The hottest Interventions Substack posts right now

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Biological Age Clocks: Are They Useful?

Harnessing the Power of Nutrients • 778 implied HN points • 19 Dec 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Interventions Health Testing Longevity
  1. Biological aging clocks can help us monitor the effects of our health choices on how fast or slow we age.
  2. If biological aging clocks are inaccurate, they can potentially misinform us and lead to unnecessary worry or misguided actions.
  3. Understanding the effectiveness and reliability of biological aging clocks is crucial to prevent irreversible health damage and take proactive steps to reverse any harm.

Common Terminology and Statistics Issues- Part 2

Weight and Healthcare • 738 implied HN points • 27 Dec 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Statistics Obesity Interventions Research Terminology
  1. Using percentages without proper context can be misleading, it's crucial to provide a full picture for accurate interpretation.
  2. Understanding the difference between relative and absolute risk in statistics can prevent manipulation and provide a clearer view of the data.
  3. Different methods for handling dropouts in trials, like LOCF and BOCF, can impact outcomes significantly and need careful consideration in research.

Reducing Stigma by Ending the Pathologizing of Fatness - Part 1

Weight and Healthcare • 718 implied HN points • 12 Jul 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Weight Stigma Healthcare Research Interventions
  1. Pathologizing fatness contributes to weight stigma and can dehumanize fat individuals, perpetuating discrimination and exclusion.
  2. Traditional weight stigma reduction methods that shift blame or rely on empathy fail to address the root cause of pathologizing fatness and are ineffective in dismantling weight stigma.
  3. Efforts to eradicate weight stigma should focus on depathologizing fatness, creating interventions that challenge stigma's underlying foundations and embracing collaboration with stigmatized communities.

Serious Issues With the American Academy of Pediatrics Guidelines For Higher-Weight Children and Adolescents

Weight and Healthcare • 938 implied HN points • 14 Jan 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Guidelines Interventions Surgery Health Issues
  1. The American Academy of Pediatrics guidelines for higher-weight children and adolescents focus on intensive behavioral interventions, drugs, and surgeries, which may not have long-term benefits and can have serious side effects.
  2. The guidelines pathologize higher-weight bodies and promote weight loss as a solution, without enough evidence to support the efficacy or safety of these interventions on a long-term basis.
  3. There are ethical concerns about recommending weight loss surgeries for adolescents as young as 13, considering the significant risks, lack of long-term follow-up, and potential impact on the mental and physical health of the individuals.

Of Course DEI Programming Should Be Seen As Psychological Interventions And Held To The Appropriate Standards

Singal-Minded • 1728 implied HN points • 24 Jul 23
🎭️ Culture Diversity Psychology Standards Workplace Interventions
  1. Workplace diversity, equity, and inclusion programs are facing challenges and skepticism.
  2. DEI interventions should be seen as psychological interventions and held to appropriate standards to ensure they do not cause harm.
  3. There is a lack of formal and rigorous evaluation of DEI programs, which hinders the ability to determine their effectiveness.
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Study Misleads About Efficacy of Weight Loss Interventions in Children

Weight and Healthcare • 499 implied HN points • 20 May 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Efficacy Interventions Weight Loss Children
  1. The study discussed how weight loss interventions in children might not be as effective as previously thought. The research highlighted issues with how body size changes are linked to health outcomes.
  2. The study pointed out flaws in assuming that weight loss directly improves health outcomes. It emphasized the importance of considering the impact of behaviors on health, rather than just focusing on weight change.
  3. The study recommended being cautious about interpreting weight loss as the main driver for health improvements. It highlighted the need to question biases and assumptions about the relationship between weight loss and health outcomes.

Help the US Preventative Services Task Force Avoid Harming People and Wasting Money

Weight and Healthcare • 359 implied HN points • 24 May 23
🏥 Health Politics Healthcare Policy Research Interventions
  1. The US Preventative Services Task Force's draft research plan on weight loss interventions lacks consideration for the long-term effectiveness of weight loss attempts.
  2. Small amounts of weight loss do not necessarily cause improved health outcomes - factors like behavior changes and access to healthcare may play a bigger role.
  3. Focusing on health-supporting behaviors rather than weight loss interventions could lead to more meaningful and less harmful outcomes for higher-weight individuals.

Weight Loss Research Should Be Five Years Long - At Least

Weight and Healthcare • 479 implied HN points • 22 Oct 22
🏥 Health & Wellness Weight Loss Research Interventions Chronic Conditions Side Effects
  1. Weight loss research should be at least five years long to capture long-term outcomes accurately.
  2. The weight loss industry often conducts short-term studies that may overlook weight regain and potential harms of interventions.
  3. There is a need for systemic change in how weight loss interventions are researched and marketed to protect patients from ineffective and potentially harmful treatments.

