Richard G. Petty, MD

A Stunning Video

For anyone interested in publishing and promoting book, the John Kremer website and blog are essential reading.

John has just published this extraordinary video, and I thought that I would pass it on.

RP On The Radio... Again... and Again

I am pleased be able to let you know that starting this week I am going to be doing a regular slot on Donna Seebo's show on www.bbsradio.com.

We are going to be doing regular updates on Integrated Medicine and the science that underpins it.

I shall let you know when the shows are on, and I shall be attaching the broadcasts to my website.

Here is a little piece that I just recorded for the station.

Download seebo_advert2.mp3

Bonnie D. Graham on WGBB Tonite

I have the privilege of being on Bonnie D. Graham on WGBB Tonite:

LISTEN LIVE TODAY 6PM-EST: www.am1240wgbb,com
Up Close & Personal with Bonnie D. Graham on WGBB Tonite – Featured guests:
6 PM: Richard Petty, MD, "Healing, Meaning and Purpose–The Magical Power of the Emerging Laws of Life" on journaling, integrated medicine, healthy aging & more. www.RichardGPettyMD.com

The second guest is:
6:30 PM: Masha Malka, "The One Minute Coach– Change Your Life One Minute At A Time" believes we are all potential geniuses capable of achieving success in all areas of life. www.MashaMalka.com

I have just reviewed Masha's most recent book on the Amazon website.

LISTEN to PODCASTS Anytime: www.BonnieRadioPodcasts.com
Digital media services: www.QBProductions.com
See you on the radio!.../bonnie

I shall let everyone know once we have the Podcasts prepared.

National Acupuncture Detoxification Association

I had the pleasure and privilege of being on Scott Cluthe’s show on Lime Radio this evening. It’s on Sirius Satellite Channel 114, and if you are interested in the new holistic worldview that is emerging all over the planet, I highly recommend Scott’s show and, in fact, all the shows that I have heard on Lime. I have also had a link to Lime website for some time now, and it always has a great deal of excellent material.

There were some excellent questions from listeners, and one caused me to do some research. The question was about the National Acupuncture Detoxification Association (NADA). The Association is a nonprofit that conducts training and provides public education about the use of acupuncture as an adjunctive treatment for addictions and mental disorders.

There is a substantial body of research literature on the topic of using acupuncture as part of a package of measures for treating substance abuse, and although it is still considered controversial in some quarters, it is being used in over 1,500 places around the world, and that does not include China and Japan, where I have seen acupuncture used a great deal in addictive disorders.

My own experience has been mixed. I have had little success I treating smoking addiction with acupuncture, though I have many colleagues who say that it is extremely helpful. I have had more success in using thought field therapy and homeopathy for treating smoking addiction, even though there is so far no good research data on the use of either for smoking.

If you are interested in the use of acupuncture as an adjunctive treatment for substance abuse, the NADA website if a good place to start.

Howard Hughes Medical Institute Joins the Open Access Revolution

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) has agreed to support Springer's Open Choice program. What that means is that if articles are accepted for publication after a process of rigorous peer-review, they will immediately be published with full open access and deposited in repositories such as PubMed Central, at a flat-rate fee per article of $3,000. Springer's Open Choice program applies to all its journals.

HHMI has a strong commitment to ensuring public access to original research articles. Beginning with papers submitted for publication after January 1, 2008, HHMI will require its scientists to publish their original research articles in journals that allow the articles and supplementary materials to be made freely accessible in a public repository within six months of publication.

HHMI is the largest private funder of biomedical research in the United States and commits more than $500 million a year for research and distributes $80 million in grant support for science education.

HHMI investigators already publish a significant number of research articles in open access journals or in journals with open access options. Under the new policy, HHMI will pay up to $2,000 in open access charges per article with the balance coming from laboratory budgets or other sources.

It is wonderful that one of the largest and most prestigious research institutes in the world, is actively supporting open-access publishing and backing up their words with significant funding

New Treatment Options: Knowing What to Use

One of the main reasons that I created this blog is that I want to empower you: I want to give to give you the information that you need to care for yourself and the people around you.

One of the problems with many new treatments is that they promise the earth, sometimes drag people away from things that may help them and then fail to deliver.

This is something that I struggled with in the field of holistic medicine for thirty years. I constantly hear and see fantastic claims that cannot be right and are often based on a complete misunderstanding of how the body functions. On the other hand there are some highly unorthodox methods and techniques that can be amazingly helpful. My job has been to find out which is which!

