The Journal

Stories for a healthier home.

Physician-reviewed reading on care, treatment, eating, family and strength.

After the emergency room, pass the news to your own doctor yourself

You were sent home from the emergency room with a discharge sheet, a new prescription and no idea whether your own doctor will hear about it. Until someone confirms it, passing the news on falls to you, and the sheet in your bag is where to start.

Oct 4, 2026

Treatment

Flying with a fridge medicine and syringes in your carry-on

You are flying soon with a medicine that lives in the fridge, its ice packs and needles. All three can travel in your carry-on bag, as long as you tell the officer about the medicine and the syringes at the start of screening.

Oct 4, 2026

Strength

Caught yourself on the stairs twice? Tell your doctor

You have put a hand out on the stairs twice this week, while the scale says you are lighter than in years. Those near-misses are worth raising with your doctor, along with a short leg-strength test the doctor can run at the appointment.

Oct 4, 2026

Life stage

Ask for the blood sugar test you missed after gestational diabetes

You had gestational diabetes in a pregnancy seven years ago, it cleared after the birth, and nobody has tested you since. It left a raised chance of type 2 diabetes, so the test that was missed is a simple blood sugar test, and you can ask for it now.

Oct 4, 2026

Eating

Read a food label for half a serving, and compare two packages fairly

You eat about half the serving printed on the back of the package, and the two packages in your hands list different servings. Scale every number to what you actually eat, and compare percentages only between foods set to the same amount.

Oct 4, 2026

Family

Tell your family about new blood pressure and blood sugar results

A check-up before weight care turned up a high blood pressure reading and a raised blood sugar result, and your brothers and daughter have not heard. The conditions behind both can run in families, which makes the news theirs as well as yours.

Oct 4, 2026

Treatment

Getting rid of a used needle, leftover vials and the box with your name on it

There is a used needle in a yogurt pot and two vials you will not use. What to keep the needle in tonight, where unused medicine goes, what to do if someone is stuck, and why the empty box needs your name scratched out.

Sep 9, 2026

Family

Move the weight medicine off the fridge door if young children visit

Your medicine lives in the fridge door, within a young nephew's reach. How to keep it cold and out of reach at the same time, what to do if you think a child got into it, and the handbags and coats that bring medicine into the house.

Sep 9, 2026

Care model

Reporting a side effect that has not gone away

When a side effect your clinic called expected is still there weeks later, tell the clinic again, with notes on how it has gone since. A report to FDA's MedWatch program is open to you as well, with or without your clinician.

Sep 9, 2026

Care model

Had a sleeve or bypass? Bring the operation to any new weight care

You had a sleeve or a bypass years ago, some of the weight has come back, and you are looking at weight care again. The operation still governs how much fits and what you absorb, so your surgical records and a recent blood test come first.

Sep 9, 2026

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