Pedophile Problems (v2)

Secretum Secretorum • 505 implied HN points • 14 Mar 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Mental health Genetics Interventions
  1. Ethical dilemmas arise when teaching and mentoring individuals with a history of heinous crimes like pedophilia.
  2. Taboos around discussing pedophilia can hinder conversations about related issues such as mentoring and societal norms.
  3. The genetic component of pedophilia and potential medical interventions raise complex ethical questions that society will inevitably need to address.

Comparing Smoking with Being Higher Weight

Weight and Healthcare • 279 implied HN points • 01 Jun 22
🏥 Health & Wellness Weight Body Image Public Health Interventions Health Risks
  1. Comparing smoking to being higher weight is not a fair comparison because they are different in terms of behaviors, interventions, and health impacts.
  2. Smoking and being higher weight are not directly comparable because body size is not a behavior like smoking, and the health implications differ significantly.
  3. Shaming fat people to be thin is not the same as shaming smokers to quit, as they are different issues with unique complexities and considerations.

Why Can't Americans Take A Vacation?

The Weekly Dish • 177 implied HN points • 11 Aug 23
🏥 Health & Wellness Work-life balance Physical therapy Medication Interventions Mental health
  1. American workers put in long hours, with some even working up to 90 hours per week, impacting their ability to take vacations
  2. The pursuit of material possessions and societal pressure to work hard contribute to Americans' lack of leisure time compared to Europeans
  3. Globalization and technology have intensified the work culture, making Americans always accessible and potentially leading to burnout

Exercise helps long covid patients in a randomized trial

Vinay Prasad's Observations and Thoughts • 59 implied HN points • 16 Feb 24
🏥 Health & Wellness Exercise Long Covid Research Quality of Life Interventions
  1. Exercise has been shown to improve quality of life for long COVID patients in a randomized trial.
  2. Even with varying levels of participation, the exercise program led to positive impacts on mental and physical health in long COVID patients.
  3. This study highlights the importance of consistent exercise as a potential treatment for long COVID symptoms.

Master Protocols: A Tool for Increasing the Reliability of Behavioral Evidence

The Good Science Project • 26 implied HN points • 30 Aug 23
🔬 Science Research Interventions Reliability
  1. Behavioral interventions are crucial for promoting public health alongside biomedical products.
  2. Replications of trials of behavioral interventions in multiple settings are crucial for reliable scientific knowledge.
  3. Master protocols can increase the reliability of behavioral research by coordinating trials and meta-analyses across diverse populations and settings.

The National Weight Control Registry's Shaky Science

Weight and Healthcare • 2 HN points • 15 Oct 22
🏥 Health & Wellness Weight Loss Research Methods Interventions Fat Activism
  1. The National Weight Control Registry's definition of weight loss success may not accurately represent the reality of weight loss maintenance.
  2. The NWCR's findings do not conclusively disprove the idea that weight loss attempts fail about 95% of the time.
  3. The NWCR's suggested behaviors for weight loss maintenance lack specificity and may not be effective for the general population.

Work and Mental Health: Challenges and Opportunities

Psych • 0 implied HN points • 27 Jan 24
🏥 Health & Wellness Mental health Work Interventions Research Policies
  1. Mental health issues are common in the workplace and have significant costs for individuals, employers, and society.
  2. The relationship between work and mental health is complex and requires more research and inclusive approaches.
  3. It's crucial to examine working conditions and their impact on mental disorders to promote mental health among workers.

Incrementalism beats YOLO

Hypertext • 0 implied HN points • 27 Mar 24
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics Policy Social Science Interventions Research
  1. Incremental social policies have proven to make the world a better place over time
  2. Narrow, incremental policy changes can have significant positive impacts, like increasing school attendance, boosting earnings, and reducing incarceration rates
  3. Incremental changes informed by high-quality evaluation and research can lead to greater effectiveness over time in various social programs, showing better results than 'you only live once' approaches in policy-making

Data in, garbage out

Hypertext • 0 implied HN points • 27 Mar 24
🔬 Science Data Analysis Social Science Interventions
  1. Statistics can only tell us so much, so we should approach data with humility about both the power of social programs and hard data to test them.
  2. Rigorous measurement often doesn't definitively show whether interventions work, leading to ongoing debates and conflicting results in various fields.
  3. While randomized controlled trials have their value in measuring specified outcomes, they can miss unexpected effects and subtle interactions, highlighting the importance of qualitative methods and personal observations.