But it is not only in the field of unorthodox medicine. I have recently heard about something very questionable in the field of psychotherapy. Somebody has invented a new form of therapy that cuts across and ignores decades of research. He is now offering certifications in his method. So long as you have a very basic healthcare qualification, you pay him a few hundred dollars, do an online training and then you can set up shop as a therapist. Many members of the public do not know how little regulation there is for some of these therapies.

Here are some guidelines for checking out a new therapy or remedy:

1. Efficacy
Be suspicious of any treatment or therapist if they:

• Claim that a treatment works for everyone: I have yet to find ANY treatment that works for everyone
• Only use case histories or testimonials as proof. The plural of anecdote id not evidence. If we see or hear about something that looks promising, it is essential to confirm the reports with systematic, independent controlled research. Be aware that if that has not been done, the person selling you the treatment or the therapist claiming to help is essentially experimenting on you. And if they want to experiment they need your consent and the approval of an Institutional Review Board. And don’t buy into the “my work is so brilliant and cutting edge that nobody will publish it in a journal.” It is hard to publish really new work, but we cannot believe what people are saying until it has been subjected to peer review: other experts go through the work with a fine toothcomb to see if it is right.
• Cite only one study as proof. Hundreds of promising studies have turned out to be dead ends when someone else tried to repeat it. You can be a lot more confident if several studies have shown the same thing.
• Cites a study that did not have a control (comparison) group. That is always a first step in evaluating a new treatment.
• Cite a study that you cannot see yourself. We spend a lot of time checking some of the claims made on infomercials and websites. They often talk about some obscure study in a hard-to-find journal written in a foreign language. We go and find the papers and if necessary translate them. We constantly find that the studies quoted contain results that are 180 degrees away from what they claim.
• Only reference themselves. This recently came to light with a form of therapy that comes with a short book. There was not one scientific citation, but loads of self-references, so it looked as if there was something credible behind it.
• Testing a treatment without a control group is a necessary first step in investigating a new treatment, but subsequent studies with appropriate control groups are needed to clearly establish the effectiveness of the intervention.

2.  Safety?
Be wary if:

• A therapist or someone promoting a remedy cannot tell you the exact consequences of not following up with some other treatment. Safety is not only about the safety of a product or a therapy: it is also about the risks of declining a proven treatment
• A therapist tells you stop any other treatment that you are on without discussing the risks of stopping it, and without discussing the situation with any previous therapist. It does not matter whether you were on a medication or having acupuncture. Different treatments interact, and stopping and starting can be risky. If a therapist who does not prescribe medications tells you stop them, be very, very careful. There are precise ways to discontinue most treatments
• A remedy comes without precise directions about how to use it
• Something does not list its contents or ingredients
• A product has no information or warnings about side effects
• If a product or therapeutic approach is described as natural, with the implication that natural means safe. Hurricanes, arsenic and deadly nightshade are all natural!

3.  Promotion
Be very cautious if a therapy or treatment:

• Claims to be based on a secret formula or a secret that has been deliberately hidden from you
• Claims that the particular treatment or therapy is being suppressed or unfairly attacked by the medical or therapeutic communities
• Claims to work immediately and permanently for everyone
• Is described as an “Amazing breakthrough” or a “Miracle.”
• Claims to be a cure for something that other experts believe is incurable. They could be right, but then we have to go back to the first point about efficacy
• Is only promoted through infomercials, self-promoting books, online or by mail order

4. Evaluating Media Reports

• When evaluating reports of health care options, consider the following questions:
• What is the source of the information? Good sources of information include medical schools, government agencies (such as the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute of Mental Health), professional medical associations, and national disorder/disease-specific organizations. Information from studies in reputable, peer-reviewed medical journals is more credible than popular media reports.
• Who is the authority? The affiliations and relevant credentials of "experts" should be provided, though initials behind a name do not always mean that the person is an authority. Reputable medical journals now require researchers to reveal possible conflicts of interest, such as when a researcher conducting a study also owns a company marketing the treatment being studied or has any other potential conflict of interest.
• Who funded the research? It may be important to also know who funded a particular research project.
• Is the finding preliminary or confirmed? Unfortunately, a preliminary finding is often reported in the media as a "breakthrough" result. An "interesting preliminary finding" is a more realistic appraisal of what often appears in headlines as an "exciting new breakthrough." You should track results over time and seek out the original source, such as a professional scientific publication, to get a fuller understanding of the research findings

5. What Are the Financial Implications of This New Therapy or Remedy?

• Is the treatment covered by health insurance?
• What out-of-pocket financial obligation will you or your family have?
• How long will this out-of-pocket financial obligation be?
• Is there any kind of guarantee?
  

