I suggest watching the whole video, I found it very interesting. Here's my attempt to summarize the key points.
An MIT-educated neurosurgeon quit his job after realizing surgeries weren’t addressing the root cause of patients’ problems. He observed that the outcome of surgeries would vary greatly: for some it would help, for others a bit and for others, it would not help at all even though he performed them perfectly every time. Some patients even called before the surgery to say that they were okay and no longer needed surgery.
So he started asking patients questions and after 9 years he concluded that patients who got better and healed did the following (at 19:42 in the video): low salt diet; mostly plant-based diet; did things that would cause sweat: exercise, sauna, or living in hot weather; did not smoke; drank little to no alcohol; had good social support: family, friends, etc; slept 8 hours a day; were not stressed or managed to release it back, e.g. meditate.
Then he talks about the moral dilemma. If he helps patients to truly heal by sharing what he has learned, he and the hospital would not make money.
Google tells me that Americans consume on average 3.5g of salt, while the recommended intake is 2.3g. Quite some room there to decrease salt consumption.
DISCLAIMER: If you have back/spine problems and you delay surgery because you hope the problem would go away on its own, with healthy living, you might end up with damaged/dead nerves which is irreparable damage, which even a delayed surgery cannot fix.
With regards to for-profit medicine, this is why I hate all market based health insurance systems. Even if you are rich and get treated like a king, you still have to question whether your doctor/surgeon is trying to sell you a procedure. The only system that does not suffer from this issue is the NHS (e.g. UK) where the incentive is lacking. The debate about health care systems tends to focus on availability and coverage, but this for-profit perverse incentive is orthogonal to all that.
This is not really true unless there's something _really_ wrong with your back. For run of the mill disk hernia the patient satisfaction scores at 1 year for surgery and conservative treatment are pretty much the same [0][1].
I've dealt with lower back issues for a long time. The worst of it was long behind me and I've been diligent enough to not have crippling events. My lower back hasn't felt as good and pain free as of today.I don't know if it was all the walking I've been doing (vacation) and the bag on my back (weird right). The biggest change was the level of stress after vacation. I haven't been on one for over 7 years.
I feel much more relaxed these days but I can also tell that everyday this "stress bucket" is slowly getting filled by daily life and I have to dump it all out by doing something other than the ordinary. I'm not a super healthy eater but I'm conscientious about it. I'm not a gym goer or even home exerciser. Once in a while, I'd use my weights and do somebody weight exercises.I don't eat fruits and vegetables as much as one should. I also know that there is great variability in humans.
I'm also much more aware of my body and what it needs as far as physical therapy exercises. I've a lot of time watching videos on physical therapy and back pain. I spend the most of my time at home walking on a treadmill while watching something on the TV.
> The only system that does not suffer from this issue is the NHS (e.g. UK
Is that a joke? With NHS you have to wait to get GP appointments, wait several weeks for examination by specialists, more waiting in waiting list for surgery... The backlog for everything is huge!
In NHS you can literally wait years for non life threatening surgeries.
Parent comments is still correct, NHS is free from the Financial Incentive problem. I don't think anyone claims the system is good, just this one aspect is correct.
I have that gold plated US insurance that you pay a lot for. Just last week, I was rushed to the hospital due to my heart. We don't yet know what tried (or is actively trying) to kill me. The cardiologist ordered an emergency MRI.
Three weeks. I am told to wait three weeks. The doc wants it last week. We are having to call around and mess with coverage questions. Similar for my dad and a specialist. Waiting a month while having breathing issues.
People wait already for emergency medical situations, but we pay a premium. And I am still not sure what my 20% shared cost is gonna be for the ambulance and hospital stay. And yes, that factored into my decision to even be treated, which, had I stayed home, may have killed me.
Fuck our system. Medical should not be for profit. It should cost money to run because it should be a service.
> Is that a joke? With NHS you have to wait to get GP appointments, wait several weeks for examination by specialists, more waiting in waiting list for surgery... The backlog for everything is huge!
My experience of healthcare in capitalist America is exactly the same in that regard. I have a mole I want examined, and one of the dermatology practices I called (part of a major local health system) was taking appointments for March 2025! I usually have to wait 3 or 4 weeks to see my primary care doctor (though I suppose I could settle for a rando doctor with an opening or a nurse practitioner and be seen sooner, but whenever I've done that there have been other issues).
I don't know about NHS, but I do know about Michael Jackson. He was a rich person and got treated like a king; and how did the for-profit health care system treat him? (It killed him.)
A bed side and what appears to be an unethical doctor overdosed his meal ticket with a heavy duty medication to induce sleep. I don't think there is much to argue either way on for-profit medicine in that case.
Classic anglophonic world view. Seems like people forget that literally all of Europe has universal healthcare, with many working far better than the NHS.
