A lot of people have started buying devices promising to find problems and lead to cure. These may include sugar monitors, blood pressure cuffs, and even monitors to find heart irregularities including the dreaded afib. But are these devices helpful, or could they have a dark side? We discuss all of this today, but we also focus on what is most important to home safety and health promotion, and it has nothing to do with gadgets. Well, one gadget is beneficial, one that you can press if you fall! But a major goal of the home is to set it up to prevent falls, to let in light, to enable you to get out (and others to get in) to keep you social, to help you to eat well. We talk about the best ways to assure you are safe and thriving at home, and talk down the recent focus on gadgets to find problems that are not really important.

"The greater the ignorance, the greater the dogmatism." -William Osler, MD

www.returntohealing.com

Alan and Andy discuss the HALE scale, a subset of longevity that measures the average length of years people live without being disabled. The longevity in our country averages 79 years, about 4 years lower than most industrialized nations. But we do far worse in the HALE score, where our healthgevity (the average length of life we live not disabled) is 63 years, meaning that on average we spend the last 16 years of our lives suffering poor health or frank disability. Compare this to other industrialized nations, where the average HALE age is 74 years, a full 8 years longer than us, with less end of life disability. Why?

We spend far less on primary care and lifestyle care than virtually any other country. We are a specialized, high tech system that becomes interested in you only when you get sick. Thus, little attention is spent on prevention. How can we fix this? We lay it out in our book, and we talk about it on this podcast. The solution is easier than you may know, but it will take some pushback from those most harmed to create change.

"The greater the ignorance, the greater the dogmatism." -William Osler, MD

www.returntohealing.com

We are hearing a lot about measles on the news. The escalating cases. The unprecedented deaths. The tragic repercussions of the anti-vaxxers and Kennedy in particular It has become a war between those who fear vaccines and those who demand that everyone get every vaccine we have. Two extremes fighting it out, as the sensible middle falls prey to this battle and media scare campaign.

Yes, measles is preventable with vaccination, but are we in the midst of a health crisis because some parents choose not to vaccinate their kids? And is this a case of public health exigency whereby parents should be forced to vaccinate? As of now the CDC reports 5 total measles deaths nationwide in 2026. There were 3 deaths in 2025. All are in the unvaccinated, one at least in an infant too young for vaccination, none in any who who ever received a vaccination. Meanwhile, in 2026, 1000 people die every day from smoking related deaths, 1000 die a day from being in the hospital, 500 die a day from poor diets, and yet the media chooses to point its finger at measles. Why?

In this podcast we talk about how extremism drives not only media coverage but policy decisions as well. We also discuss how absolutism, shaming, and extremism voiced by public health advocates only creases more mistrust in the system, especially knowing that the vaccine industry is extremely profitable. As always, we advocate for the middle road, one that advocates vaccine education and advocacy when vaccines are reasonable, but which allows choice and common sense shared decision making. But, isn't that the road all of heath care should take? We think so!

"The greater the ignorance, the greater the dogmatism." -William Osler, MD

www.returntohealing.com