Rules of Thumb [View All]

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

It is human nature to deny things, and to minimize the extent of any bad habits that we have, to minimize any possible embarrassment to ourselves.

When I was in medical school, I learned things such as this:

"Whatever patients tell you they drink (i.e. 'I drink 2 beers a week'), multiply it by five."

"However little a patient says that they smoke, if they smoke at all, rounds up to one pack a day."


To explain that second one... "pack-years" in medical parlance = number of packs of cigs smoked per day (on average) times the number of years smoked. So for example if you smoked two packs a day for 30 years, you'd be a 60 pack-year smoker. By the rule of thumb above, if someone tells you they've smoked for ten years, but they only have one cigarette a day, or 3-4 cigs/day, they are a ten pack-year smoker, end of story.

Any rules of thumb taught to you to use in your dealings with others?