The Evidence for Gratitude and Health, 2024 Giving Thanks
In our home, we’re feeling very grateful for our healthy lives and work-flows right now, being very mindful about seeing blessings around me and within me…. So I’m sharing the love (or “scaling the love” as I recently coined at OSF’s Digital Health Symposium!) to honor American Thanksgiving 2024 here in Health Populi pointing out several sources highlighting the evidence on gratitude and health….underpinned with love, the ultimate driver of health and well-being. Leslie Sarasin, President and CEO of FMI, the Food Industry Association, reminds us that, “Our immigrant ancestors, the pilgrim settlers, worked hard
“People will seek wellness, peace and healing” – Reading the GWI Future of Wellness Report, 2024 Trends
Healthy eating and weight loss, personal care and beauty, exercise and physical activity, and wellness tourism are the four biggest components of the world’s wellness economy, quantified in The Future of Wellness, 2024 Trends, the perennial report from the Global Wellness Institute (GWI). Here’s the bubble chart, which I’ve updated with the 2025 data so we get a sense of what the coming year will bring for the eleven total segments that make up the global wellness market. The fine print of the projections for these areas identifies the annual growth rates for
Peace and Health: A Causal Relationship Explored in the AMA Journal of Ethics
“Peace and health are inextricably connected,” the Editors of the AMA Journal of Ethics introduce an issue of the journal devoted to Peace in Health Care published November 2024. In this timely journal issue, we can explore nearly one dozen essays exploring the interrelationship between peace and health in various clinical, care, and community settings — including hospice, maternal/child care, built environments, and adjacencies looking at the use of psychedelics and music for quieting one’s inner voices. You, the reader, will find your own favorite issues to explore based on your work, values, and interests.
We Are Stressed in America – APA’s 2024 Stress in America Survey on “A Nation in Turmoil”
Two in three people in the U.S. are dealing with Presidential Election Stress — a significant contributor to Americans’ overall stress we learn from the American Psychological Association’s study into Stress in America 2024. I’ve covered the APA’s Stress in America studies for many years, appreciating the role that anxiety and stress play in peoples’ overall health status and well-being. In 2024, “stress” is a mainstream factor in daily life whether you identify with Main Street or Wall Street. Here was my most recent post on the APA study here in Health Populi,
The Future of Love and How It Could Shape Health, Well-Being, and Daily Living
“The future of love is bound to the institutions that have historically shaped and defined it,” Ipsos’s What the Future: Love report begins. Consider: religion, government, financial institutions….and the health care ecosystem, as well. On this Valentine’s Day 14th February 2023, it is a good time to consider this convergence as health politics, financial well-being, and emerging technologies will be re-shaping institutions and consumers in the coming months and near-term. The Ipsos researchers have been assessing the future of many aspects of our lives over the past couple of years, such as the future of wellness,
Wellness in 2023 Is About Connections, Mental Health and Science – Global Wellness Summit’s 2023 Trends
Consumers’ wellness life-flows and demands in 2023 will go well beyond exercise resolutions, eating more greens, and intermittent fasting as a foodstyle. It’s time for us to get the annual update on health consumers from the multi-faceted team who curated the Global Wellness Summit’s annual report on The Future of Wellness 2023 Trends. In this year’s look into wellness for the next few years, we see that health-oriented consumers are seeking solutions for dealing with loneliness and mental health, weight and hydration, travel-as-medicine as health destinations, and — not surprisingly —
What Are Patients Looking for in a Doctor? It Depends on Who You Ask…and Their Race
While the same proportion of Black and White patients say they are looking for a doctor with empathy and compassion, there are relatively large differences between patients based on their race, found in the Everyday Health-Castle Connolly Physician-Consumer study. The survey was conducted in December 2022 among a group of 1,001 U.S. consumers and 277 Castle Connolly health care professionals. As the first bar chart illustrates “where patients differ, “Black people were nearly twice as likely as white people (41 percent versus 22 percent) to completely agree that they would be more comfortable and
Telehealth and Spirituality – a View From Florence, Italy
