Hi everyone, since we're still in the middle of flu and cold season, I wanted to go over some of the typical symptoms we see in patients with COVID-19, respiratory syncytial virus (a.k.a. RSV), influenza (a.k.a. the flu), the common cold, and allergies, so folks could get a sense of what they may or may not have come down with. While symptoms alone will not definitively identify the virus you may or may not have, they can certainly help point toward a diagnosis. You have likely heard of the term "tripledemic" which refers to a recent increase of COVID-19, flu, and RSV in the population. These three infections typically make you feel worse and/or for longer than from a regular cold, and it’s important to have a sense of what you may have contracted in order to heal better and quicker...

Hi everyone, one of the common ailments that we see in the clinic is high blood pressure. In fact, patients often come into the clinic with high blood pressure and are completely unaware of it. It is estimated that nearly half, around 47% of adults, have hypertension, which is defined as a systolic blood pressure (upper number) greater than 130 and diastolic blood pressure (lower number) greater than 80. As your blood pressure increases, it increases your risk for damage to your heart and arteries. As your arteries become less elastic, the flow of blood and oxygen to your heart and body tissues is decreased. This can then lead to stroke, vision loss, heart failure, heart attack, kidney disease or kidney failure and sexual dysfunction. So… I would like to take a few minutes to share...

As residents of our thriving community, we are truly fortunate to live in a place that allows us to be active. We can go for a swim or visit a nearby gym. We can bike and play tennis, squash or golf at our many city parks. We can stroll through the Denver Botanic Gardens or do some gardening of our own. Without a doubt, Denver and the nearby mountains are a hiker’s paradise.

There’s plenty of information out there on the benefits of exercise. Most of us know that physical activity is essential for maintaining a healthy weight and reducing the risk of chronic conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and cancer. As an added benefit, staying active promotes mental and emotional wellbeing by increasing focus and mental clarity, improving our state of relaxation, and even staving...

Unhealthy eating is probably one of the more challenging lifestyle habits to change when talking about health. One contributing factor is that early food exposures teach our bodies to recognize certain tastes and textures as desirable. Eating broccoli as a kid begets broccoli for brunch as an adult, and those sugary treats we enjoyed as toddlers often lead to a sweet tooth down the road. Adopting a healthy diet is, of course, not only good for children. As adults, continuing on a healthy path or switching to healthier options protects us from chronic health conditions such as heart disease, obesity and diabetes. Healthier foods are loaded with vitamins and antioxidants which strengthen our immune systems and help us avoid the unhealthy fats, sugars and salts that prevent us from living...

Greetings all! We hope you are now mostly back in your groove as you have returned from any amazing trips, purged any pent-up frustration, and masks are mostly a memory. As you head outside, reconnect with your neighbors and do the things you love to do, we thought this might be a good time to share the work of a prominent scientist, Daniel Levitin, in his latest book, The Changing Mind: A Neuroscientist’s Guide to Ageing Well.

“Mens sana in corpore sano” is a popular phrase often used in sports and educational contexts. Translating the phrase from the Latin, it means: “a healthy mind in a healthy body”. Originally, it appeared in a Roman poem written by Juvenal stating, “a man should pray for a healthy mind in a healthy body”. And, although the ancient poet may have been unaware of the tight connection between mind and body regarding health, he certainly understood the importance of needing both for a fulfilling life.

Today, we better understand the powerful connection between body and mind, and we typically use the phrase to promote physical activity because of its proven benefits on mental health. Indeed, the two are interdependent. The state of the body affects the state of the mind and vice versa,...

Imagine yourself climbing into your car....

You start the engine, and you point the front end down the road and away from home. Traffic is busy. You feel a slight tension creep into your arms and shoulders as you hold the steering wheel just a bit tighter. Your breathing accelerates slightly. You can feel your heart. Subtly, your pupils dilate, and your mouth becomes drier as you become aware of cars zooming by your window. What in the world is happening…?

You are experiencing the physical manifestations of stress.

When I was a kid, our family had a rotary telephone that was connected to the “network” via wires. Any of you guys remember those…? When I would reach for the phone late in the evening, my father would remind me to never call anyone after 9 PM. It was actually some great advice because getting a good night’s sleep makes a big difference in the way we feel and function every day. Even worse, keeping someone awake can make them downright irritable…

Sadly, sleep is one of the foundational health pillars that we often either misunderstand or convince ourselves we can ignore. As you are likely aware, good sleep allows our brains to remodel and our bodies to de-stress, so we can function optimally the next day. Also, as we move through the deep stages of REM sleep, we grow, heal and...

When we consider and identify the key tenets of maintaining good health, one of the least known - and most important - is establishing and maintaining a personal sense of purpose and meaning. As we age, we gain important perspective by looking back on our lives to see what motivated us during each stage of our journey. Having an increasingly mature point of view allows us the vantage of understanding the guiding forces that brought us to the place where we currently stand. It is through this introspective process that we learn why our lives are important – to us and everyone around us.

My grandmother was a wonderful lady who lived in a small town in central Oklahoma. She was a housewife, a mother, an ardent churchgoer, and she managed the general store they owned in town before it was closed down toward the end of the Great Depression. The store was a small mercantile of the day, carrying most of life’s necessities and was, essentially, the Walmart of their small community.

OK… So, what’s not good about being happy?

As members of a robust community like ours, you are undoubtedly aware of how wonderful it is to partake in the environment, great neighbors and amenities in the Denver area. You know the collective joy you experience when you greet your friends and engage with others in active endeavors. But, is there a way for us to define these good feelings?

Last week we were remembering a day, pre-COVID.

We had gone to the art museum with a couple of friends – there were a lot of people there during one of the free-admission days. We decided to enjoy a movie in the early afternoon, and we finished the day at one of our favorite restaurants. We then agreed that some of our outdoor opportunities have changed a bit now as the snow is accumulating on the mountains, but things are definitely looking up.