I was pretty moved by this. It wasn't what I expected. It's his personal experience working as a neurosurgeon for 9 years, his critiques of US healthcare, his recognizance of burnout, and his escape from it all. What comes across most, especially on youtube, is his sincerity and lack of presentation or preaching. It's so personal and ends up kind of inspiring.
I vouched for it so it's temporarily back up, but I'm afraid it won't be for long.
Downvoters/flaggers, please explain yourself. I've found this very thoughtful and worthy of the front page... quite long though, I'll grant you that, but the guy has something honest and genuine to say
It could be a mistake. I've accidentally flagged and downvoted comments before and then only realized it when looking at the list of comments I've flagged and downvoted. I'm more careful now, though.
There's an oddly related video here. [1] It's an interview between two doctors and YouTubers, both named Mike. One is a practicing medical doctor, the other has a doctorate in sports science and provides generally provides excellent nutrition, lifting, and other advice related to body building. The reason it's relevant is because the medical doctor in that video also expresses similar views to the video from this article, yet the sports science Mike expresses radically different views. And his views are ones that even crop up on this site on occasion, so I expect it's a sort of bubble that you or I may not have even really been aware of.
They get into a topic about half way through on the future. Lifting Mike thinks that by the early 2030s medical science will have made breakthroughs such that basically every disease will be cured, people will be approaching living forever, and so on. This is paired alongside a general blind faith in all things tech - that the LLMs we have today will be imminently super-geniuses surpassing human intelligence with scales of exponential growth on the orders of magnitude, every other year, and so on.
Medical Mike is far more bearish on the future (and the present), though like a good host he doesn't really try to go to war with his guest, so much as just picking his brain and seeing how he responds to basic counter-points. And lifting Mike's responses are mostly to say "that's a very valid point" and then completely ignore them. In my opinion the singularity types are starting to gradually coalesce into something like a secular religion, because I don't think he really believes what he's saying, but he wants to believe it - because the thought of dying sucks.
And this video (from this topic) is yet another medical doctor speaking about the questionable path we're currently on and how not only are we not making this exponential progress many seem to want to believe we are, but that the motivations involved in a lot of things like medicine today are quite broken. This isn't going to be responded to well with people who have the faith that in a decade or two we're all going to be living forever.
----------
Okay, cripes this post ended up wayyyy longer than expected. But I also want to add that once you know about this sort of divide, it's almost enlightening to read threads like this [2] (currently on the front page: "Scientists discover a cause of lupus, possible way to reverse it") and watch how the views shape people's responses. There's [fortunately] no real signaling or whatever, but just people having extremely different views on what has happened in the past and present, and even more so about what will happen in the future.
The channel contains 10-hour-long videos of natural sounds.
Maybe the post is less about what is right or wrong in medicine and more about the author having gone into the wrong field, which is opposite to what they enjoy in life.
Perhaps all along, the author misunderstood what modern medicine is about and how life really works. There is no miracle cure that would restore the neural system.
There is a miracle prevention however, be active, exercise, eat well, sleep well, enjoy life, contribute to society. That will help your back more than surgery once things go bad.
Yeah "positive thinking and going with the flow will fix disease". Tell me: why didn't everyone 1000 years ago live to be a hundred everywhere? Oh that's right: because it's not that simple.
I have taken career breaks. I don't call myself unemployed. To me, unemployed means that you are not working but you want to be. It seems like the terms "unemployed" and "alone in the mountains" are just being used to dramatic effect. Am I wrong?
> To me, unemployed means that you are not working but you want to be.
In economics, exactly that is the definition of unemployment:
> Unemployment, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work during the reference period.
".. When you let go of something you are holding too tightly, even though it's hurting you. When you let go of it, then you are able to pick up something else that is hopefully better for you."
Despite all the post-rationalization on the why's of medicine, it does feel like he is someone bouncing back from Burnout.
The risk being that he may fall into the opposite end of the pendulum swing. As the saying goes: "A ship in harbour is safe, but that is not what ships are built for."
In the end there is a balance to everything, I hope he finds his.
When he isn't talking about medicine, I get very strong Chris McCandless vibes. That need to be free, away from modern life, the demands, the unnecessary stress. Maybe get away from people too (which is harder to admit to... people directly).
I haven't come across a video yet but I'm sure he's better prepared for outdoor living than some others that have done similar. There's a large sub-community of Van Lifers doing similar. With a little planning and preparation, it's a great life. Especially for those that clearly need to get away from it all.
I can't imagine how difficult the decision was. He basically said that his entire 9 year career was emotionally difficult. That is a heavy burden to bear for so long. I'm certain that his upbringing, his years of preparation, the expectations of the world... made the decision to walk away (without a plan) seem overwhelming.