I’m in Florence, Italy, this week, working on Slow Food as medicine and finding myself contemplating spirituality, health and wellbeing as I walk the streets of this grand city of the Renaissance. Imagine my surprise, yesterday, walking through the city center by the glorious Duomo, the great dome of the cathedral named Santa Maria del Fiore, with the beautiful Baptistry built just across the piazza. You see my initial view approaching the square here, the church and Duomo on the left and the Baptistry on the right. Now cast your eyes in the
Vaccinations, Art and Labor Day: Learning from Diego Rivera and Edsel Ford
For Labor Day 2022, I’m thinking about health, vaccines, work (especially returning-to-work), and art. Let’s start with the vaccine news. Called the “first updated COVID-19 booster,” on September 1st the CDC announced the availability and approval for health citizens to get new vaccines which have added Omicron BA.4 and BA.5 spike protein components to the original vaccine formulation. The booster shots will be administered using vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech for people ages 12 years and older, and from Moderna for people ages 18 years and older. Walgreens announced appointment scheduling for the boosters, and CVS Health discussed the plans for the
Life Expectancy Falls in the U.S., the Largest 2-Year Decline in 100 Years
Life expectancy at birth in 2021 in the United States fell to 76.1 years, the lowest level since 1996. Men fared much worse than women, with 73,2 years of life expectancy versus 79.1 years for women, the latest research from the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics revealed. In their Provisional Life Expectancy Estimates for 2021, the CDC kicks off a demographically detailed analysis with this simple line chart which graphs the dramatic decline in life expectancy at birth. The overall decline across gender and all race/ethnic groups was 2.7 years: 3.1 years
Your State as a Determinant of Health: Sharecare’s 2021 Community Well-Being Index
People whose sense of well-being shifted positively in the past two years are finding greater personal purpose and financial health, we see in Sharecare’s Community Well-Being Index – 2021 State Rankings Report. Sharecare has been annually tracking well-being across the 50 U.S. states since 2008. When the study launched, Well-Being Index evaluated five domains: physical, social, community, purpose, and financial. In 2020, Sharecare began a collaboration with the Boston University School of Public Health to expand the Index, including drivers of health such as, Healthcare access (like physician supply per 1,000
Jasper, Scaling a Human Touch for People Dealing with Cancer, Now With Walgreens
Each year, the first Sunday in June marks National Cancer Survivors Day. This year’s NCSD occurred two days ago on Sunday, 5th June. When you’re a cancer survivor, or happen to love one, every day is time to be grateful and celebrate that survival of someone who has come through a cancer journey. We all know (or are) people who have survived cancer. We know that the recipe for battling cancer goes beyond chemotherapy. We know of the resilience and grit required in the process: body, mind, and spirit. “Celebrate Life” is the mantra of NCSD, as this year’s campaign
Reimagining Health Care Without Walls – Deloitte’s Vision
Delivering health care during the heights of the COVID-19 pandemic proved to both patients and their clinicians that virtual care was not only a viable channel for care, but very often a preferable “place” to collaborate for treatment. Even before the coronavirus pandemic emerged in early 2020, telehealth and the hospital-to-home movement were beginning to become part of a portfolio of delivery modes across the continuum of care. Deloitte spells out the current and future prospects for the Hospital in the future “without” walls in a new report that spells out driving forces, future scenarios, and impacts on a business long
I was invited to be a Judge for the upcoming CES 2025 Innovation Awards in the category of digital health and connected fitness. So grateful to be part of this annual effort to identify the best in consumer-facing health solutions for self-care, condition management, and family well-being. Thank you, CTA!
Thank you Team Roche for inviting me to brainstorm patients as health citizens, consumers, payers, and voters in the Healthcare Transformers series.
For the past 15 years, the annual CES conference in Las Vegas has been my go-to meeting for updating my research and network in digital health and consumer-facing electronics that people find meaningful for their well-being, families, and home lives. I'll be back in Vegas in January for a full week of Media Days, one-on-one meetings, and speaking about my perspectives on health consumers.