A lot of research is being done in those diseases; however there is an important barrier some doctors and researchers are facing: they have not enough cases to work with. This issue is especially relevant in those severe diseases that are not very frequent among population, like malignant brain tumours. There is not enough critical mass in a town or a city to research about malignant brain tumours; however the number of cases country-wide is significant enough as to be in the agenda of cancer researchers.

I have met few doctors and researchers who are on the frontline of fighting malignant brain tumours (astrocytoma, glioblastoma, etc.) and they say the same: “we do not have enough cases” to work with. On the other side, there are thousands of generalist oncologists out there with patients suffering from the same disease. Those doctors/oncologists are not specialised in that type of disease so that they decide to apply standard, conservative treatments that are proven to not to work as good as the sort of treatments/approaches that any specialised doctor would use. In other words, there is a lot of non-standard medicine (but proven to be useful) that is under-used just because generalist doctors feel uncomfortable about applying it to their patients, and those doctors prefer to be conservative.

I am not saying that there are good doctors or bad doctors (although there may be), what I am saying is that there are doctors who do that disease 100% of their time, and others who do it 5% of their time. Specialised oncologists get better results (less mortality, longer survival period, better quality of life, etc.) than generalist oncologists.

For the patient, health care tends to be a “black box”. The patient and his/her family believe that once the patient is within the public health system, he/she is going to be treated the same regardless the doctor or the medical centre that is treating him/her. For testicle cancer it might be the case, but for brain tumours I do not think it is.

In the USA, where the health system is private, when a medical centre gets reputation of providing better medical solutions for a type of disease, patients tend to choose that centre so it rapidly gets more cases and the research process accelerates, setting the foundation of more successful findings.

In Europe however, due to our public system’s structure, and to our “black box” mindset, when a medical centre finds some advance, patients rapidly expect to get that advance implemented in their nearest oncology centre. Patients not only expect, they assume it is going to happen. Patients are not aware that medical breakthroughs take years to be standardised all across the health system. That is a long time, a time the patient might not have to fight his disease.

What I suggest is trying to modify the European health systems (without touching their core philosophy) so that it is possible for any European citizen to choose his/her medical centre for a selected group of diseases. If a Spanish brain tumour patient decides to be operated in a –public- clinic in Marburg (Germany), so the Spanish health system cover it the same as if it was done in Spain. If a British pancreatic cancer decides to be operated in a public hospital in Málaga (Spain), so the same applies. As far as I know currently the local health systems only reimburse health treatments carried out in other countries if is because of an emergency and there was no chance to come to the original country for treatment (i.e. holydays, travelling, etc.). Unofficially –however- it is possible to carry out tricks (the Government usually closes its eyes to those tricks) and get the right to choose and get a reimbursement, but I truly feel that the correct approach is making it feasible by law.

This proposed approach would be a sort of “Erasmus program”, but for patients instead of students. It would complement the actual systems in place, enhancing them in terms of providing better health for patients, and fostering medical research.

The success of this EU program (plus the usual EU partners, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, etc.) would rely not only on the EU directive that would regulate it, but on the mass media campaign to be carried out in each country. Citizens must understand that health systems have their limits, and that the EU is working to improve them by giving more options to choose a medical centre.

Note: this post has been written in a train from Lausanne (Switzerland) to Hannover (Germany), in a happy day for me since one of my closest relatives is getting advantage of brain tumours top notch medical research, what has resulted in very encouraging outcomes.

However I do love cars and motorcycles so much… I improved my reading skills when I was a child not by reading books, but motor magazines.

So this weekend I have been to “my holy land”, i.e. The Italian Region of Bologna and Modena, where Ferrari, Lamborghini, Ducati, Maserati, Dallara, Minardi, and many other excellent manufacturers are based.

We went to:

The Ducati factory in Bologna (not visitable, but we “took a look”) and the Museum:

The Lamborghini museum and the factory (an incredibly cool experience been inside the factory watching manufacturing cars). Also at the end of the visit we could see a Lamborghini Reventon (20 units, USD 1 million each), see how happy we are on the picture!

The Ferrari museum (the factory is not visitable, unless one owns a Ferrari…) and the Fiorano circuit in Maranello. See the F40, F50, Ferrari Enzo and 25o TR (valued at USD 8 million) among others:

So today I went to Switzerland (by train, crossing the Alps) for two days and then I’ll return to Madrid.

The financial services industry in general, and specially the insurance industry, has a problem of information asymetry. It is difficult to compare products since information is opaque, or/and it is difficult to interpret that information (financial background requiered). Additionally, at the time you know there is something wrong in your policy, it is too late. Yo may discover that a life insurance does not cover driving accidents, or that a health insurance can expelled you after a certain age.

Goverments try to regulate to prevent those sort of problems. However it is imposible to regulate everything so that consumers should find alternative ways of “defending” themselves. The most popular being -of course- buzzing. For ages the financial industry is a one of buzzes coming and going. That may explain why sometimes people do not change banks even though the offers are very attractive.

Zuzzid tries to bring that sort of buzzing into the Internet. I would say it is a sort of web 2.0 model applied to insurance.

I love the idea but I think in the case of Zuzzid it is not well rounded. There are two problems:

1. Zuzzid is open to anybody. To be accurate and rigorous there should be an opinion per user. What happens now with Zuzzid is that it can be used for insurers to fight to each other. More marketing here…
2. Zuzzid belongs to an insurance company, Norwich Union, so that there is a parciality issue here.

