BEAR Press Release
Dr. Matthew Brady is homegrown native of Carbon County and, because of that, he has a unique perspective on medical care, its roll in the community and what he feels medical professionals like himself owe the place they live and work in.
“Sometimes, the face of medical care in a community becomes the hospital and doctors are kind of hidden behind that,” he said as he spoke at the Carbon Country Business Expansion and Retention general board meeting on May 9. “Physicians are excited to be a part of the community and be involved in it.”
He said it feels like sometimes the hospital (which handles much of the business part of his own practice) employees are hidden behind a curtain, although not intentionally so. He stated that often when the community sets up boards and committees, it is forgotten that the hospital has a wealth of people who would like to be involved in those kinds of things.
“We, as doctors, are excited to be involved in the community in any way we can in an independent role,” he said.
Brady, who did his undergraduate work at Utah State University, going on after that to the University of Utah for Medical School, then spending four years of residency and special training in South Bend, Indiana, wasn’t sure when he began his medical career if he would end up back where he was raised.
“I wanted to practice rural family medicine and in places, like along the Wasatch Front, that was difficult because everything is so specialized,” he said. “It just happened to be that if I wanted to practice all the kinds of things I wanted to do; this was the best place for that.”
He explained that working in family medicine is varied and interesting.
“The favorite thing I do is just working with families and helping them,” he stated. “I like to deliver a baby, take care of the baby afterward and then later be considered part of that family unit where they can call on me when they need help.”
He said he loves a challenge and the biggest ones come particularly from older, Medicare-type patients who have major health situations.
“The problems are complex in those cases, but there is something nice about the mental gymnastics that go along with helping a patient in ICU and working to get them better,” he said.
He then spoke at length about preventative care and said that with every age group there are things that doctors need to look out for. Some of that has to do with genetics and what has gone on in the family’s history. He said that as a person’s age changes, doctors look at certain things that are more common in a patient’s age group.
“Prevention is part of the game of trying to catch the things that happen before they become a real problem,” he said. “When you have a 40 year old that has a heart attack or the 35 year old that has a stroke, many times that could have been prevented with proper preventive care.”
Being a true family doctor, however, means more that just looking at the physical health of a patient because there are so many mitigating factors that can affect that state of being.
“Poverty, divorce, substance abuse, obesity, depression and anxiety, are all things we see daily in the local community,” he said. “These are things we are always dealing with.”
A lot of that has to do with family relationships. He stated that while it is a simple concept, the idea that families that eat together, stay together is very important to family medical care and health.
“Families that come together is a proven idea that in our day and age, and we seem to be getting farther and farther away from that,” he explained. “More time together in close proximity to each other makes for better family relationships.”
He explained that for children, it is particularly important because it provides a sense of security, family bonding and also an increased sense of belonging. It also means better nutrition as well.
“Something as simple as having dinner together every night has profound effects on families,” he stated. “Another thing about doing this is that kids between nine and 14 years old that eat dinner with their families tend to eat better quality foods. There tends do be more fruit on the table, more veggies on the table, less soda and they eat less fried food. The resultant benefit is that it helps fight some of that battle against obesity that we are facing.”
He said one study that was done showed that teens who eat between five and seven family meals each week are twice as likely to report A’s and B’s in school.
“So, there is not only a nutritional benefit, but an educational one as well,” stated Brady.
He said another study shows that teens that eat regular meals at home also have more emotional strength and stability as well. They are more likely to be well adjusted, have better manners, better communication skills and just “generally happier,” he said.
“Emotional issues are critical issues in this day and age,” he stated. “You don’t need to be in the medical field to realize what is happening in our society to understand that.”
Brady also touched on sleep disruption. He said that sometimes your body can adjust to switching up with work schedules where one works at night and sleeps during the day.
“But, what the body does not adjust very well is when one stays awake at night and then tries to stay awake during the day too,” he explained. “This can cause lower levels of happiness overall, create feelings of loneliness and that can lead to depression creeping in.”
This is a hotbed issue because it has a lot to do with screen time, primarily into the night hours, which can cause circadian rhythm problems during the day. He laid some of the concerns on why this is happening on the doorstep of social media, which also has other side problems such as cyber bullying.
“People hide behind their screen name and they can say anything they want to,” he exclaimed. “And it seems kids just have to take it. This makes it so children are always anxious about things and it just kind of snowballs.”
He said so many young people aren’t really sleeping at night because they are on social media and they are anxious about what is going on there. He also pointed out that unrealistic portrayals of people appear on that platform. Often, people use beauty shots of themselves or things that make them more than they are. Kids see that and they have a hard time because they begin to believe that everyone is better than they are. Adults even do the same thing.
“This leads people to believe their life is not as good as someone else,” he stated. “This leads to increased envy, jealousy and hatred.”
He said after a while, the unacceptable that is posted becomes acceptable unless someone puts a stop to it. The recent laundry detergent packet challenge in which some people got very sick is a good example of that.
“It is interesting that even though most parents know the dangers of social media and understand a lot of it, they go ahead and help their kids to set up accounts (anyway),” Brady stated. “Then often parents use control from a master phone to monitor what the kids are doing and can shut apps on and off. The problem with this is when you do that your child will hate you. They will think you are the devil. But, it does give a parent a chance to see what is going on there.”
There is also a difference between how these things affect boys and how they affect girls. He said females are seemingly more affected by what happens on social media than boys are. But, boys are more affected by the gaming on the Internet, with the violence, anxiety and insomnia that many studies have shown increases over time with excessive play.
Turning to another societal problem, he discussed Oxycodone. He said that if one looks at the number of prescriptions for such drugs now as compared to years ago, it is way down, partially due to the new generation of physicians that are now entering practice. He said the standing laws need to be applied to those who continue to be suppliers in any community and make sure punishment for over prescribing should be adequate.
The alternative to some of the problems is to have the right kinds of community infrastructure in place to help kids. He said there needs to be recreational activities and programs for kids to keep youth involved in healthy types of activities.