Mission: Healing October 7, 2011

PGY 39, Day #99
As usual, I am thinking ... always thinking more as I recover from my week of patient care and sleep deprivation. Delayed processing of the events of the week and examination of my emotions ... a trick I have learned over the years to keep emotions out of my interactions with patients. This works for patient care, but I am sure it drives everyone else in my life crazy.

Anyway, lately I have been thinking that I need to start posting some of my Stress Management strategies & some pages from the "Stress Management Workbook: An Action Plan for Taking Control of Your Life and Health". I wrote it with a Psychologist friend & co-worker (Stephen Aronson, PhD) to help worried well patients get healthy and stay healthy. More than half of my Family Practice patients (I did Family Medicine for 14 years before Anesthesiology & Critical Care) were suffering from stress related disorders, and, even though less than 10% of the folks were motivated to "take control" of their own health, I thought it was a worthy endeavor. The book was written in 1979, and published by Appleton Century Crofts in 1981, and ... low and behold, it is still sound and relevant. I have threatened to publish an electronic version and to write a new edition for years, and, maybe I will just have to start posting the updates in the blog.

The fact is, that little has changed with regard to the fundamentals of Stress & Stress Management, but I can update the book with new and emerging problems since the original publication. Not much needs to be added, but there are some issues that deserve special attention for the New Millennium. Specifically, I will update the immunization section, add a sections on AIDS, and bits for some of the newer global issues and worries such as terrorism, financial instability and disaster preparedness. Also, an electronic version should enable strategically placed live links for references and easy user updates.

Hopefully, I can get some feedback and interaction from my Twitter Followers, Facebook Friends and Blog Readers, so that I can fine tune the New Edition to make it particularly relevant and helpful. What do you think?

Dr. Mike