Dr. J.R. Paulson to offer Bucket Course “The Evolution of Health and Disease”
Contact: Joanne Bunge, 236-5231
A four-session Bucket Course offered by Grinnell Family Physician Dr. J.R. Paulson will focus on “The Evolution of Health and Disease.”
Dr. Paulson will examine how the health system is adapting to the rapid changes in healthcare and disease. He will explore whether modern medicine is keeping up.
The sessions will occur on four consecutive Wednesdays: February 15, February 22, March 1, and March 8. Each session, in the Caulkins Room at the Drake Community Library, will begin at 10 am and end at 11:30 am.
The course is open to all; a registration fee, payable at the first class, is $15. People may register for the course on the website http://www.grinnellcecbucketcourses.org beginning on February 1. Class size is limited to 100.
Dr. Paulson points out that much has changed since the days of Hippocrates, whom many credit with the beginning of western medicine. Recent breakthroughs have heightened our optimism about the power of modern medicine. The invention of CAT scans, MRI’s, and genetic engineering have sparked major diagnostic breakthroughs. The creation of a huge pharmaceutical armamentarium has allowed us to fight many diseases that in the past were often fatal. New discoveries seem just over the horizon.
Yet, Dr. Paulson maintains, “All is not well in the house of medicine. I will propose that its foundations are crumbling, its superstructures dangerously weakened, and even its direction hijacked by forces outside its walls. The house holds many dark secrets that doctors don’t want you to know, and many that they fail to acknowledge themselves.”
In the classes Paulson plans to explore this evolution: how we got here and what forces are shaping it today. In the process, he comments, “we shall seek to dethrone medicine as infallible and attempt to restore its vision as the true science and Art that it once was.”
Dr. J.R. Paulson, a longtime family practitioner in Grinnell, majored in philosophy as an undergraduate at the University of Michigan and went on to earn a Master’s degree there in science and education. After working as a public school teacher for four years, he turned to medicine, receiving his M.D. from Michigan State.
As a family practice physician and longtime director of hospice in the community, he takes a holistic and integrative approach to medicine, focusing not just on the physical but on all the elements that affect peoples’ health. He takes special interest in the relationship between spirituality and health.
Members of the sponsoring Community Education Council (CEC) include Grinnell Regional Medical Center, Grinnell College, Drake Community Library, Grinnell-Newburg School District, Grinnell Area Arts Council, Mayflower Community and Iowa Valley Community College.
For more information about the Bucket Courses, contact Joanne Bunge at 236-5321 or email her at jbunge@bungefarms.com.
