If you drive around an hour to and from work like I do, you’ve probably developed some kind of formula for getting to work. And if you’re like me, you’ve seen people do scary things while driving. People texting, women putting on makeup (sorry, I haven’t seen a single man do this yet … but I’m only 54 years old), men shaving, doing crossword puzzles and looking at maps … (Hello Google Maps). A few years ago, a woman was arrested for flossing her teeth while speeding at over 70 miles per hour in the UK. I don’t know how he would hold on to the wheel if he was flossing like me (with both hands), maybe he was wearing floss holders …
I have been doing my journey for about 20 years and I have a routine. I usually try to have a cup of low carb cereal (dry, of course) and wash it down with 32 ounces of water. And for a long time I listened to the radio, and with XM I could listen to sports radio or the news … so I could keep up with the world. Once or twice a month I would listen to an informational CD on some aspect of dentistry. It’s not a bad use of time, or so I thought.
But recently, thanks to the purchase of an iPhone (thanks to Verizon for welcoming this technology) I discovered the Audible books. In the last 2 months I have listened to 3 books and they all helped me focus better in my life. The first book was called “The five languages of love“By Gary Chapman, the second was”Tea Success principles“by Jack Canfield and the third was “Talent is overrated“by Geoff Colvin.
It is the fourth book that I like and it is called “Blood sugar solution“by Dr. Mark Hyman. In recent years I have developed a thirst for knowledge about health care prevention. Dr. Hyman is passionate about preventing what he calls diabesity, a combination of diabetes and obesity He, along with various healthcare providers, are trying to sound the alarm about the dangers of this deadly combination of health problems and the enormous cost of lives and money facing the world (not just the US). 35 million to 240 million, a 7-fold increase. But in the three years after that 110 million more cases were added to the lists. Their point is that governments should be looking to see why the numbers are increasing, not just trying to figure out from the big drug companies how to get medicated.
Unfortunately, there are great powers that do not want to help. I have already mentioned how invested the big pharmaceutical companies are because they are trying to find different ways to fight diabetes. I remember about 15 years ago a golf buddy gave me an article to read about investing … and it was about companies that deal with diabetes medications. The article called diabetes the perfect reversal disease … rarely fatal, but needs constant monitoring and medication … for the life of the patient. But there is another major player in the cause of diabetes and that is the food industry. All the sugar in our food (and in particular liquid sugar: sodas, sports drinks, energy drinks, etc.) is a major contributing factor. The way our body works is changing and now people who are not obese are also at higher risk of diabetes, particularly people from the Far East … the switch to the westernized diet started to take its toll, just ask the Chinese who now also have an epidemic. Until about a decade ago, diabetes was a rare diagnosis in China, but now nearly 1 in 10 Chinese adults are estimated to have it. WOW!
So let’s get back to what Dr. Hyman actually says. You cannot call diabetes hereditary when you observe an astronomical increase in diagnosed cases. There has to be a strong environmental aspect and we have to learn to control it to stop this epidemic.
Actually, this is not much different from what I have said about dentistry. As a dentist, my job is to go out of business. Simply put, there is no child born in America today who should have gum disease or tooth decay (which, by the way, is a contributing factor to diabetes). All it takes is education (I give our country a D here) and parental control (I won’t even dare to give a grade). I mean, do you really have money to spend on preventable diseases? And on a larger scale, do our governments have the money to spend on treating a disease that, by all estimates, costs more than $ 1 in every $ 10 spent on health care (and probably a lot more if you add all the other problems? What does diabetes bring? above).
After almost 20 years of traveling 2 hours a day, I have found a way to make the most of that time … to educate myself more about what I can do to improve the health of my patients and the people I care about. I call that time well employed.