by Don Ingwerson The sight of spinach on my dinner plate can – for me – ruin an otherwise good meal. Although I’ve always been told that eating spinach makes you healthy, this does little to change my feelings about the value of it. I’m not sure exactly what would make me reconsider my view of this green, leafy vegetable,
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by Don Ingwerson One night many years ago while I was serving in the military, the chaplain calmly and quietly told me over the phone that a soldier’s wife had been asphyxiated because of a gas leak in the family housing barracks. He asked me to go immediately to the base hospital and prayerfully support her. You might say that
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by Don Ingwerson When the subject of placebos enters into the conversation, what’s the perception? That the brain can fool the body? That doctors sometimes use it to convince the patient that a substance or pill will change the existing conditions of the body? Are there ethics guiding the use of placebos? The 60 Minutes interview concerning placebos brought to
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by Don Ingwerson “Mindfulness Meeting This Way” proclaimed a small sign at the entrance of one of the many medical buildings on the UCLA Campus – and suddenly I felt invigorated. I was not there to attend a mindfulness meeting, but to interview the GWish (George Washington Institute for Spirituality and Health) project director, Dr. Margaret Stuber, about a Templeton-funded
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A guest post written by Ingrid Peschke, legislative liaison for Christian Science and spirituality in Massachusetts More people are asking themselves this question in part because of the newly mandated healthcare law, or Affordable Care Act, and in part because health care in the United States isn’t exactly delivering on the goods. “We have a disease care system, not a
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by Don Ingwerson What comprises good health and how to maintain it can sometimes add up to a fuzzy picture for many of us. A growing number of studies point to the ineffectiveness and inappropriate use of drugs, while over-diagnosis and over-treatment by physicians continue to be a concern. Then there’s the ongoing dialogue about the lifestyle choices we make
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by Don Ingwerson Since complementary and alternative medicines (CAM) include the area of prayer, I keep abreast of reports that mention CAM. The attached report mentions alternative and complementary medicines. In prior reports, prayer was the leading alternative medicine used by the public (49%). I found this report interesting and I’m sharing it with you. I hope you find the
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by Don Ingwerson Article first published in the U-T San Diego. Amid the nation-wide debate about health care and each person’s search for a safe, effective, and affordable approach is the realization that being healthy is an individual responsibility and personal endeavor. A synopsis of an article in The Atlantic by Dr. David H. Freedman says, “the medical profession kept
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A guest post written by Charles Lindahl “Peeling Away Health Care’s Sticker Shock,” a recent Wired magazine article on the high cost of health care, concluded, “The health care business is about patients. But the patient population has been largely powerless….” A new study by the Institute of Medicine found that, “patients often find the health care system uncoordinated, opaque,
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A guest post written by Keith Wommack, a legislative advocate for spiritual healing in Texas There are too many of us feeling isolated. And, unfortunately, loneliness can be unhealthy. The conclusion from a study by the University of California, San Francisco, supports this: “Among participants who were older than 60 years, loneliness was a predictor of functional decline and death.” Since
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