Still... he broke free from all of that!
Honestly... I feel so happy for him. To be able to make the decision and implement it. To be at a point where he can begin talking about it, freely. To be connected to civilization on his terms. To live his life in a way that makes him happy.
I'm wondering, does anyone know what are the chances for returning to neurosurgery after an extended hiatus? Person in the video practiced for a decade (edit: nearly a decade of practice, and two decades total including training), I'm sure burnout is common in the field, but I wonder if people that left ever make their way back.
I'm more curious if he could re-specialize in a surgery that he finds more rewarding. I'd think orthopedics could provide very clear and quick resolutions for patients; hip replacement is known as the "surgery of the [previous] century" for having such clear quality of life improvement.
Yeah that was partly my reaction too ... Why not steer your career -- i.e. accept a temporary setback -- instead of walking away from the whole thing?
But it sounds like he already did that once. The first part of the video talked about how he wanted to specialize in brain-machine interfaces, and then he came to the belief that the approach would never work.
It did feel like he had very high expectations for himself. Almost a bit of a hero complex.
But I don't think that's a bad thing. I think we need people like this to tell us the truth sometimes!
It's not the whole truth, but what he's saying is definitely part of the truth.
---
As a particular example, I have noticed that doctors and dentists don't talk to each other ... It's not overstating it to say "the system" essentially discourages that. But your body doesn't know anything about these divisions, and I agree with the observation that the mouth is one of the two main openings in the body and is central to health !!
i.e. the condition of your teeth are a good indicator of general health, not just dental health
This relates to the part of the video where he says: "if your body heals, it doesn't just heal the spine -- it heals everything"
It is comforting to know that people can see with what I think of as "blank mind" -- see and think from first principles -- rather than falling back on all the technical jargon that we use to justify ourselves and our jobs
Readit News
An MIT-educated neurosurgeon quit his job after realizing surgeries weren’t addressing the root cause of patients’ problems. He observed that the outcome of surgeries would vary greatly: for some it would help, for others a bit and for others, it would not help at all even though he performed them perfectly every time. Some patients even called before the surgery to say that they were okay and no longer needed surgery.
So he started asking patients questions and after 9 years he concluded that patients who got better and healed did the following (at 19:42 in the video): low salt diet; mostly plant-based diet; did things that would cause sweat: exercise, sauna, or living in hot weather; did not smoke; drank little to no alcohol; had good social support: family, friends, etc; slept 8 hours a day; were not stressed or managed to release it back, e.g. meditate.
Then he talks about the moral dilemma. If he helps patients to truly heal by sharing what he has learned, he and the hospital would not make money.
If your salt intake is low, and you start sweating due to hot weather, exercise or a new-found interest in saunas, you probably need to bump that up.
Successful lobbying, if not straight corruption, would be closer to the current situation.
With regards to for-profit medicine, this is why I hate all market based health insurance systems. Even if you are rich and get treated like a king, you still have to question whether your doctor/surgeon is trying to sell you a procedure. The only system that does not suffer from this issue is the NHS (e.g. UK) where the incentive is lacking. The debate about health care systems tends to focus on availability and coverage, but this for-profit perverse incentive is orthogonal to all that.
[0] - https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/6/12/e012938.short
[1] - https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00586-010-1603-7
I feel much more relaxed these days but I can also tell that everyday this "stress bucket" is slowly getting filled by daily life and I have to dump it all out by doing something other than the ordinary. I'm not a super healthy eater but I'm conscientious about it. I'm not a gym goer or even home exerciser. Once in a while, I'd use my weights and do somebody weight exercises.I don't eat fruits and vegetables as much as one should. I also know that there is great variability in humans.
I'm also much more aware of my body and what it needs as far as physical therapy exercises. I've a lot of time watching videos on physical therapy and back pain. I spend the most of my time at home walking on a treadmill while watching something on the TV.
Is that a joke? With NHS you have to wait to get GP appointments, wait several weeks for examination by specialists, more waiting in waiting list for surgery... The backlog for everything is huge!
In NHS you can literally wait years for non life threatening surgeries.
how is this different from NHS?
Three weeks. I am told to wait three weeks. The doc wants it last week. We are having to call around and mess with coverage questions. Similar for my dad and a specialist. Waiting a month while having breathing issues.
People wait already for emergency medical situations, but we pay a premium. And I am still not sure what my 20% shared cost is gonna be for the ambulance and hospital stay. And yes, that factored into my decision to even be treated, which, had I stayed home, may have killed me.
Fuck our system. Medical should not be for profit. It should cost money to run because it should be a service.
My experience of healthcare in capitalist America is exactly the same in that regard. I have a mole I want examined, and one of the dermatology practices I called (part of a major local health system) was taking appointments for March 2025! I usually have to wait 3 or 4 weeks to see my primary care doctor (though I suppose I could settle for a rando doctor with an opening or a nurse practitioner and be seen sooner, but whenever I've done that there have been other issues).