Tips for Finding Reliable Information Online
The good news is that the Internet is becoming an excellent source of medical information. The bad news is that with its low cost and global entry, the Web is also home to a great deal of unreliable health information.
In addition to the tips cited earlier, Web surfing really needs some special considerations:
Know the source. The domain name tells you the source of information on the Web site, and the last part of the domain name tells you about the source. For example:
.edu = university/educational
.biz/.com = company/commercial
.org = non-profit organization
.gov = government agency

The same rules do not always apply if you are looking at websites in other countries.
Obtain a "second opinion" regarding information on the Web. Pick a key phrase or name and run it through a search engine to find other discussions of the topic or talk to your health care professional.

Experts who spend time and trouble evaluating reports and then publish their findings online will often answer questions. RichardGPettyMD.blogs.com is one that does, and there are many others.

The Accelerating Open Access Revolution

It is only a couple of days since I last wrote something on the revolution in open access to information, but here are two new things that I need to share with you.

First, today saw the launch of the journal Open Medicine.

These are a couple of extracts from James Maskalyk's editorial in the inaugural issue:

...To attain their true worth, medical journals need to place the knowledge on their pages into as many capable hands as possible. In the past, this opportunity was limited mainly to those with a university library close by. Now, because of the Internet, one simply needs to be near a telephone line. The capacity of medical journals to disseminate knowledge has never been greater...

Unfortunately, physicians attempting to answer a clinical question are faced with two unappealing options: to navigate a sea of unedited pages of varying quality, or to pay for access to more carefully reviewed scholarly information. It seems an anathema to the spirit of medical research that, largely for economic reasons, the information it produces remains hidden from many potential users. Access is limited not only for health professionals in poorer countries, but also for health care providers in wealthy countries (most of whom do not have "free" access to information unless they work in universities), and for patients, who deserve the opportunity to become informed about research that affects their lives. The transformation of research findings and discussion of the results — the application of knowledge — is curtailed. Just as importantly, the debate over its merit is stifled before it can properly begin....

Medical knowledge should be public and free from undeclared influence. When possible, it should be free for those who apply it. Since people's lives depend on it, that knowledge must be filtered several times before it is ready to use. Studies need to be peer reviewed, to have their statistics analyzed, their content edited, then copy edited, then published quickly for as wide an audience as possible. The prospect of having a high-quality source of information that held true to these principles but was also free and globally accessible was impossible to imagine 20 years ago....


The second thing is something very helpful on Peter Suber's excellent blog:

OA podcasts from non-OA journals

Charles W. Bailey Jr. has collected some links for journals offering OA podcasts.

In a recent SSP-L message, Mark Johnson, Journal Manager of HighWire Press, identified three journals that offer podcasts or digital audio files:

• BJM
• JAMA
• New England Journal of Medicine

Here are a few others:

• ACS Chemical Biology
• Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine
• The Journal of Law, Economics and Policy
• The Journal of Neurologic Physical Therapy
• The Lancet
• Nature
• Science

The Delayed Leopard

Like most lovers of all things Apple, I’ve been greatly disappointed by the delay the release of the new Macintosh operating system, a.k.a. Mac OS 10.5 or Leopard.

It seems that we are going to have wait until October. Though we do have the iPhone to look forward to. ☺

After all the conspiracy theorists had finished saying their piece, there were some really rather funny takes on why the delay.

Have a look here:

Biomedical Journals and Open Access

I have written before about my enormous admiration for the global attempt to make research freely available to everyone. This is such an important step toward patient empowerment and greater transparency in science and medicine.

There is currently an online petition to support free and open access to European research, and if you also believe in the principles of integrity, transparency and personal empowerment, you may want to consider signing.

I was gratified to see how many major journals are now making articles immediately and permanently available online without charge. A number of journals require an institutional or a personal subscription to view other content, such as reviews or paper reports. Free trial subsciptions to these journals are available.

This seems to be the most up-to-date listing, and everyone involved really deserves our gratitude. I shall continue to update this list as more journals become involved.

	A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
	Acta Veterinaria Scandinavica     all content Open Access

