1. Software that helped…
If you prefer to take notes using the SmartNote system, RoamResearch seems to be more useful than Evernote. Here’s where the idea behind the app is explained (click). I admit I tried to use the old-school index card method for the SmartNotes (as per the developer), but the index cards were not being filed, so I swapped to RoamResearch (also recommended by the author of the book). (here’s where to try the app).
2. Helpful research…
During my years as a general internist, I saw frozen shoulder too frequently disrupt the ability of the elderly to recover from stroke. The treatment has been surgery or corticosteroids. The following article showed that PRP injection of the shoulder improved range of motion more than did corticosteroid injections: click.
3. Most important research I read this week —
When COVID was initially blasting through the planet, I once heard Dr. Fauci quote a mortality rate of 4%… BEFORE we knew the incidence in the general population.
The mortality rate eventually turned out to be less than what he quoted; he was looking at the mortality of hospitalized patients and wrongly speculating on the mortality in those infected who did not require hospitalization (this was before widespread testing was available, so he just did not know the incidence rate). Eventually, as a way to think about things with real numbers, I used real numbers available to the public and did the following easy, 5-step calculation…
- I used mortality as the main marker, thinking that it’s hard to fake or ignore a death and less likely to be misidentified than say who is sick with COVID.
- Then I postulated that the mortality rate would naturally be directly proportional to population density.
- Then I calculated a linear regression with population density for each state on the x-axis and mortality rate on the y axis.
- Not surprisingly, there IS a linear correlation (correlation coefficient of 0.68 at that time).
- So, then I looked to see if the more restricted states were seeing a mortality rate less than predicted and if the less restricted states saw mortality more than predicted. Such was not the case (you can see those calculations here)<—
I know, it’s a very rough estimate, but the numbers convinced me to stay as healthy as possible and inclined me to feel a little like I was endorsing the Tooth Fairy when practicing social distancing or when wore a mask on the sidewalk or in a store (to me like trying to cage mosquitoes with a rabbit cage).
But, who was I to say? So, I played the game when asked or stayed in my bubble.
This week, however, researchers at Johns Hopkins looked at an initial pool of 18,590 studies, narrowed those down to the 117 eligible by their criterion (one of which was that they also chose morality as the more reliable number), and did a meta-analysis.
Here are the conclusions they reached:
“Overall, our meta-analysis fails to confirm that lockdowns have had a large, significant effect on mortality rates. Studies examining the relationship between lockdown strictness (based on the OxCGRT stringency index) find that the average lockdown in Europe and the United States only reduced COVID-19 mortality by 0.2% compared to a COVID-19 policy based solely on recommendations. Shelter-in-place orders (SIPOs) were also ineffective. They only reduced COVID-19 mortality by 2.9%. Studies looking at specific NPIs (lockdown vs. no lockdown, face masks, closing non-essential businesses, border closures, school closures, and limiting gatherings) also find no broad-based evidence of noticeable effects on COVID-19 mortality.”
And their closing paragraph…
“The use of lockdowns is a unique feature of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lockdowns have not been used to such a large extent during any of the pandemics of the past century. However, lockdowns during the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic have had devastating effects. They have contributed to reducing economic activity, raising unemployment, reducing schooling, causing political unrest, contributing to domestic violence, and undermining liberal democracy. These costs to society must be compared to the benefits of lockdowns, which our meta-analysis has shown are marginal at best. Such a standard benefit-cost calculation leads to a strong conclusion: lockdowns should be rejected out of hand as a pandemic policy instrument.”
4. Helpful business book…
So many time management books populate my shelves, yet some days I still feel more like a leaf in a hurricane than a man walking a straight path to intended results.
I’m several weeks into the 12 Week Year method and am finding some fresh ideas. The workbook that goes with the book has been, perhaps more helpful than the book.
5. Quote I’m pondering —
Rachel Corbett’s book, You Must Change Your Life, describes the relationship between Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin and relates when Rilke’s Letters to Young Poet were written in relation to the lives of the two men. In one passage in the book, Corbett documents the two men discussed a quote from Beethoven; so, I thought, perhaps it was worth meditating on for me as well:
“No friend have I, I must live with myself alone: but I know well that God is closer to me than to others in my art, I go about with him without fear, I have always recognized and understood Him; I am also not at all afraid for my music, that can have no ill fate; he to whom it makes itself intelligible must become free of all the misery with which other are encumbered.”
And, please give me feedback: hit “reply” and shoot me an email, or on our membership sites, or on our weekly Journal Club with Pearls & Marketing. Which bullet above is your favorite? What do you want more or less of from the CMA? Other suggestions? Please let me know!
Have a great week!
Charles
P.S. The last book I launched could be of help with your patients who suffer with premature ejaculation: Extend Sex: The 30-Second Trick. You’ll notice that my trick makes use of the functional anatomy, even though I did not know the anatomy when I dreamed this up 40 years ago.
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References:
Corbett, Rachel. You Must Change Your Life: The Story of Rainer Maria Rilke and Auguste Rodin, 2017.
Shahzad, Hafiz Faisal, Muhammad Taqi, Syed Faraz Ul Hassan Shah Gillani, Faisal Masood, and Munawar Ali. “Comparison of Functional Outcome Between Intra-Articular Injection of Corticosteroid Versus Platelet-Rich Plasma in Frozen Shoulder: A Randomized Controlled Trial.” Cureus, December 21, 2021. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.20560.
Ahrens, Sonke. How to Take Smart Notes, 2017.
Moran, Brendan, and Michael Lennington. The 12 Week Year. New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2013.