March Madness Vasectomies: Postop period is "a perfect situation for television", says Cleveland Clinic urologist

Vasectomy is a surgical procedure for male sterilization, and consequently, birth control. During the procedure, the vasa deferentia of a man are severed, and then tied/sealed. This prevents sperm from entering into the seminal stream (ejaculate). You can watch a video how the procedure is done here.



From Cleveland Clinic YouTube channel: A urologist talks about the increase in the number of vasectomies he does this time of year. "Guys get it done, then watch the NCAA Basketball tournament all weekend long." The procedure takes 5-10 minutes. Patients need to ice the area for 2-3 days.

The NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship is a single-elimination tournament held each spring in the United States, featuring 68 college basketball teams, to determine the national championship in the top tier of college basketball. The tournament, organized by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), was created in 1939 by the National Association of Basketball Coaches, is held mostly in March, and it is known informally as March Madness (source: Wikipedia).



Private urology practices advertise on TV their "Vasectomy Madness" campaigns:



CNN RidicuList with Anderson Cooper: Vasectomy and free pizza (video):

Top medicine articles for March 2014

A collection of some interesting medical articles published recently:

1 in 10 U.S. Children Now Has ADHD, CDC Says http://buff.ly/IeqY1S

Lifestyle interventions effectively decrease the incidence of type 2 diabetes in high-risk patients http://buff.ly/1bSrw9j

Time for another go at understanding vitamin D metabolism http://buff.ly/1hdob8f

Do healthier foods cost more than less healthy options? Healthy eating costs an extra $1.50 per day - BMJ http://buff.ly/JEpi2t

1% of women in a U.S. study who have become pregnant claim to have done so as virgins - BMJ/Reuters http://buff.ly/19zkHIZ

You’re never too old to exercise: 98-year-old shows why http://buff.ly/JEv5oN - Also, exercise is “the best medicine no one wants to do".

JAMA Pediatrics | Environmental Factors in Tiny Tim's Near-Fatal Illness http://buff.ly/Jicezj

Life, Interrupted: By a Dog - NYTimes http://nyti.ms/1c0t4gz

A Doctor’s Intimate View of Hemophilia - NYTimes http://nyti.ms/1bplxEw

BMJ: "Evidence based medicine is now the problem, fueling overdiagnosis and overtreatment". Research pond is polluted, with fraud, sham diagnosis, short term data, poor regulation, surrogate ends, questionnaires that can’t be validated, and statistically significant but clinically irrelevant outcomes http://buff.ly/1abhSyh

Dapagliflozin (Farxiga) — an inhibitor of sodium-glucose co-transporter 2 — is approved for type 2 diabetes http://buff.ly/1a2lT7N

What Makes Older People Happy - not surprisingly, experiences that make people happy change over time - NYT http://buff.ly/1ntURsU. For young people trying to figure out who they want to become, extraordinary experiences help establish personal identities. As people become more settled, ordinary experiences become central to a sense of self and therefore more valued. “It’s just what you would expect, this emphasis on savoring what you already have when your time starts to become limited”. Happiness derived from extraordinary experiences remained fairly constant, but pleasure from ordinary experiences increased as people got older. Another experiment demonstrated that an individual’s perception of the future — whether it was open-ended or limited — was a critical factor in explaining the results.

The articles were selected from Twitter and my RSS subscriptions. Please feel free to send suggestions for articles to clinicalcases AT gmail.com and you will receive acknowledgement in the next edition of this publication.

Top medicine articles for March 2014

A collection of some interesting medical articles published recently:

1 in 10 U.S. Children Now Has ADHD, CDC Says http://buff.ly/IeqY1S

Lifestyle interventions effectively decrease the incidence of type 2 diabetes in high-risk patients http://buff.ly/1bSrw9j

Time for another go at understanding vitamin D metabolism http://buff.ly/1hdob8f

Do healthier foods cost more than less healthy options? Healthy eating costs an extra $1.50 per day - BMJ http://buff.ly/JEpi2t

1% of women in a U.S. study who have become pregnant claim to have done so as virgins - BMJ/Reuters http://buff.ly/19zkHIZ

You’re never too old to exercise: 98-year-old shows why http://buff.ly/JEv5oN - Also, exercise is “the best medicine no one wants to do".

JAMA Pediatrics | Environmental Factors in Tiny Tim's Near-Fatal Illness http://buff.ly/Jicezj

Life, Interrupted: By a Dog - NYTimes http://nyti.ms/1c0t4gz

A Doctor’s Intimate View of Hemophilia - NYTimes http://nyti.ms/1bplxEw

BMJ: "Evidence based medicine is now the problem, fueling overdiagnosis and overtreatment". Research pond is polluted, with fraud, sham diagnosis, short term data, poor regulation, surrogate ends, questionnaires that can’t be validated, and statistically significant but clinically irrelevant outcomes http://buff.ly/1abhSyh

Dapagliflozin (Farxiga) — an inhibitor of sodium-glucose co-transporter 2 — is approved for type 2 diabetes http://buff.ly/1a2lT7N

What Makes Older People Happy - not surprisingly, experiences that make people happy change over time - NYT http://buff.ly/1ntURsU. For young people trying to figure out who they want to become, extraordinary experiences help establish personal identities. As people become more settled, ordinary experiences become central to a sense of self and therefore more valued. “It’s just what you would expect, this emphasis on savoring what you already have when your time starts to become limited”. Happiness derived from extraordinary experiences remained fairly constant, but pleasure from ordinary experiences increased as people got older. Another experiment demonstrated that an individual’s perception of the future — whether it was open-ended or limited — was a critical factor in explaining the results.

The articles were selected from Twitter and my RSS subscriptions. Please feel free to send suggestions for articles to clinicalcases AT gmail.com and you will receive acknowledgement in the next edition of this publication.

The Colonoscopy Song - March is National Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month

Peter Yarrow of the musical group Peter, Paul and Mary appeared on the CBS Early Show to sing a song he composed about his own colonoscopy:



In the video below, Dr. Paul Limburg, a Mayo Clinic Gastroenterologist, provides background on colorectal cancer and the screening methods:

Related reading:

Cleveland Clinic Colorectal Cancer Risk Assessment Tool. Get your score in 2 minutes (free).
Colon cancer and colonoscopy - Cleveland Clinic YouTube playlist 
Dr. Oz Has Colon Cancer Scare During Taping of His Colonoscopy for the TV Show http://goo.gl/F4CX

Fear was the No. 1 reason people gave to explain why they hadn’t gone in for a colonoscopy to screen for colon cancer. NYTimes.

Get your colonoscopy in the morning - each hour brings a 4% reduction in the number of polyps the doctors spotted http://goo.gl/2FGQt

Dr. Oz: What I Learned from My Colon Cancer Scare http://goo.gl/q7rjD
Colonoscopy Developer Dies at 94 - NYTimes http://goo.gl/iBnOp - Dr. Wolff was unconventional and surely made headlines in his day.