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January 2018

CHAPALA MED’S Monthly Health Newsletter 
January 2018 Health Newsletter
Happy New Year to all of our patients and readers. I hope that all of you had a delightful, warm and cheerful holiday season thus far and hopefully have avoided getting the dreaded respiratory infection that seems to be going around.  Due to the number of patients I had hospitalized in December and the end of year engagements that I had to attend to, I found it difficult to find time to write a newsletter worth your time.
January is the month for awareness for Glaucoma, Cervical health, Thyroid disease month as well as National Drug and Alcohol Facts week from the 22-28th.  Regular check ups and a guided plan with your doctor can help maintain a good quality of life and independence by early detection of Glaucoma and Thyroid disease as well as Cervical Cancer.  

I’d like to reiterate that this newsletter includes articles that I believe will be of great interest and value to the EXPAT population of the Lake Chapala area as well as the Guadalajara metropolitan area. Please feel free to share this newsletter with anybody whom you believe may benefit from the information or articles included within it.
This upcoming 2018 Chapala Med will continue to expand the number of services that it provides as part of PRIMARY CARE. We will also be welcoming a new full time GP and a Geriatrician whom will hold regular office ours and be part of the Palliative Care team at Chapala Med.  Dr. Adrian Chaurand Morales will head our Palliative Care department and our network of specialists will continue to grow.   It has been an honor and a privilege to serve you all in whatever capacity we could.  Thank you for that that honor.
In closing I’d like to remind our readers of our
MISSION STATEMENT so that you are all aware of what we are striving to accomplish everyday and hold us to this mission.

Our medical team and staff pledge to you that we will provide purposeful medical care catered to the purposes of your lives. We will cure sometimes, treat often, and comfort always. We will always provide purpose-driven medical care to provide our patients with care that will allow them to enjoy the best quality of life and maintain or improve their level of independence. 



Santiago R. Hernandez M.D. 
 Chapala Med would like to formally welcome and announce the addition of Dr.  Cherry Adjchavanich as a full time healthcare provider. Dr. Adjchavanich, a general practitioner, is a native of Houston, Texas. She graduated from U.A.G. in 2007 and received her license to practice in Mexico in 2010 after completing her year of Social Service. She has been working in research and academia in the U.S. and her most recent position was doing research at Baylor College of Medicine.

Dr. Cherry (as she likes to be called) embodies the principles that Chapala Med has been built upon and is an empathetic and caring doctor. Her roles will include home visits, women’s health examinations and implementing cardiology testing under Dr. Sobrino. Her role and number of responsibilities will grow as the year goes on and as Dr. Santiago Hernandez’s role as medical director of the Ribera Medical Center Hospital has been fully implemented.  Stop by and meet this warm and caring soul that is Dr. Cherry.  She leaves smiles on people’s faces wherever she goes.

 

Palliative Care at Chapala Med
Dr. Claudia Fuentes 
Plancarte
 Chapala Med’s Geriatrician & Palliative Care doctor
 

Dr. Gawande’s book,
BEING MORTAL has helped shape in large part my philosophy and manner in which I practice medicine. After reading this book I have had the “HARD CONVERSATIONS” with my patients and parents. I only wish some members of my family had read his book before my mother was at the end of her journey on this earth. I believe my mother’s suffering and agony could’ve been for the most part avoided. Placing a family member of loved one in HOSPICE or PALLIATIVE CARE
 does not mean “GIVING UP”. In fact, patients who chose hospice care over surgery or chemotherapy for some diseases live 25% longer than those who do.
 
Imagine if there was a pill called PALLIATIVE CARE, who wouldn’t take it?

 

Keeping in mind the lessons and philosophy that I have learned and internalized from Dr. Gawande I have sought to partner with healthcare professionals whom have been specifically trained in this relatively new realm of medicine. Dr. Adrian Chaurand Morales recently finished his doctoral degree in Spain in Palliative Care and has an entire team of healthcare providers, nurses and counselors whom can help our patients and their loved ones during such a difficult time.
Below are links that I hope you may find helpful information on HOSPICE and PALLIATIVE CARE according to Dr. Gawande’s research has shown.
Sunday mornings I regularly listen to NPR’s
ON BEING podcast.  I was delighted to hear that their guest one week ago was Dr. Atul Gawande. I am posting a link to that interview as well as a link to a PBS/FRONTLINE documentary on the very subject of his book. For those of you whom have not had the chance to read his book, I STRONGLY RECOMMEND that you at least listen to the podcast or view the documentary.
FRONTLINE follows renowned New Yorker writer and Boston surgeon Atul Gawande as he explores the relationships doctors have with patients who are nearing the end of life. In conjunction with Gawande’s new book, Being Mortal, the film investigates the practice of caring for the dying, and shows how doctors – himself included – are often remarkably untrained, ill-suited and uncomfortable talking about chronic illness and death with their patients.

 

6 Percent of Cancers Caused by Excess Weight, Diabetes 

Both obesity and diabetes are preventable causes of cancer for which intervention is possible at multiple levels — in individuals, communities, health care systems, and policy,” said Dr. Graham Colditz, of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

 

 

 

Baby Boomers at High Risk for Death From Prescription Opioid Overdose

Overuse of Opioids medications is not only a problem in the U.S. but also in the EXPAT communities here in Mexico. Many of the EXPATs in Mexico are BABY BOOMERS.
Sugar increases risk of heart attacks

The latest medical research has clearly demonstrated that it is indeed SUGAR that is more likely to cause coronary artery disease instead of eggs and meats.

 

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