Triggerband Web Journal

It is a well-known fact that America suffers from nationwide shortages of primary care physicians.¹ This shortage has caused headaches for both doctors and patients. However, I have an effective mid- to long-term solution to this problem.

My solution is to federally charter a dozen or so large medical schools that are geographically dispersed throughout the nation. This act of Congress is constitutionally permissible under the commerce clause because employee healthcare is a major concern and expense of businesses who engage in interstate commerce.

There will certainly be enough qualified med school applicants to fill these schools, which could enroll as many as 1000 students per class at each school. Right now, many of our qualified med school applicants are choosing Caribbean schools and osteopathic degrees because there are simply not enough positions for them in U.S. medical schools. Other would-be qualified applicants choose ancillary or altogether unrelated professions because medical school admission is too competitive.

You might think this ultra-competitiveness in U.S. MD schools (and even osteopathic colleges) results in more highly skilled doctors and superior care. If you think that, you would be mistaken. What we end up with is medical schools full of perfectionists – students with college GPAs that approach 4.0 and competitive type A personalities whose drive is fueled largely by fear of failure.

Perfectionists like that might be valuable in a profession such as astrophysics; but medicine is not only complex, it is dynamic and personal. We need doctors who can handle failure and know how to make tough decisions. After all, there is a saying that every doctor kills somebody. They must also communicate with patients and their families on an emotional level. And perhaps most importantly, doctors must admit when their philosophies, procedures, and quality of care are poor and ineffective. This frequently happens, but type A personalities are loathe to be honest and acknowledge their own incompetence, and then make changes and seek solutions.

Pouring thousands of new doctors a year into the marketplace will balance supply and demand. The profession will find relief quickly, like arteries relieved of high blood pressure. Now doctors will have more time to spend with patients and be less overworked and stressed, and their quality of care will improve. And doctors will have to compete for patients, another powerful motivation for them to improve care. Currently, “bad” doctors have as many patients as “good” doctors. Most patients are obliged to take whatever care they can get.

What about the cost? Granted, the venture is costly, but the return is likewise large, even in the short term. New medical residencies will provide inexpensive care for patients and increased revenues for hospitals. The price of office visits and medical procedures will drop as a result of the market economics discussed above. And the cost of insurance programs will subsequently decline, including government-sponsored insurance programs.

If we delay this relief, the situation will continue to deteriorate. Overworked and stressed out doctors tend to provide subpar healthcare. And patients who receive subpar healthcare tend to not recover from their illnesses, so they return to the doctor repeatedly. This exacerbates the problem by further straining schedules and thus leading to even worse care. Where will this downward spiral end? With the patient dying, the doctor quitting, Medicare and Medicaid going bankrupt? I do not want to find out.

Alexander Typaldos, JD

¹Many Doctors Plan to Quit or Cut Back: Survey, November 18, 2008, http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081118/us_nm/us_doctors_usa_survey;_ylt=AsuanTbXtgowlEJGt5xucHXLLJ94.

I took a class in college where successful entrepreneurs came and told their stories. One of them was a man named Sam Caster, founder of Mannatech. Mr. Caster’s presence screamed VIP. And he spoke in a way that was friendly yet commanded attention. He told us how his business got started and grew, and displayed a passion that was contagious.

Mr. Caster then described Mannatech’s main product, Ambrotose, in great detail. He told of marketing strategy and patent applications, and what Ambrotose is able to do for people who take it. The benefits of this one supplement were astounding! By the end of the lecture we all felt as though our lives would be incomplete until we had some.

Honored to have such an important businessman take the time to share his story, we little understood that our guest salesmen had just made a sale. My professor soon purchased some Ambrotose (which is not cheap, I should mention). I asked him how he felt after taking it. He said he felt a little better in one specific way; maybe he slept better or had more energy, I can’t remember. And he was still very pleased to have discovered Ambrotose.

How Ambrotose works

Ambrotose supplies the body with all of the eight necessary glyconutrient saccharides. According to Mannatech, the average person’s diet only gives them two of these monosaccharides. And all eight are required for cellular communication and glycoprotein structure. Mannatech claims that these molecules help the immune system communicate, so without them a person could develop autoimmune disorders. But if they take Ambrotose, they might recover. Of course, Mannatech cannot come right out and say that or Ambrotose would legally be considered a drug and subject to FDA regulation.

Mannatech suggests that every person on the face of the earth take a dose of Ambrotose every day for the rest of their life. Before I thank Mannatech for their life-changing discovery and service to humanity, let me ask a few questions. Where did Mannatech find these glyconutrients? The answer: plants. Their argument is that “primitive” humans ate more raw fruits and vegetables, thus receiving a full dose. But “modern” humans eat a lot of refined foods, and are thus depleted in glyconutrients.

Their argument is logical; however, I come to a different conclusion. Eat more raw, organic vegetables. The body digests, absorbs, and utilizes nutrients in natural form more easily than altered supplements found in capsules or powders. We know that Mannatech alters the nutrients in Ambrotose because it has a patent for the substance. You can’t just put some aloe gel in a capsule and apply for a patent. There has to be a chemical alteration.

That brings me to my next question. If Mannatech is so interested in the greater good, why does it have a total of 45 patents all over the world? This is no mere formality. Mannatech has a record of bringing suits against smaller companies it suspects of patent infringement, with mixed outcomes. Sounds like big pharma tactics to me.

Finally, if Mannatech has such great products, why do they resort to multilevel marketing to get their products out? The answer is that the validity of their products is based purely on testimonials, not scientific research. I for one am not going to discount the value of personal testimony. But when I put all the facts together, Mannatech starts looking like another pyramid scheme from Texas (where it is headquartered).

The bottom line

We do need all eight glyconutrients, but we can get them by eating a balanced diet rich in raw, organic vegetables. If you have had a bad diet for a long time and don’t want to change, you could benefit from a glyconutrient supplement. Though, your health is unlikely to improve dramatically. And any brand of glyconutrient saccharides will suffice. It doesn’t have to be Ambrotose.

I do believe that occasionally people who take Ambrotose are cured of debilitating diseases like lupus. However, people who play the lottery occasionally win. That does not make it an effective strategy for accumulating wealth. So let’s stop playing the lottery with our health, start eating a healthier diet, and foil Mannatech’s wealth-generating scam.

Alexander Typaldos, JD