- With Mayo Clinic oncologist
Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
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Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
"The magic of the electronic village is transforming health information. The mouse and keyboard have extended the stethoscope to the 500 million people now online." - Dr. Edward Creagan
The power of the medium inspires Dr. Edward Creagan as he searches for ways to share Mayo Clinic's vast resources with the general public.
Dr. Creagan, a Newark, N.J., native, is board certified in internal medicine, medical oncology, and hospice medicine and palliative care. He has been with Mayo Clinic since 1973 and in 1999 was president of the staff of Mayo Clinic. Dr. Creagan, a professor of medical oncology at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, was honored in 1995 with the John and Roma Rouse Professor of Humanism in Medicine Award and in 1992 with the Distinguished Mayo Clinician Award, Mayo's highest recognition. He has been recognized with the American Cancer Society Professorship of Clinical Oncology.
He describes his areas of special interest as "wellness as a bio-psycho-social-spiritual-financial model" and fitness, mind-body connection, aging and burnout.
Dr. Creagan has been an associate medical editor with Mayo Clinic's Web sites and has edited publications and CD-ROMs and reviewed articles.
"We the team of (the Web site) provide reliable, easy-to-understand health and wellness information so that each of us can have productive, meaningful lives," he says.
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Stress blog
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April 4, 2008
Reaching out helps others, and you
By Edward T. Creagan, M.D.
"You cannot give what you do not have." So began a sermon by a minister several weeks ago. He went on to say that if we do not have a musical skill, we cannot teach music to others. If we do not have an athletic gift, we cannot teach others how to golf, swim, or run. What the minister was really saying is that if we are unfocused, distracted, letting ourselves get overwhelmed with issues, we are hardly in a position to offer the hand of friendship and the voice of comfort to others.
We all recognize and acknowledge that yes, bad things do happen sometimes to wonderful people, and yes, there are tragedies for which we have no obvious explanation. But, if we are able to maintain a sense of physical, spiritual, and emotional resilience, we can deal with just about anything.
If we feel marginalized and without a support system, there certainly are avenues to improve this situation such as joining a faith community; becoming involved in civic or community activities; or simply picking up that phone and calling a friend, colleague, or neighbor. Most of us are reluctant to reach out for help — especially us men — and maybe that is why women outlive us by about ten years.
Having read a recent book on Buddhism, a recurrent theme from one of the writers was the notion of being "preemptive." This meant trying to anticipate some of the issues that might befall us and doing our best to deal with adversity. These sacred writings also emphasized that if our focus is "all about me" we are doomed to unhappiness and will try to fill that void with trinkets, things, awards, and "stuff." Somehow the gift of reaching out to someone to make their lives a little better also makes our lives a little better.
So, what have other members of the community learned from other belief systems in dealing with these difficult and thorny issues of disease, illness, and life's unfairness?
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