Health EquityIf the risk of cancer, heart disease or another debilitating disease became real tomorrow, I ask patients what they wish they would had done today
Updated Oct. 14, 2026, 8:00 a.m. ET
Years ago, as a young internal-medicine doctor at Massachusetts General Hospital, I was called to answer a “code blue.” In the room, I found a man in his 70s, whose heart had stopped.
For 20 minutes, we pressed on his chest and pushed medicines, but despite our best efforts, we could not revive him. I later learned from his daughter that he had struggled with controlling high cholesterol, high blood pressure and Type 2 diabetes — all conditions which he had been diagnosed with years earlier but for which he had not sought ongoing medical care.