	AIDS Research and Therapy     all content Open Access
	Algorithms for Molecular Biology     all content Open Access
	Annals of Clinical Microbiology and Antimicrobials     all content Open Access
	Annals of General Psychiatry     all content Open Access
	Annals of Surgical Innovation and Research     all content Open Access
	Arthritis Research & Therapy     all research articles Open Access; subscription required for other content; free trial available
	Australia and New Zealand Health Policy     all content Open Access
	Behavioral and Brain Functions     all content Open Access
	Beilstein Journal of Organic Chemistry     all content Open Access
	Biology Direct     all content Open Access
	BioMagnetic Research and Technology     all content Open Access
	Biomedical Digital Libraries     all content Open Access
	BioMedical Engineering OnLine     all content Open Access
	BioPsychoSocial Medicine     all content Open Access
	BMC series
	BMC Anesthesiology     all content Open Access
	BMC Biochemistry     all content Open Access
	BMC Bioinformatics     all content Open Access
	BMC Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Biotechnology     all content Open Access
	BMC Blood Disorders     all content Open Access
	BMC Cancer     all content Open Access
	BMC Cardiovascular Disorders     all content Open Access
	BMC Cell Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Chemical Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Clinical Pathology     all content Open Access
	BMC Clinical Pharmacology     all content Open Access
	BMC Complementary and Alternative Medicine     all content Open Access
	BMC Dermatology     all content Open Access
	BMC Developmental Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Ear, Nose and Throat Disorders     all content Open Access
	BMC Ecology     all content Open Access
	BMC Emergency Medicine     all content Open Access
	BMC Endocrine Disorders     all content Open Access
	BMC Evolutionary Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Family Practice     all content Open Access
	BMC Gastroenterology     all content Open Access
	BMC Genetics     all content Open Access
	BMC Genomics     all content Open Access
	BMC Geriatrics     all content Open Access
	BMC Health Services Research     all content Open Access
	BMC Immunology     all content Open Access
	BMC Infectious Diseases     all content Open Access
	BMC International Health and Human Rights     all content Open Access
	BMC Medical Education     all content Open Access
	BMC Medical Ethics     all content Open Access
	BMC Medical Genetics     all content Open Access
	BMC Medical Imaging     all content Open Access
	BMC Medical Informatics and Decision Making     all content Open Access
	BMC Medical Research Methodology     all content Open Access
	BMC Medicine     all content Open Access
	BMC Microbiology     all content Open Access
	BMC Molecular Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders     all content Open Access
	BMC Nephrology     all content Open Access
	BMC Neurology     all content Open Access
	BMC Neuroscience     all content Open Access
	BMC News and Views     all content Open Access
	BMC Nuclear Medicine     all content Open Access
	BMC Nursing     all content Open Access
	BMC Ophthalmology     all content Open Access
	BMC Oral Health     all content Open Access
	BMC Palliative Care     all content Open Access
	BMC Pediatrics     all content Open Access
	BMC Pharmacology     all content Open Access
	BMC Physiology     all content Open Access
	BMC Plant Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Pregnancy and Childbirth     all content Open Access
	BMC Psychiatry     all content Open Access
	BMC Public Health     all content Open Access
	BMC Pulmonary Medicine     all content Open Access
	BMC Structural Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Surgery     all content Open Access
	BMC Systems Biology     all content Open Access
	BMC Urology     all content Open Access
	BMC Veterinary Research     all content Open Access
	BMC Women's Health     all content Open Access
	Breast Cancer Research     all research articles Open Access; subscription required for other content; free trial available
	Cancer Cell International     all content Open Access
	Carbon Balance and Management     all content Open Access
	Cardiovascular Diabetology     all content Open Access
	Cardiovascular Ultrasound     all content Open Access
	CBD Ubiquitin now accepting submissions
	Cell & Chromosome     all content Open Access
	Cell Communication and Signaling     all content Open Access
	Cell Division     all content Open Access
	Cerebrospinal Fluid Research     all content Open Access
	Chemistry Central Journal     all content Open Access
	Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health now accepting submissions
	Chinese Medicine     all content Open Access
	Chiropractic & Osteopathy     all content Open Access
	Clinical and Molecular Allergy     all content Open Access
	Clinical Practice and Epidemiology in Mental Health     all content Open Access
	Comparative Hepatology     all content Open Access
	Conflict and Health     all content Open Access
	Cost Effectiveness and Resource Allocation     all content Open Access
	Cough     all content Open Access
	Critical Care     all research articles Open Access; subscription required for other content; free trial available
	Current Opinion in Drug Discovery & Development     review journal; subscription required
