When my niece was about 7 years old, we were in a taxi on our way to the theater when she turned to me and said, "Isn't it strange that we don't know what is going on inside our bodies?"
Strange no longer, Chelsea, thanks to an amazing new website developed by the internationally renowned Alexander Tsiaras and Deepak Chopra, MD, FACP. Based on the belief that visualization of health information coupled with good storytelling can change behavior, The Visual MD is organized around 9 Visual Rules of Wellness:
- Baseline Your Health
- Define Your Wellness Mission
- Develop and Maintain Nutritional Balance
- Get Aerobic and Anerobic Exercise
- Never Smoke...If You Do Now, Quit
- Take a Moderate Approach
- Make Sleep a Priority
- Manage Your Stress
- Embrace Joy
Health Centers and Libraries on the site include multilayered, interactive content with gorgeous, eye-popping 3-D graphics and video created from actual MRIs, CT scans, electron microscopy and other imaging technologies. We are taken deep inside the human body to experience the wonder of chemical, molecular and mechanical processes that sustain life. We also see the benefits of our good decisions as well as the consequences of our bad habits. The section Your Health Explained Through Your Own Biomarkers and Tests is especially illuminating as it describes the clinical relevance of the substances measured and the possible reasons underlying high or low results.
As Tsiaras described in his TEDMED presentation (below), the vignettes are brief and engaging and designed so that users will arrive at a "holy shit, I finally get it moment" and feel empowered to heal themselves. It seems to be working. Tsiaras cited positive results from an initial study that, "reduced people's biomarkers by up to three decades in four months using the nine rules."
Take some time to explore The Visual MD. It will make you think about the miracle of your body with childlike wonder.
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