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-28021488.amp
Deleted Comment
Why not mentionning France? It's pretty awesome in that regard
He talks slowly and you can watch at 1.5x.
Edit: Why is this flagged?
Downvoters/flaggers, please explain yourself. I've found this very thoughtful and worthy of the front page... quite long though, I'll grant you that, but the guy has something honest and genuine to say
They get into a topic about half way through on the future. Lifting Mike thinks that by the early 2030s medical science will have made breakthroughs such that basically every disease will be cured, people will be approaching living forever, and so on. This is paired alongside a general blind faith in all things tech - that the LLMs we have today will be imminently super-geniuses surpassing human intelligence with scales of exponential growth on the orders of magnitude, every other year, and so on.
Medical Mike is far more bearish on the future (and the present), though like a good host he doesn't really try to go to war with his guest, so much as just picking his brain and seeing how he responds to basic counter-points. And lifting Mike's responses are mostly to say "that's a very valid point" and then completely ignore them. In my opinion the singularity types are starting to gradually coalesce into something like a secular religion, because I don't think he really believes what he's saying, but he wants to believe it - because the thought of dying sucks.
And this video (from this topic) is yet another medical doctor speaking about the questionable path we're currently on and how not only are we not making this exponential progress many seem to want to believe we are, but that the motivations involved in a lot of things like medicine today are quite broken. This isn't going to be responded to well with people who have the faith that in a decade or two we're all going to be living forever.
----------
Okay, cripes this post ended up wayyyy longer than expected. But I also want to add that once you know about this sort of divide, it's almost enlightening to read threads like this [2] (currently on the front page: "Scientists discover a cause of lupus, possible way to reverse it") and watch how the views shape people's responses. There's [fortunately] no real signaling or whatever, but just people having extremely different views on what has happened in the past and present, and even more so about what will happen in the future.
[1] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrzF-rhJtOs
[2] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40931636
Maybe the post is less about what is right or wrong in medicine and more about the author having gone into the wrong field, which is opposite to what they enjoy in life.
Perhaps all along, the author misunderstood what modern medicine is about and how life really works. There is no miracle cure that would restore the neural system.
There is a miracle prevention however, be active, exercise, eat well, sleep well, enjoy life, contribute to society. That will help your back more than surgery once things go bad.
In economics, exactly that is the definition of unemployment:
> Unemployment, according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work during the reference period.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unemployment
To me, it does not mean that. In the very same way that "unforgettable" does not mean "I remember but want to forget".
I don't think this semantic difference is something to get worked up over.
".. When you let go of something you are holding too tightly, even though it's hurting you. When you let go of it, then you are able to pick up something else that is hopefully better for you."
Despite all the post-rationalization on the why's of medicine, it does feel like he is someone bouncing back from Burnout.
The risk being that he may fall into the opposite end of the pendulum swing. As the saying goes: "A ship in harbour is safe, but that is not what ships are built for."
In the end there is a balance to everything, I hope he finds his.
I haven't come across a video yet but I'm sure he's better prepared for outdoor living than some others that have done similar. There's a large sub-community of Van Lifers doing similar. With a little planning and preparation, it's a great life. Especially for those that clearly need to get away from it all.
I can't imagine how difficult the decision was. He basically said that his entire 9 year career was emotionally difficult. That is a heavy burden to bear for so long. I'm certain that his upbringing, his years of preparation, the expectations of the world... made the decision to walk away (without a plan) seem overwhelming.
Still... he broke free from all of that!
Honestly... I feel so happy for him. To be able to make the decision and implement it. To be at a point where he can begin talking about it, freely. To be connected to civilization on his terms. To live his life in a way that makes him happy.
But it sounds like he already did that once. The first part of the video talked about how he wanted to specialize in brain-machine interfaces, and then he came to the belief that the approach would never work.
It did feel like he had very high expectations for himself. Almost a bit of a hero complex.
But I don't think that's a bad thing. I think we need people like this to tell us the truth sometimes!
It's not the whole truth, but what he's saying is definitely part of the truth.
---
As a particular example, I have noticed that doctors and dentists don't talk to each other ... It's not overstating it to say "the system" essentially discourages that. But your body doesn't know anything about these divisions, and I agree with the observation that the mouth is one of the two main openings in the body and is central to health !!
i.e. the condition of your teeth are a good indicator of general health, not just dental health
This relates to the part of the video where he says: "if your body heals, it doesn't just heal the spine -- it heals everything"
It is comforting to know that people can see with what I think of as "blank mind" -- see and think from first principles -- rather than falling back on all the technical jargon that we use to justify ourselves and our jobs