	Current Opinion in Investigational Drugs     review journal; subscription required
	Current Opinion in Molecular Therapeutics     review journal; subscription required
	CytoJournal     all content Open Access
	Developmental Epidemiology now accepting submissions
	Diagnostic Pathology     all content Open Access
	Dynamic Medicine     all content Open Access
	Emerging Themes in Epidemiology     all content Open Access
	Environmental Health     all content Open Access
	Epidemiologic Perspectives & Innovations     all content Open Access
	Filaria Journal     all content Open Access
	Frontiers in Zoology     all content Open Access
	Genetic Vaccines and Therapy     all content Open Access
	Genome Biology     all research articles Open Access; subscription required for other content; free trial available
	Geochemical Transactions     all content Open Access
	Globalization and Health     all content Open Access
	Harm Reduction Journal     all content Open Access
	Head & Face Medicine     all content Open Access
	Health and Quality of Life Outcomes     all content Open Access
	Health Research Policy and Systems     all content Open Access
	Human Resources for Health     all content Open Access
	IDrugs     review journal; subscription required
	Immunity & Ageing     all content Open Access
	Immunome Research     all content Open Access
	Implementation Science     all content Open Access
	Infectious Agents and Cancer     all content Open Access
	International Breastfeeding Journal     all content Open Access
	International Journal for Equity in Health     all content Open Access
	International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity     all content Open Access
	International Journal of Health Geographics     all content Open Access
	International Journal of Mental Health Systems now accepting submissions
	International Seminars in Surgical Oncology     all content Open Access
	Journal of Autoimmune Diseases     all content Open Access
	Journal of Biology     all research articles Open Access; other content currently available free of charge
	Journal of Biomedical Discovery and Collaboration     all content Open Access
	Journal of Brachial Plexus and Peripheral Nerve Injury     all content Open Access
	Journal of Carcinogenesis     all content Open Access
	Journal of Cardiothoracic Surgery     all content Open Access
	Journal of Circadian Rhythms     all content Open Access
	Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine     all content Open Access
	Journal of Experimental & Clinical Assisted Reproduction     all content Open Access
	Journal of Immune Based Therapies and Vaccines     all content Open Access
	Journal of Inflammation     all content Open Access
	Journal of Medical Case Reports     all content Open Access
	Journal of Molecular Signaling     all content Open Access
	Journal of Nanobiotechnology     all content Open Access
	Journal of Negative Results in BioMedicine     all content Open Access
	Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation     all content Open Access
	Journal of Neuroinflammation     all content Open Access
	Journal of Occupational Medicine and Toxicology     all content Open Access
	Journal of Orthopaedic Surgery and Research     all content Open Access
	Journal of Translational Medicine     all content Open Access
	Journal of Trauma Management & Outcomes now accepting submissions
	Kinetoplastid Biology and Disease     all content Open Access
	Lipids in Health and Disease     all content Open Access
	Malaria Journal     all content Open Access
	Medical Immunology     all content Open Access
	Microbial Cell Factories     all content Open Access
	Molecular Cancer     all content Open Access
	Molecular Neurodegeneration     all content Open Access
	Molecular Pain     all content Open Access
	Neural Development     all content Open Access
	Nonlinear Biomedical Physics now accepting submissions
	Nuclear Receptor     all content Open Access
	Nutrition & Metabolism     all content Open Access
	Nutrition Journal     all content Open Access
	Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases     all content Open Access
	Osteopathic Medicine and Primary Care     all content Open Access
	Particle and Fibre Toxicology     all content Open Access
	Pediatric Rheumatology     all content Open Access
	Philosophy, Ethics, and Humanities in Medicine     all content Open Access
	Plant Methods     all content Open Access
	Population Health Metrics     all content Open Access
	Proteome Science     all content Open Access
	Radiation Oncology     all content Open Access
	Reproductive Biology and Endocrinology     all content Open Access
	Reproductive Health     all content Open Access
	Respiratory Research     all content Open Access
	Retrovirology     all content Open Access
	Saline Systems     all content Open Access
	The Scientist     magazine; daily news free; subscription required for other content
	Scoliosis     all content Open Access
	Source Code for Biology and Medicine     all content Open Access
	Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy     all content Open Access
	Theoretical Biology and Medical Modelling     all content Open Access
	Thrombosis Journal     all content Open Access
	Trials     all content Open Access
	Virology Journal     all content Open Access
	World Journal of Emergency Surgery     all content Open Access
	World Journal of Surgical Oncology     all content Open Access

