Dr. Bhavan

31/12/2024

Wishing you strength to achieve your dreams, courage to follow your passions, and wisdom to grow—gentle to nature and kind to all.

May 2025 bring you joy, health, and success. Let’s keep the momentum going and make it our best year yet!

11/02/2024

Time for Change: Saying Goodbye to BMI

Remember those times at the gym and doctor visits when they'd always check your weight and calculate your BMI? It's a common practice even today among healthcare professionals and digital health products.

But here's the thing: BMI, born decades ago, was mainly used by insurance companies to jack up premiums based on weight. It's an old system that doesn't tell the whole story. It doesn't consider things like fat distribution, ethnicity, lifestyle, and many more.

Real obesity isn't just about weight—it's about how fat affects our bodies. Apex establishments like WHO and obesity medicine associations define obesity as an "increase in body fat that promotes adipos tissue dysfunction and abnormal fat mass, resulting in adverse metabolic, biomechanical, and psychological health consequences."

It's time for a change, folks! Let's move beyond BMI and start focusing on what really matters: body fat and how it affects us. Even though BMI has been around forever, it's time to give it a fresh look.

We need better tools and a new mindset. As healthcare folks, let's learn more, think differently, and make a real difference. It's all about helping people live healthier lives, no matter their size. I would love to hear back.

21/03/2023

Most of the healthcare and fitness apps focus primarily on tracking, goal-setting, and education, rather than on behavior change.
Why should we focus on behaviour rather than only outcome ?

If we don’t eat well, exercise, or sleep right, we are inviting lifestyle disease. Yet I’ll guess that this is nothing new to us; we already know that exercise is a good idea. We are aware that we should eat better. And generally speaking, we already know what to eat—more vegetables, more protein, and less junk food. On that, almost all diets concur.

So why don’t we do it ?

Because, information isn’t always motivation. Because It isn’t sufficient to simply know what to do. Success needs to be redefined because it shouldn’t be based on actions rather than on behaviours.

We can influence our weight, but you can’t control it. However, what we can control is whether you exercise and eat well. After all, if we exercise and eat right, but the weight isn’t moving, if your focus is the outcome (weight loss), we’ll be disappointed. But if our focus is on the behaviour (I will exercise 5 times in the next week), we’ll feel a sense of accomplishment once complete it.

So we basically change the definition of success from something we can’t control (our weight) to something that we can control (the number of times per week that we exercise).

By focusing on behavior, we can identify specific actions that we can take to improve our health and wellness, rather than feeling helpless or discouraged by outcomes that may be outside of our control.

Behavior is a better predictor of long-term success than outcomes. While outcomes such as weight loss, improved blood pressure, or reduced risk of chronic disease are important measures of health and wellness, they are often influenced by a variety of factors beyond our control. By focusing on behavior, we can create habits and routines that support our overall health and well-being, making it more likely that we will achieve and maintain positive outcomes over time.

Focusing on behavior is empowering. By taking ownership of our behavior and making intentional choices to improve our health and wellness, we can feel a sense of agency and control over our lives. This can be especially important for individuals who may feel discouraged or overwhelmed by health challenges, giving them a sense of purpose and direction in their journey toward better health.

It’s Important to note that behavior change is a complex process that can take time and effort. While healthcare apps can be helpful tools, they are not a substitute for professional healthcare advice or treatment.

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03/03/2023

Are the digital healthcare eco-systems lagging in obtaining evidence of their modulated outcomes?

Digital ecosystems are willing to have their systems labelled and tagged in order to prove their legitimacy. Will this, however, be enough to give the ecosystem its soulful indendity?

The outcome or achieving goals are halfway through where the digital ecosystem is living the users in bay and living out them getting through with short-term goals (reduce weight, lower sugar levels, etc.), but are these efforts sufficient to change individuals' beliefs?

What users acquire determines outcomes. What users do is what processes are about. What user believe determines the product indendity.

With outcome-based goals, the focus is on what you want to achieve. With identity-based processes, the focus is on who you wish to become.

To learn more about identity-building healthcare ecosystems, I am ecstatic to immerse myself in additional information.

31/12/2022

Wish you all healthy, fruitful and productive year ahead.

07/10/2022

I got to thinking about how to connect this adoption to intelligence when I saw how quickly my dad picked up mobile technology and health tech, just like someone could have learned to eat with a spoon. This is how TQ was conceived in my mind.

A technology quotient (TQ) represents a person's ability to adapt to and integrate technology in comparison to the statistical norm or average for their age, which is set at 100.

The combination of IQ, EQ, and TQ creates a new dynamic that enables us to succeed in the world of today and future.

The technology quotient (TQ) attempts to quantify our ability to use current technologies wisely as well as quickly adapt, embrace, and capitalize on future innovations.

TQ, which is frequently masked by terms like "innovation" or "tech savvy," can now compete head-to-head with the traditional metrics of IQ and EQ as a tool to drive digital transformation.

When discussing healthcare innovation, one must hold TQ accountable for many adoptive technology developments while also seeking their adherence level.

13/08/2022

Donating an organ can bring joy and happiness to others. You can live forever by simply donating an organ.

We had a campaign a few years ago with Sterling Speciality Clinic & Cancer Centerand The Times of India to educate school-aged children at about organ donation awareness, and I remember the kids being so interactive and asking such great questions. Why can't we do more of this?

Let us join forces to raise awareness about organ donation.

21/05/2022

It's World Tea Day.

Tea is a liquid wisdom, which helps to reduce the risk of developing chronic diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, arthritis, and diabetes.

Tea is the most widely consumed beverage in the world, next only to water. There is often a misconception, essentially a marketing gimmick, that herbal tea is also tea. However, herbal tea is not made from the plant Camellia sinensis, which is the base plant.

Chai tea is a popular fragrant Indian tea, with a combination of black tea, ginger and other spices, such as cardamom, fennel, cinnamon, black pepper, cloves, and potentially star anise, coriander seeds and peppercorns.

Cinnamon is proven to lower blood pressure and cholesterol. Moreover, both cinnamon and ginger can increase insulin sensitivity and reduce blood sugar levels. Black pepper, ginger, cinnamon and cloves all prevent bacterial infections and help to support proper digestion. Additionally, protein from the milk in chai tea reduces hunger, so this is an ideal option if you are looking to replace the energy you have expended during your workout.

So next time when you go for fancy tea, go for local, tapri chai .

19/05/2022

28/04/2022

Laughter is the Best Medicine. Its official when doctors prescribe nature. It's right time to introduce alternative way of pain management other than the conventional medical management.

One method for putting laughter into practice is to discuss laughter with the patient during a visit. Providers can ask, “What has made you laugh recently?” or “How often do you laugh?” Inquiring about laughter opens the door to light heartedness and also could lead to counseling on laughter and sharing the latest research with the patient.

Laughter makes you feel good. And this positive feeling remains with you even after the laughter subsides. Humor helps you keep a positive, optimistic outlook through difficult situations, disappointments, and loss.

Let's Change our perception while consulting pain management clients.