pediatric housecalls Robert R. Jarrett M.D. M.B.A. FAAP

Hello, and welcome to Pediatric House Calls. I am…
A Physician board certified in Pediatric medicine with Clinical experience including caring for infants, children and teens – well these days mostly children and teens up to twenty-one;
An Administrator experienced in top medical management for several national health insurance companies;
An Author of health care manuals, newspaper columns and even children's stories;
A Business Medical Consultant for drug companies, insurance companies and physician practices;
A Veteran of the US Navy in the Vietnam era;
And…
I make House-Calls.

Vintage Proverbs: Intro/Index

graphic vintage advice about wisdom

In the U.S., old Ben Franklin published a series of articles in his Old Richard’s Almanac which, even if he didn’t come out right and say it, people took as the truth and became Medical Proverbs still with us today.

Perhaps, because a lot of these medical proverbs had their roots in vintage manuscripts like the bible and early writings of the pioneering healers/doctors throughout time.

How about it? Should we take sayings like: “early to bed…”, “an apple a day…”, “pay attention to seasons…”, “doctors’ best book is the patient”, “health checks don’t add anything meaningful…”, “eight glasses of water…”, “cold hands…”, “cigarettes stunt your…” and “feed a cold…” as truth or with a huge grain of salt?

Let’s do some proverb-busting!

4 Posts in "Proverbs" Series

  • Proverbs Series: Intro/Index – 1 Oct 2018
    Vintage medical proverbs: are they true or, like some, just "old wives' tails?"

  • Heart, fever, smoking, water and apples – 6 Oct 2018
    "An apple a day," "cold hands, warm heart," "feed a cold, starve a fever." and "cigarettes stunt your growth" are all medically related proverbs (myths)—are they true? This curated series of posts all deal with proverbs of a kind, which are explored and declared either "confirmed" or "busted."

  • Seasons, patient learning, remedies, eating and health checks – 1 Dec 2018
    This post continues our exploration of medical proverbs only now let us turn our attention to doctors and what they do. Are physical exams really necessary anymore? Should doctors really pay attention to the seasons? In true Mythbuster fashion, let's confirm or bust them.

  • sleep and health – 18 Feb 2019
    Previous posts have discussed medical proverbs but there is one glaring omission that needs to be addressed: does "early to be and early to rise REALLY make you healthy, wealthy and wise"?


 

Puberty and Underwear: Boxers, Briefs or Commando?

Boxer shorts are usually preferred once the growth spurt of puberty is underway

[I have to tell you, this article about boy’s underwear in puberty has been an interesting one to write. Mostly because I usually write about documented recommendations with scientific support and this topic is pretty much a collection of known, assumed and extrapolated suggestions from information in areas sometimes only tangentially related. Therefore it still leaves a lot of room for personal preference]

I answered a question of a 16 year-old patient who had been the subject of some school-girls’ highly personal and intrusive questioning: “What kind of Underwear do you wear? boxers, briefs or commando?” He wrote into an answer-line: “Which is best?” and I told him I’d think about it and see if there was an informed answer that covered all the Tanner Stages.
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How To Build A Dinosaur

Here is professor Jack Horner, the technical advisor for the Jurassic Park movies and the inspiration for the film’s lead character, Dr. Alan Grant, who says: “I’m extremely dyslexic… reading is the hardest thing I do.”

We should all be so afflicted! He loves to talk to sixth-graders because they love dinosaurs… almost as much as he does; and he’s going to tell us how to build a dinosaur!

See the video…

Boxers, Briefs or Commando??

[An “almost 16” year old boy out on a church group date is set about by a girl he likes and a couple of her friends who ask him what type of underwear he wears, boxers, briefs or commando. Having a good relationship with his doctor’s office he texted their “answer-line” to see if there was a particular type that might be better. He really hasn’t given it too much thought and basically just picks “the top one out of the drawer that’s clean that still fits” out of many Christmas and Birthday gifts from the past.

His doctor, a friend of mine, was a bit perplexed about how to answer, so I offered to take a stab at it on the blog.]
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Why We Laugh

Laughing: Sophie Scott

Sophie is a neuroscientist who studies laughter. In this TED talk she teaches us about why we laugh – and gives a whole lot of examples

See the video…

Childhood Diabetes Update

Update in diabetes care of the pediatric patient

Although, as explained, personal issues prevent me from posting as regularly as I have always done; none-the-less, I still try to keep up with the new developments in pediatrics and one such area is Diabetes in childhood.

I’ll try and update several “discoveries” related to “Diabetes” in the pediatric population that should be posted in this site: 1 – New naming conventions; 2 – that adolescent diabetes is much more refractory to treatment than we had thought; and, 3 – that the FDA has now approved the “artificial pancreas” for use in children with “type 1” diabetes.
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