While I am a nurse and have worked in the medical field for over 40 years, I certainly can appreciate your point of view. You are so right about the US approach to everything--a "team" with everyone having their own expertise and often not working in conjunction with each other. It really takes someone who is highly invested in their own issues to do diligent research to make sure they know their options in treatment. So many patients are either too trusting or too intimidated to speak up regarding their treatment options. You are also correct about medications; a smart cardiologist once told my husband that "all medication is really a poison" and that the "benefits" had to override the side effects to make them worth taking. This doc was highly against statins (they were very new then) and encouraged lifestyle changes as the "cure" for high cholesterol. While we tried the "seaweed and bark" (joking) diet plan, my husband's cholesterol problem was more genetic than purely dietary and the endocrinologist that finally ordered a statin for him really did save his life. It is a combination of things in the end. It is the desire to live a better quality of life. My nurse friend's father took her non-medical sister in the ambulance with him during his heart attack because he knew she would let him smoke one last cigarette on the way! As for me, after one A-fib experience that lasted 6 weeks before I could safely get cardioversion, I have done everything on the list to reduce my chances of reoccurrence except change my age! No caffeine, chocolate, alcohol, heavy meals; exercise daily as I did before, lost 10 pounds (even though I wasn't overweight), sleep improvement with attention to the position I sleep in. I take the meds and hope to heaven they work and so far I have no side effects, luckily! We all will die of something as you said, so it is quality of life in the time we have left that matters! As my husband said years ago after his heart attack--when he quit smoking cold turkey and began exercising and eating more healthy foods, "I'm not willing to die for a pork chop!" I loved your comments; unfortunately, Americans are much more willing to want a pill/treatment for their "condition" than to do the things they can do for themselves.