 

Information Overload

The British Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) has funded some very important research that confirms something that many of us have feared for quite a while: there is now so much information online that important science websites are in danger of becoming buried in a sheer avalanche of facts. Key science sites are failing to register in the top 30 Google search results.

Dr Ralph Schroeder, Dr Alexandre Caldas, Professor William Dutton, and Dr. Jenny Fry of the Oxford Internet Institute have investigated how the Internet is changing the way in which people seek out sources of scientific expertise.

Traditionally publishers have held a central position because of the importance of academic articles, but this is changing with increasing uses of the Internet and Web.

The study focused on how academic researchers in particular interact with the Web on topics including HIV/AIDS, climate change, terrorism, the Internet and society. These subjects are, of course, all highly topical, but the findings of this study will apply much more widely to the uses of the Internet and Web for searching for information on a variety of topics.

The research also confirmed something that clinicians have known for some time: the Web is far from being a neutral source of information. It has a particular structure that steers the search in directions that may not be intended by the user and so makes some sites more accessible than others. Search engines such as Google play an increasingly important gate-keeping role that will influence the information that is found. They can shape "winners and losers" by means that are not always apparent and moreover do so in a manner which can vary according to subject matter.

There is also a problem  that some vested interests are able to "buy" high visibility. Many people with psychological difficulties have stumbled on Scientology websites without realizing it. And there are some people who have the time and the energy to attract a lot of "hits."

The researchers came to several conclusions:

* The "visibility" of information on the Web is of increasing importance. Do people looking for research results on climate change or terrorism find themselves directed to a few top sites rather than a wide array of diverse sources? Do they encounter the most highly regarded researchers rather than marginal ones?

* Interviews revealed that researchers' ideas of key networks, structures and organisations may not be mirrored by search engines. For example the HIV/AIDS researchers reported using national journals, charity organisations, statistics and public sector organisations but none of these appear in the top 30 search results for generic domain keywords. In addition, a number of institutions, people and other key organisations and resources failed to appear in the top 30 search results.

* The role search engines play can vary according to topic. In the HIV/AIDS and the Internet and society domains, for instance, search engines such as Google was mainly used as an aide memoire for locating known sources. For researchers on terrorism, the search engine played a more central role in exploring the object of research and identifying relevant sites of information.

"This will be an issue not just for policymakers," Dr. Schroeder says, "but for educators, organisations involved in science and research communication, regulators responsible for access to the Web, and citizens who are concerned with the diversity and richness of the information world around them."

More Saturday Satire

I think that I can tease Apple because I like their products so much: I've bought enough of them! And I'll be getting a lot more come June.

Here's another piece of fun.

Enjoy!

RP On The Radio Part Deux

I mentioned that Kim Colvard and I were going to be having an online discussion. We covered a lot of topics and we’ve had some great feedback.

We are definitely going to do this again!

You can download the file here.

Enjoy!

Saturday Satire

Most people seem to know that I am a cheer leader for virtually all things Apple. I'm on about my fifteenth Macintosh and I have no idea how many iPods we have. And the thought of the up-coming iPhone has me palpitating with desire. I've been lovingly poring over it's specs and I know that I'm going to be at the front of the line when it comes out in June.

But I just had a mega snigger when I saw this from the Borowitz Report:

Apple Recalls iPhone; Forgot to Include ‘Phone’ Feature

Jobs: Oops

In what could prove to be the most embarrassing misstep in consumer electronics history, Apple Inc. announced today that it would recall its entire production run of the Apple iPhone after discovering that it had failed to include a “phone” feature in the much-hyped handheld device.

Speaking from Apple corporate headquarters, company founder Steve Jobs offered consumers his apology for the monumental goof and seemed to be searching for an explanation for how it could have occurred.

“First and foremost, we’re sorry,” a red-faced Mr. Jobs said in a conference call with Wall Street analysts. “When you make a product called the iPhone, people expect it to include a phone, and we messed that part up.”

Mr. Jobs suggested that Apple had been so focused on making the iPhone the “coolest handheld device ever” that it had forgotten to include one of the most important features of any cellular phone: “One thing people like about cell phones is that you can dial numbers into them and call people.”

Instead, he explained, Apple’s engineers had crammed the iPhone with a plethora of what he called “non-phonal features,” such as a camera, an MP3 player, a taser, and a tactical nuclear weapon.

While Mr. Jobs said that almost all of the nine million iPhones that had been shipped to stores were on their way back to Apple’s manufacturing plant, he offered advice to consumers who somehow had already obtained the phoneless iPhone: “Just hold it up to your head and pretend to be talking into it.”

Elsewhere, the Fish and Wildlife Service said that it would remove wolves from the endangered species list and add Republicans.

RP On The Radio

Next Monday, February 5th, I am going to have the privilege of having a one hour conversation about Healing, Meaning and Purpose with Kimberley Colvard at Radio Sandy Springs. We are going to be on from 12 noon to 1PM EST. The show gets repeated twelve hours later for you folk in Europe and Australasia.

Here is the neat thing: you can either listen on the radio (AM 1620 in Atlanta) or listen in on line. I am hoping to put the audio file on this website. So you can listen at your leisure as I explain how we discovered that the Laws of Healing are changing, what it means for your health, well-being, personal development and business, and how you can use these new insights starting today.

I do a lot of radio and TV work, but I am particularly happy to be doing this particular show. Kim is the author of an extremely interesting book - Life is a Perception, What's Yours?: How your thoughts and beliefs determine your life - that is full of novel ideas clearly showing that she is completey in tune with the aims and objectives of Integrated Health and Medicine. When I first started explaining the principles to her, she was one of the few people who "got it" straight away. So I am expecting this to be a very dynamic and creative program.

