| |
Daily DigestElection Day Approaching
 The last day for Massachusetts residents to register to vote in the Nov. 4 presidential election is Wednesday, Oct. 15. Out of town that day? Apply for an absentee ballot at your town or city clerk's office.
For more information or to find out if you are registered:
North Adams City Clerk: 413-662-3015
Williamstown Town Clerk: 413-458-9341 |
16. A ball atop a stone
17. Town and country |
Find out what's happening in the Berkshires |
| Need to contact iBerkshires? Here's how. |
Obituaries | Orville Hamilton Thornall, 90 |
Newest VideosSales FliersWhat's PlayingColumnists |
@theMarket
|
Outside the BerkshiresRelated Stories |
| |
Go To Health!: Getting the Words RightBy Peter May - April 12, 2008
iBerkshires Columnist
 | | Peter May |
As acclaimed author Michael Pollan recently wrote, "the corruption of society begins with the corruption of words. Therefore, any attempt to fix what is wrong in the world, had best start with the rectification of names."
Clearly the corruption of language to serve ulterior motives is as old as communication itself. However, its impact has been greatly magnified by the speed and reach of modern communication technologies. Lacking clear definitions of our own we accept as truth those conveyed to us by sources that all too often do not have our best interests in mind.
Let's look at the biomedical pharmaceutical-based model of "health."
Health care: The entire focus of medical training is the study and treatment of disease and pathology. Doctors do not study health or what maintains it. They do not promote health or prevent disease. You only go when you are sick and care kicks in with disease diagnosis, the end stage of a process.
What's healthy about that? Wouldn't it be more accurate to call it disease care?
Health screen: A systems check looking for observable signs of disease progression, done repeatedly over time until something is found to diagnose and treat. Again, what's healthy about that? Wouldn't it be more accurate to call it a disease screen?
Health insurance: It only pays if you are diagnosed with illness. Except for token gym memberships and disease screens, most do not cover wellness care or anything that maintains and promotes health. Wouldn't it be more accurate to call it catastrophic homeowner's insurance for the body?
Health care crisis: The crisis, we are told, is that too many of us do not have health insurance and that costs are skyrocketing. All true. However, the crisis is not that we don't have insurance. The real crisis is that so many of us are so sick. Wouldn't it be more accurate to call it a disease crisis? And wouldn't the real fix be promoting health?
Interestingly insurers now refer to doctors as providers, patients as consumers and health care as managed care. Sounds harsh? Money-oriented? Perhaps, the "rectification of names" has begun.
The medical model has a real and very beneficial role in crisis and emergency care and management and the alleviation of catastrophic symptoms. All after the fact, infection or trauma induced or end process disease care.
However, this model of waiting for, and then treating, the symptoms of disease has failed any way you look at it. It has failed in terms of the continued skyrocketing rates of disease and mortality, the inefficacy of medical care in treating them and the economic costs associated with them.
Real change will come when there is a shift in our collective consciousness away from the passive pill-popping and surgical intervention of the disease-care paradigm to the daily personal responsibility of the health and wellness-care paradigm.
It is not as if we do not know what health is or how to achieve and maintain it. You do not need to be sick to have a healthy intervention! Eating a whole foods plant-based diet, exercising daily and having a positive outlook on life not only create health they can reverse and/or ameliorate disease processes and symptoms.
Health is way more than the avoidance or absence of disease and the removal of symptoms. Health is about living a full, active and happy life. It comes from personal awareness, responsibility and commitment to a healthy lifestyle.
Health throughout your life is not only possible, it is your birthright. As Buddha said: "We are each the architects of our own health or disease."
What are you going to do today, and every day, to maintain and improve your health?
Peter May is a doctor of chiropractic and a local resident with a practice in North Adams. He writes a monthly column on health. |
This is a GREAT piece.
My personal paradigm breakthrough happened through many long years of pet care - I have a lot of animals....
It took literally years of failed treatments and sick/deceased furry friends before the idea finally clicked in for me - the incredibly commonsensical idea of promoting health rather than treating/suppressing symptoms.
But baby, when it did - the results I was able to achieve with the fur people were nothing short of amazing.
One day I had the bright idea to try some of that philosophy on my human self. Hey, it worked!
Peter, you have done every person who reads your piece a great big favor.
This one's a keeper.
Thanks.
| | from: Jamie Bairstow | on: 04-14-2008 |
|
|
Enter your email address below to receive our FREE iBerkshires.com Newsletter
|
