The logical fallacy exists on a daily basis in the orthopedic world. Perhaps more importantly, it costs the health care world millions of dollars and a tremendous unnecessary burden psychologically.

Orthopedic patients are referred for countless imaging studies as a first line of assessment. An MRI is a detailed image which patients are told will provide all the answers to the diagnosis of their problem.

Technology is a wonderful thing, right?

But there are some significant problems with this that begin with the initial line of thinking.

Should we trust pathoanatomy?

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[Note: This is the follow-up post to “Sidewalk Surfing”]

That neon orange skateboard was like a launch pad, and Skateboarder Magazine became the rocket fuel. I would anxiously await its arrival every month. Stacey Peralta became one of my heroes. I was always bewildered by the antics and otherworldly photos of Tony Alva and Jay Adams. I read every article, and studied every photo. I knew this world inside-out, and backwards.

There was no question though: I was a long ways away from the skateboard epicenter in Dogtown. Total distance? About 2700 miles. And I lived in Brockville, Ontario, a place where prime skating weather of the non-ice variety lasted about 4 months, a place where hockey players far outnumbered skateboarders.

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It is a simple decision that stands in our way to the promised land of health care reform. When do we finally get to the point in which health care consumers just say no?

Imagine, if you will, a world without Big Medicine, Big Pharma, Big Insurance, and Big Hospitals. Imagine, again, that same world with legislators who made decisions based on the needs of their constituents, and not the needs of the Bigs. I know, I am creating a world of science fiction here, but work with me for a moment.

When do consumers finally decide that the status quo - and its currently accepted "standards" of health care - is no longer acceptable? And when will consumers finally choose to take back their health care system once and for all?

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The days would start getting a little longer. It would get a little warmer outside. The streets would dry off. Summer time was upon us, and it was just a matter of time before the sidewalk surfing would resume.

My adventures in skateboarding started with a bright neon orange piece of plywood. My father had attached some clay wheels which were, unbeknownst to me at first, scavenged from my old-style roller skates. Add a few strips of white bathroom shower grip tape, and this old-school skateboard was ready for its maiden voyage along Water Street.

Welcome to the 1970s. I remember that first skating experience like it was yesterday. The sound of those wheels on the concrete was grating at best. But it offered a new-found freedom. And man, was it cool.

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