“Anne” is a mother I met in my fieldwork who was happy to share her story, but not her name. Her son had become sick very suddenly, complaining of a combination of symptoms that were difficult to pinpoint. Anne took him from one specialist to another, who performed test after test, but they could find […]
Archives for October 2023
Wow! How? Home inventors
Hot springs have always been therapeutic destinations, but it was a father, desperate to relieve his child’s pain, who invented the home spa. Candido Jacuzzi, a mechanical engineer, and his wife, Inez, tried everything to help their son, who was suffering from juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. Hydrotherapy helped immensely, so Candido set to work, eventually building […]
Transforming research participation
Below is a letter I wrote in response to Tania Simoncelli’s article, “From Bedside to Bench and Back,” (Issues in Science and Technology, Summer 2023). Read all the responses here. Biomedical research has blind spots that can be reduced, as Tania Simoncelli writes, by “centering the largest stakeholders in medicine—the patients.” By focusing on rare […]
Wow! How? Health
Wow! How? Health is a LinkedIn newsletter that will feature the Wow! stories of patients, survivors, and caregivers who are doing extraordinary things, along with the How? lessons that we all can learn. Subscribe to the newsletter or to my blog (I’ll cross-post here). Today’s story is about how connecting with a peer, a “just-in-time someone-like-you,” can make all the […]
Cover reveal
I am thrilled to share the cover design for my upcoming book, Rebel Health: A Field Guide to the Patient-Led Revolution in Medical Care, set to come out in February 2024 from MIT Press. The design is inspired by what Clara Ganz created for me — a bright, joyful color scheme with a type treatment […]
Recent Comments