Stayed tuned (!), and you will be able to assess that for yourself!

Open Access

I have had a number of kind comments about my brief piece concerning the revolution in open access to information.

Few people have yet realized the impact that it will have on our lives.

I am most honored to have just received this note from Peter Suber:

Hi Richard: PLoS is part of a larger movement for open access to peer-reviewed research literature, and a lot has happened since PLoS was launched in 2001. For details, see my Timeline [ http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/timeline.htm ], and for daily updates see my blog, Open Access News [ http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/fosblog.html ].

I have had a good look at Peter's material, and I have also subscribed to his blog, so it will now appear on the left-hand side of this blog under "What I'm reading," so you can access his writings without having to dart all over the place.

The entire open access movement encompasses a great deal more than just scientific and medical research, and is all precisely aligned with my aim of achieving greater personal empowerment, so that you can take control of your life, your health, your future and the legacy that you leave behind.

Several correspondents have agreed with my point, that the next imperative is to teach people how to use this information.

Healia, I Thank You!

I've written before to extol the virtues of the new seacrch engine Healia.com.

Well now you can color me REALLY impressed.

My Web Mistress (I'm STILL not at all sure that I should be calling her that {!}), Carol Kirshner and I both asked for two extra things: a widget in the sidebar of a blog that allows you to search Healia directly. And second that it would be possible to open a search result in a new window. So now you can get all the information that I offer, and do all your searching to follow up on things that I've said or suggested, without having to go tearing all over the Internet.

We wanted to offer you "One stop shopping."

A single place where you can find out what's new, or what's tried, tested and true, in Health, Wellness and Personal Development. And a place where you can receive free guidance and support on your journey.

Your time is very valuable, and these new developments should help you enormously.

Healia did all this within seven days of our request, and any company that's going to be that responsive tells me exactly where they are coming from.

So read and enjoy the articles, and be sure to use the Healia search box to follow up on anything that you need.

All the best to you!

Healia is Here!

Several months ago, I wrote about Healia.com, a new and innovative search engine for all things to do with health.

This morning I got the news that I'd been waiting for from Carol Kirshner my Web Mistress (I'm still not sure that's a PC term for her) and researcher. Healia will be officially launched to the public tomorrow, September 18th.

As a writer on health, wellness and personal development, I think that this is going to become a major source of information for me. Much as I love Google, this is a search engine dedicated to these topics.

From a release that I've just received, Healia says that:
The newest version of Healia has several major improvements over our initial version:

• We have enhanced the accuracy and performance of our filtering algorithms
• We are offering additional filters to allow people to filter by the topic of the document when they submit a disease or drug-related search (Try searching on a disease and drug name to see how they are handled differently)
• We provide a “Suggested Result” from a reference site for disease and drug-related searches
• We detect and provide expanded equivalents to common medical abbreviations and acronyms

I've been putting it through its paces, and I must say that I'm very impressed. I'm probably a lot more demanding than most users, and it's very quick and accurate.

If you are a consumer or potential consumer, Healia will likely be the best place to research an illness. Or ways of keeping healthy.

I agree with the points in Carol's evaluation: It would be nice if search results opended in a separate window. Even though I use a laptop for everything (Macintosh, of course), and don't have much screen real estate, with Macintosh OS X, that's not a problem: navigating from one screen to another is a snap. Having to keep going back is a pain in the posterior.

And my cri du coeur: please, please, please could we have a Healia Search widget to add to our blogs??

I do everything that I can to provide my readers with totally accurate, up to date information, and I encourage them to check on everything. I'd love readers to be able to search directly from within medical blogs. It would be a real win/win, IMHO.

Wouldn't it be great to be able to demonstrate it at the Healthcare Blogging Summit in Washington in December???

When Being First Is Not the Only Thing

Regular readers and anyone who's looked at my blogroll, knows that I like Zach Lynch's consistently insightful blog.

He has been working on a project for four years, and now it appears that someone is coming out with some of the same ideas in a book that is due to arrive in late September.

This does not look to me like plagiarism. Once a new idea is out there, it quickly spreads, and people will run with it.

You might be interested to see some of the comments that I made on Zach's site.

The other book may be superb. But the important point is that although being first is the only thing in competitive games, in the world of ideas that will help us, being first is not the only thing.

Being correct is the only thing.

A Special Offer

Today I'm attaching a first enhanced podcast to my blog.

We've been experimenting for months to get the music, sound and graphics just right. I'm planning to do a great many podcasts in the months to come so that you can listen at your leisure, and I can also share some specific tips and techniques that are tricky to explain using the written word alone.

