Should Jerry Brown Just Ignore His Cancer?

Governor’s Choice of Radiation Therapy Could Cause More Harm Than Doing Nothing at All

As California’s oldest governor, Jerry Brown has gone out of his way to demonstrate his vigorous good health, jogging around the Capitol and even challenging reporters to pull-up contests—which he won. Now that he’s been diagnosed with prostate cancer and begun radiation therapy, some news outlets seem to be experiencing a bit of schadenfreude, gleefully calling the 74-year-old governor’s diagnosis a “blow to his healthy image.”

They missed the real story, which isn’t the governor’s prostate cancer but rather the fact that he has chosen to be treated at all. Given …

You Might Wanna Die Elsewhere

Shannon Brownlee Discusses End-of-Life Overtreatment—and Names L.A. As a Culprit

Shannon Brownlee, acting director of the New America Foundation Health Policy Program, began an event sponsored by the California HealthCare Foundation by taking a survey of the crowd at MOCA …

Does Fresno Mean Feeding Tube?

How To Figure Out If You Live In a Place With Good End-of-Life Care

 

In some parts of California, you’re likely to have all sorts of medical treatments at the end of your life and die in a hospital. In other parts of California, …

The Danger of Too Much Health Care

How Overtesting and Overmedicating Harm Patients and Society

Early in her talk about the importance of giving patients the information they need to make medical decisions, Shannon Brownlee emphasized the relevance of the topic in dramatic fashion.

“How many …

How Can We Be Better Patients?

Exploring How We Can Help Ourselves in the Doctor’s Office

Too often, patients don’t take an active role in their health care, leaving decisions up to their doctors in the mistaken belief that “doctor knows best.” This troubling trend is …

Health Care Can Make You Sick

Angelenos Get Plenty of Medical Attention - That's the Problem

Shannon Brownlee will visit Zócalo July 6th to discuss the question “How Can We Take Charge of Our Health?“

Los Angeles doctors are plentiful, and Angelenos have some of the highest …