MyHealth Beijing

As I celebrate my second father’s day as a dad, I’ve been thinking more and more about my own father, who died over ten years ago. When I travel back home to Boston I always drive down the spartan Cape [...]

Which mask is the best against pollution? I can’t really answer that for everyone, as our faces have different sizes and shapes. I’ve recently shared results from three large tests, which unfortunately didn’t review many of the consumer masks I’ve used. [...]

Do you or your children bike to work or school? Here in Beijing, a lot of us are fortunate to live close enough to their schools and offices that walking or biking could be an option. I bike to my [...]

Any long-time reader of mine knows that I’ve repeatedly lamented the dearth of independent evidence regarding pollution masks. But now I finally have good news: since last month, two excellent mask comparison reports from consumer groups in China have been [...]

(UPDATE April 2014: please read my new review of three mask tests.) As a family doctor, I strive to keep my patients and my community healthy by sharing informed, evidence-based advice — in clinic and via my writing. Wellness and [...]

UPDATE, MARCH 15: this project is now on hold (details here) Wow, that wasn’t very fun, was it? We just finished a miserable six days of AQI over 300. But it certainly was the perfect backdrop to my new campaign [...]

UPDATE, MARCH 15: this project is now on hold (details here) Are you bewildered and overwhelmed by all of the choices for air pollution masks? Don’t you wish you could look at independent test results which compared all of them? [...]

Who do you think are healthier: people born and raised in China, or in the USA? I used to generalize that the average person in China was healthier, mostly from observing Beijing’s lively street life, especially at night.  On every [...]

My son Alex is almost one year old now, and he loves to put everything in his mouth, especially his bathtub toys. As he happily munches away on a day-glo orange crab with big Bambi eyes, I’m always a bit [...]

The Shanghai Consumer Rights Protection Commission (上海市消费者权益保护委员会) has hit another home run! Last year,  they published a fantastic report of their independent testing of two dozen air purifiers, which I translated and blogged here. Now they have turned their focus on [...]

Did you know that only ten percent of teenage girls in the USA get enough calcium? Even here in China, the average calcium intake is less than half the recommended amounts. Most infants now have no problems with their calcium, thanks [...]

What’s the hottest gift this Chinese new year? Perhaps instead of moon cakes and red envelopes, you could give “the gift that keeps on giving”: an indoor air purifier. They certainly are all the rage in China since last year, with [...]

I’ve blogged a lot about testing my air purifiers at home, a quartet of machines (three IQAirs and one Blueair) working in symphonic harmony to create indoor air 80% cleaner than the outside air pollution — 24 hours a day, every day. I find [...]

It’s cold and flu season yet again, and time to review the simple steps can we all take to avoid these inevitable illnesses. This year’s flu season is a bit more newsworthy than usual as H7N9 bird flu continues to [...]

Have many of my readers tried the new pollution masks for your kids? I’d love to hear your stories! The big news over the last couple months was the new collection from Vogmask, which has (as far as I know) [...]