Today's podcast is a short introduction, some advice on motivation, and an offer.

To commemorate the launch of this new project, I'm also going to extend the offer here.

The Internet is full of people telling you what they think and sometimes even what you should think and do!

That's not my way of doing things. I am here to serve you, and telling you what to do is scarcely an act of service!

Now that you have got a flavor for my areas of expertise, I am going to ask you what you would like to hear about or learn about or maybe even be amused about!

As you will see if you look at my list of "Categories," there are a few areas in which a great many people think of me as THE expert: the Go-To Guy.

So I get a huge number of questions every day, and I think that most of them merit a detailed response.

So the offer is this: I'm going to invite you to email me a question in any of these categories. Just send me a quick note to healingmeaningpurpose[at]yahoo.com. The shorter the better!

Naturally I cannot diagnose or treat a person online. No responsible clinician would ever do such a thing without performing a full, detailed and personal evaluation.

I'm looking for questions that will be of interest and concern to many people.

I am going to select the hundred and one questions that I can answer with something new: a new perspective, new information or new insight. Or perhaps a question that will be best answered by intuition or by an appeal to the classics or the spiritual Masters and Mistresses who have taught us over the centuries. I am then going to put these hundred and one questions and answers together into an electronic book. I can guarantee you that the book will contain an absolute treasure trove of life-changing information.

How do I know that?

Because of the quality of the questions that I've already received and the kindness of the responses to my answers. 

When it's finished in late October, I'm going to offer the eBook for sale at $49.00.

However.

Anyone who sends a question that I select and can use will receive a FREE copy of the eBook.

I'm totally serious about that, and there's no catch: I really am going to give away almost five thousand dollar's worth of books!

While also, I hope, offering guidance, help, support and inspiration to a great many people around the world.

Enjoy the podcast, and I look forward to hearing from you if you have a question with which you think I may be able to help!

Download podcast.August.18th.2006 1.mp3

Blogging and the Tipping Point

The blogging phenomenon is well under five years old, though many of us were communicating online long before that. The question for many of us has been whether blogging is just going to remain a kind of online graffiti or political sounding board which will eventually go the way of the dodo, or whether it has now reached a level of maturity where it will be an important social, business and educational phenomenon?

Have we reached the Tipping Point? This forty-year-old term refers to a dramatic moment in time and space when something unique becomes common. The term was popularized and applied to daily life by Malcolm Gladwell in his book of the same name.

You will remember the impact of bloggers during the last Presidential election campaign, but some skeptics thought that was just a flash in the pan.

Several recent items have convinced me that blogs are indeed beginning to have a significant impact:
1.    A white paper published by Market Sentinel, Onalytica and Immediate Future in December 2005 discussed the impact of bloggers on corporate reputation, after one individual named Jeff Jarvis had a significant negative impact on Dell Computers after relating his bad customer experience.
2.    In April 2006, Custom Communications organized an event – I thin the first of its kind - on Blogging4Business. The aim was to discuss how blogs could potentially damage a brand.
3.    In May of this year, traditional news producers, aggregators and distributors gathered at the We Media Global Forum to discuss the future of news in the light of the growth of blogging and what is becoming known as citizen journalism.
4.    The Internet is moving rapidly from being a read-only or buy-only medium to an organic, participatory, interconnected and collaborative network. Just look at the burgeoning popularity not just of blogs, but also of sites like MySpace.com and the energy and eagerness that is creating Wikipedia.
5.    The Internet is rapidly becoming a web of producers who are customizing their interaction, rather than passive consumers.

The BBC ran a nice discussion on some of the dynamics of what is now occurring.

How do you see all this developing?

Technorati tags: Blogs Blogging Tipping point Malcolm Gladwell

Healia.com

Carol Kirshner, web mistress extraordinaire, has just alerted me to a great resource for anyone looking for information on health, wellness and healing, called Healia.com.

Carol's review is excellent, and now that I've tried out the website, I really do share her enthusiasm.

One of the reasons for creating my own blog is that the internet is full of medical misinformation. I have just been writing an article that I am going to post tomorrow. My initial reactions to some of the statements that I found on line would not have been fit for you gentle reader. Suffice to say that there were comments on some websites that betrayed a complete ignorance about the workings of the human body and recommendations that can best be described as bovine excreta.

Healia.com seems to be very different. I have been putting it through its paces, and I've so far not found a single problem or contentious area, despite throwing a lot of unusually tough questions at it. I fully anticipate that it's going to become one of my major research tools, and for matters pertaining to health, it seems to be better than any other search engine that I've found.

Technorati tags: Internet search engine Health Healing Wellness