I think the idea should be better implemented in an insurance broker’s scope, with only its clients being able to opinate. For me that formula is more accurate and rigorous, so that it is more useful for the prospective client. Additionally, since the feedback is based on products sold by the broker, the client realises the quality of the financial entities/products, and the quality of the broker that participates.

Yes, I know it is a far less ambitious approach than Zuzzid, but we all know that goods buzzes are those you know are reliable…

Tractis is Spanish, but aims a global reach. For what I have seen (I was beta tester) everything in Tractis is designed to be a global champion of contract signing. However Tractis is begining operations in Spain. Why? I would say the main reason is the electronic national identity card existing in Spain. Spain is a World’s champion in eIDs so that online contract signing is easier here. If your granmother has a eID (which may be the case easily) she can sign a contract online.

Today Tractis anounces it stops to be in Beta mode and begins operations regularly. I am looking forward to using the service. I think it would be great for dealing with associates at Crisalia Pro, and maybe even for dealing with clients.

Those news where so shocking that several months passed like in a second. One becomes very anxious and nervous so that times flies. I remember that time as the most confusing, stressful, and tiring months of my life. Probably the toughest life’s experience I have ever had. Everything becomes relative after it.

One of the things that helped me more was contacting (via Internet or not) other people with similar experiences. So now I think it is time to help others who are passing through the same situation. If you are googling the Internet searching for “Astrocytoma” or “Glioblastoma” are need some information or support, please do not hesitate in contacting me by email (franciscohm@gmail.com) or Skype (franciscohm). I will be more than happy to help.

In summary, as far as I am aware, I would say that Glioblastoma is one of the worst tumours/cancers that exist. In my naive understanding, it is not because of its intrinsic biological nature, but because of being in an organ that is literally irreplaceable. Also brain tumours have been little researched because the prevalence rate was very small. However, after science has come to an end to many previously-deadly tumours/cancer (testicle, breast, etc), and because the higher presence of waves (arguably) have increased the number of cases, a lot of medical research has been put into this disease that normally affects young people (in their thirties).

Those are very good news since one may observe a whole new range of new treatments, few of them showing already good results. So it is important to search for the best options for current patients. We are doing it with my relative and things are going well so far. We are very happy about that and looking forward to keeping it, if possible, forever!

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Hace 2 años a uno de mis familiares más cercanos le diagnosticaron un Astrocitoma, que es un tumor cerebral benigno que en la mayoría de los casos se convierte en un Glioblastoma, uno de los peores tumores malignos que existen.

Recibir ese tipo de noticias te deja deshecho. Todo se convierte en algo relativo en comparación. El nivel de fatiga, cansancio y confusión son tan grandes que te quedas en el limbo y se te pasan los meses como segundos.

Una de las cosas que más me ayudaron en aquella época fue el poder contactar a otras personas que estuvieran pasando o hubieran pasado una experiencia similar. Ahora siento que soy yo el que tiene que ayudar. Si has llegado a este post buscando cosas por Internet para tu familiar (o para ti) no dudes en contactarme mailto:franciscohm@gmail.com o por skype a franciscohm). Estaré encantado de echar una mano aportando información o aunque sólo sea dando apoyo moral.

Resumiendo diré -en mi opinión de no experto- que a pesar de que el Glioblastoma es uno de los peores tumores que existen, se está progresando significativamente. Son varias las razones para que esto haya sucedido y para que siga sucediendo. La primera es que el tumor en sí no es de lo peor, si no que lo malo es la zona en la que está (el cerebro es un órgano del que no se puede prescindir). la segunda es que ya se han conseguido curas/mejoras significativas en tumores que antiguamente eran necesariamente mortales (testículos, mama, etc), haciendo que este tumor quede un poco en evidencia, sobre todo ahora que su prevalencia -al parecer- está aumentando por el uso de móviles etc. Por último, el hecho de que este tipo de tumor afecte sobre todo a gente joven, es un aspecto importante a la hora de dedicar recursos a la investigación.

Todas estas noticias son importantes puesto que auguran la llegada de muchos nuevos tratamientos, algunos de los cuales ya están aquí y han mostrado resultados prometedores. Es importante por tanto estar al la última y ser capaces de ofrecer la mejor alternativa a nuestros familiares.. nosotros lo estamos haciendo con el nuestro y las cosas nos están yendo bien, mucho mejor de los esperado. Por ahora estamos muy contentos y esperamos que siga así, hasta que so logre una cura definitiva!

Now Santiago Calatrava is pushing his project “Spire Tower” in Chicago. It would be located just few minutes far away from where I used to live in Chicago. The Spire tower would be the tallest building in North America and of course… there are people who oppose it because they say it breaks Chicago’s skyline.

Many great buildings were severely opposed at the time they were proposed: Eiffel tower, Liberty statue, the Guggenheim museum in Bilbao, etc. The general explanation for this sort of opposition is that people are “averse to change”.

My explanation is more specific: there are people whose lives are so boring and even insignificant that the only way they find to feel important is opposing a great project such as
this one. It is their strange way of feeling loved. My personal experience is that smart, happy, self-realised people almost always support challenges such as Calatrava’s building in Chicago, because it rocks and pushes ahead a world-class city like Chicago.

Calatrava’s official webpage: http://www.calatrava.com