stats are twisted

  Years ago, I worked for a health charity that sent out fundraising letters with a message on the envelope proclaiming “One out of every two people who open this envelope with die from [insert disease]!”  The folklore was that it even became a joke on late-night US television, as in “who would want to open … Continue reading »

• The lay epidemiology of heart disease or why bad things happen to good people

  Recently, I was reading some interesting articles on “lay epidemiology” – how the general public understands the incidence of disease. 1, 2  In this case, the disease was heart disease, specifically cardiac deaths.  As the authors point out, the health community has spent a lot of time, money and effort educating people that cardiovascular mortality … Continue reading »

• Can we “end” the two primary causes of mortality – heart disease and cancer?

  Recently, there’s been a spate of campaigns promising to “end” cancer, or at least certain types of cancer.  I’m not naming any names here. I mean, I understand why organizations are making these sorts of claims – they want and need some sort of dramatic claim to galvanize donors and volunteers. The more flamboyant the … Continue reading »

• Is it time to move beyond ‘fight club’ analogies?

  In light of Jack Layton’s death from cancer, there was an op-ed article in the Globe and Mail about the problems and limitations of the common practice of using fight analogies when talking about disease.1  The author, Carly Weeks, makes the point that equating illness with a war, battle or fight with an enemy diminishes … Continue reading »

• Nail in the coffin of eugenics?

  The idea that people are born with innate abilities such as intelligence dates back to the ancient Greeks.  In western society, it really picked up steam in the 19th century with the publication of Galton’s Hereditary Genius. According to psychologist Victoria Plaut and Hazel Markus1, the idea spread widely through American academics and politics during … Continue reading »

• What is the Edmonton Obesity Staging System and why does it matter?

  A fair bit of media buzz was generated by the recent publication of the EdmontonObesity Staging System.1 The EOSS was created in large part because of the limitations posed by the Body Mass Index (BMI) and even waist circumference. Both may be helpful in dividing large numbers of people into risk groups but are pretty … Continue reading »

• Off Topic: Of Mad Men, the FLDS and My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding

  Not long ago, my friend, the fab media maven Elissa Freeman, wrote a guest blog concerning money and relations between the sexes (“Contemporary marriage unions would SHOCK Carol Brady and my mom” http://www.marriedmysugardaddy.com/contemporary-marriage-unions-would-shock-carol-brady-and-my-mom?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter).  What I found interesting were some of the comments. One woman wrote about remembering her father telling her mother that she didn’t … Continue reading »