William Heisel

<p>When does it make sense to tamper with a time-released medication? If the drug is a controlled substance, like the painkiller <a href="http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/concern/oxycodone.html">OxyContin</a&gt;, the answer is: never.</p><p>Doing so damages the time-released properties of the drug and can lead to a massive dose all at once. This is what makes OxyContin such a great high for people who crush it, and such a long, painful addiction for them, too.</p>

<p>It's a common complaint among police officers. In the wake of television shows like CSI, the public expects too much. They think that cops can lift a 30-year-old fingerprint off a Pabst Blue Ribbon bottle found at the bottom of a lake just by running it through the portable 30-PBR-H2O scanner the CSI team members carry in their Thermoses. </p><p>That type of technology just doesn't exist, police are fond of saying. And even some of the high-tech stuff that does exist is only accessible by the elite officers of the major metropolitan departments and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. </p>

<p>The <a href="http://www.chcd.org/">Center for Healthcare Decisions</a> has given itself a tough task. Its staff tries to bring together people from different economic brackets and get them to talk in very specific terms about all facets of health care. </p>

<p>Matthew William Wasserman of Katy, Texas, found a unique way to treat a female patient's back: "a sensory examination of the genital area."</p><p>That was according to the Texas Medical Board.</p><p>Now, Wasserman had only been out of medical residency for three years when this happened, and he did not have a lot of women in his graduating class at <a href="http://www.bcm.edu/ortho/class2003.htm">Baylor Medical College</a>. Still, one has to assume that most doctors know the basics of anatomy, male or female.</p>

<p>Anyone who has driven the highways around Los Angeles has seen the giant billboards with a chubby man stuffing a giant piece of cake in his mouth next to the words "Dieting Sucks." It's a promo for a plastic surgery practice that promises to use Lap-band surgery to cure overweight patients.</p>

<p>Anyone who has helped a friend or family member undergo cancer treatment knows the fear and frustration that can consume a patient's life. There are new, experimental treatments being touted every year, many of them only available outside of the United States.</p>

<p>Journalist. Santa Monica City Councilman. Music Producer. Entrepreneur. <a href="http://www.bobbyshriver.com/red.php">Bobby Shriver</a> has worn a lot of hats, some of them simultaneously. Now, while working as a councilman, he runs <a href="http://www.joinred.com/Home.aspx">(RED)</a&gt;, a company he created with Bono to fund the purchase and distribution of medications to fight HIV and AIDS in Africa. I reached him at his office in Santa Monica. </p><p>Here is a recap of our conversation. It has been edited for space and clarity. </p>

<p>The Record in Hackensack, New Jersey, awoke to its worst nightmare recently when one of its biggest advertisers pulled all of its ads. </p><p>The reason?</p>

<p>Father William Cleary helped set up a Catholic parish in Satellite Town, one of the growing suburbs of Lagos, Nigeria, in 1987. The 73-year-old served there until July 2008 and saw the country undergo massive societal, cultural and political changes while struggling to overcome stubborn public health threats from poor sanitation, a malarial climate and a reluctance to face head-on the threat of <a href="http://www.apin.harvard.edu/AIDS_in_Nigeria.html">AIDS</a>.</p&gt;

<p>President Barack Obama is searching for a new surgeon general. He might consider screening the resumes of doctors a little lower in the federal ranks. </p>