All posts tagged: Clinicians

Whoop will give users on-demand video access to clinicians

Whoop will give users on-demand video access to clinicians

Published by skeptic

Whoop, a screen-free fitness wearable with more than 2.5 million users, announced that it’s bringing on-demand video consultations with health professionals to its subscriber base. According to Whoop’s announcement on Friday, live consultations with licensed clinicians will be offered to users in the U.S. starting this summer. Whoop is touting the fact that clinicians will have access to an array of biometric data collected in the app, and how that will aid experts in interpreting a user’s health information. Of course, it’s probably not a coincidence that Whoop’s announcement comes just one day after Google and Fitbit released their Whoop competitor, powered by Google Gemini. To support users’ fitness goals, Whoop is also partnering with the health records company HealthEx to provide Electronic Health Record (EHR) syncing. Under this partnership, Whoop users can keep track of their health history, including diagnoses, medications, and procedures, from right within the app. Mashable 101 Fan Fave: Vote for your favorite creator today! Mashable Light Speed SEE ALSO: I ran the NYC Marathon wearing 7 fitness trackers and they …

A Clinician’s Perspective on the Polyvagal Controversy

A Clinician’s Perspective on the Polyvagal Controversy

Published by Jenni Sidey

There is an interesting controversy resurfacing in the trauma psychology community around Stephen Porges’ polyvagal theory (PVT). The debate has been going on for years, but a recently published paper has brought it back into focus. I’m writing this for clinicians, particularly those of us who have used PVT as a lens in our work and are now wondering what to make of the renewed push from neuroscientists to reject PVT. What does this debate mean for those of us who practice? PVT was always ambitious. It was an attempt to weave together evolutionary biology, neurophysiology, observable behavior, and clinical wisdom into an arc about how our nervous system states drive our behavior in the world and with one another. PVT was a bold contribution in a scientific arena where entire careers can be devoted to testing a single mechanism to increasing degrees of confidence. For many clinicians, PVT has been meaningful. Neurophysiologist Paul Grossman, along with 38 researchers, recently published a critique outlining scientific objections to some of PVT’s proposed neuroanatomical mechanisms. They conclude …

A Clinician’s Guide to Addressing High-Risk PHQ-9 Results

A Clinician’s Guide to Addressing High-Risk PHQ-9 Results

Published by Jenni Sidey

The Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) is a tool most clinicians are familiar with. It’s quick, familiar, and widely trusted across health care settings. However, when a patient’s results indicate high risk, they deserve more than a quick glance. It signals that they may be carrying a level of distress that affects mood, safety, functioning, and quality of life. How you respond in that moment matters. It can shape trust, determine next steps, and, in some cases, prevent serious harm. What Is the PHQ-9? The PHQ-9 is a nine-item screening tool used to assess the presence and severity of depressive symptoms. Each item corresponds to diagnostic criteria for major depressive disorder and asks patients how often they have experienced specific symptoms over the past two weeks.1 Scores range from minimal to severe and are often used to guide clinical decision-making, track symptom changes over time, and support conversations about mental health. Because it’s brief and easy to administer, the PHQ-9 is widely used in primary care, specialty care, behavioral health, and workplace health settings.1 While the …