A post-COVID-19 model of US primary care: Telehealth and a behaviorally enriched, expanded primary care team can tackle our chronic care challenge

The US healthcare system excels at many things. We lead in the development of new medical and digital technologies, medical devices, and drugs that benefit people worldwide. We are the world’s leader in complex and emergency medical care delivered in hospitals and emergency rooms. We train specialists to heroically diagnose, triage, and fix or stabilize

Our modern food culture and the rising tide of type 2 diabetes

Today, half of the US population has diabetes or is at risk of developing it. Even as recently as the 1950’s, type 2 diabetes was quite rare. Less than 1% of Americans at that time had symptoms. So how have our communities become such unhealthy places to live that 42% of Americans are obese, 34

Building a better behavior change model for chronic conditions

In our last blog, we focused on practical steps to improve your personal health in a world where unhealthy food and lifestyle options have become the cultural norm. In this blog, we focus on how to help patients who are living with a chronic disease and are struggling to change deep-seated lifestyle habits and thinking.

Simple lifestyle changes that work to avoid or reduce the impact of chronic diseases

As we continue the brave work of controlling the COVID-19 pandemic, we also have to face our long-standing epidemic of obesity-related chronic diseases. About 133 million people in the United States are affected by these chronic conditions, and the usual suspects are: heart disease, stroke, diabetes, chronic kidney disease, mental health disorders, fatty liver disease,

Will COVID-19 push us to tackle our chronic disease epidemic?

This post explores the possibility and hope that COVID-19 is bringing new attention to the chronic disease epidemic in the United States. The author discusses why it is imperative that our future includes collective action to end the chronic disease epidemic: the greatest health crisis of the 21st century.

Making sense of the COVID-19 virus and its devastating toll on our elderly with chronic conditions.

This post explains the relationship between obesity and chronic disease in older populations and the devastating outcomes of COVID-19.