March 2011

On the reinvention of wheels

There are several cliché metaphors that make me crazy.  Especially annoying to me are the ones about the hazards of silos and the wastefulness of reinventing the wheel.  Both of those will usually be mentioned these days in any meeting that lasts more than 60 minutes.  I will write some other day about the merits of silos, but today I want to contemplate the question of why reinventing the wheel has gotten such a bad rap.

The first wheel was not the best wheel.  It was probably some sort of short log and I am sure the inventor was pleased with how it worked. 

On two ways to bowl

These are two ways to bowl:  one can aim at the pins or at the spots in the lane.  I have done it both ways, but to me aiming at the pins is more satisfying.

All of us working in public health are trying to help real people.  We all do that differently, from our different professional positions and experiences.  In the daily grind of our work, we necessarily focus on proximal goals such as how we can get a grant or publish a paper or teach a student or better carry out a project.   In our daily work we need to focus on spots.

I have been wonderi

The best idea since sliced nodes

There was an article in the February 3 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine that upset me.  Bear with me as I explain this.