10 Reasons We Want Other Doctors Like Dr. Drauzio Varella

Doctor Drauzio Varella is what you might call a restless mind. In the good sense. At 75 years old, he is one of those people who are always involved with new projects. He has already written 16 books, commanded countless TV spots, worked as a volunteer in prisons. Lately, he has dedicated himself, among other things, to his social media channels, where he publishes dozens of posts dedicated to what is perhaps his greatest mission: to talk about medical topics in a language that everyone understands and to demystify topics related to health, at a time when rumors and false medical information circulate on the Internet with impressive speed.

In this post, the awesome.club presents 10 reasons for you to admire Dr. Drauzio’s life and work. Follow with us.

In 1965, while still a medical student at USP, Drauzio was one of the founders of the Objetivo school, together with Professor João Carlos Di Gênio, the leader and name most associated with the group, which also includes university uni. In the beginning, the Objective was just a short course aimed at preparing for the medical entrance exam.

Drauzio does not credit this change in lifestyle to any kind of conviction linked to health. He says it just happened. “I was doing an internship in the United States and I felt bad about those super sugary pies I ate there”, he said in an interview. Back in Brazil, he went a month without eating sugar and realized that he could live well like that.

Anyone who has run or runs street events knows that the marathon, with its 42 kilometers, is not a challenge for everyone. It requires focus on training and a lot of preparation. And Doctor Drauzio guarantees that this preparation and this discipline help him to stay focused and in an enviable physical shape for his 75 years.

7. But he only started running at age 50

(showing that it’s never too late to start)

It was 1992 and Drauzio was already 49 years old when, walking through the center of São Paulo, he met a former schoolmate, at that point, a little out of shape, who said to him:

“You are going to be 50, the age at which decay begins.”

At that moment, the doctor tells that he decided that, the following year, he would run the New York Marathon and would not feel decayed. The story is told in the book Correr, released in 2015.

Since then, there have been several participations in marathons, such as those in Porto Alegre, Tokyo (Japan), Blumenau, Jerusalem (Israel) and, perhaps the most important, the legendary Boston Marathon (USA). To participate in this race, the athlete needs to prove that he has run the marathon below a certain time.

The singer has participated together with Drauzio in some marathons around the world. In the interview above, they chat about their love for racing.

5. Was a smoker for 19 years

(showing that it’s never too late to stop)

“I started smoking when I was 17, when I went to parties with my cousins”, he says in an interview. “I told myself I would smoke just a little while and then I would stop. And, in this joke, it took me 19 years. The detachment process, according to him, took a long time. He remembers working at the cancer hospital with a cigarette in his pocket. “When I told my patients to stop, they would look in my pocket. I had no credibility.”

One of Drauzio’s passions is literature. In several interviews and videos, he talks about the importance of reading. This passion for reading most likely contributed to him also becoming a renowned writer, working concepts and information about medicine (in addition to his life experiences) in a simple and accessible language for the general public. In all, there were 16 works, from the first, Estação Carandiru (1999) to the most recent, Word of a Doctor (2016), which deals with themes related to discoveries in medicine and healthy living.

Of course, anyone who knows Drauzio’s work knows that we are talking about his debut book, Estação Carandiru, a best seller that sold around 460,000 copies and won, in 2000, the Jabuti Prize, the most important in Brazilian literature. The book is an account of the period in which Drauzio worked as a volunteer in the famous São Paulo prison, caring for prisoners with HIV. The work was turned into a film in 2003. In the film, he is played by actor Luiz Carlos Vasconcelos.

An oncologist trained at USP, Drauzio worked for a long time in a cancer treatment clinic that he maintained with his brother Antonio Fernando, also a doctor, in São Paulo. And it was precisely during this period that he had one of the saddest experiences of his life, following his brother’s fight against lung cancer. As experts on the subject, both already had a good idea of ​​how the disease would develop and what its outcome would be. Fernando died in 1991. The story is told in the excellent book Por um Fio, from 2004.

If you read a text signed by the other Drauzio (especially if it’s not about health) be suspicious. A classic case is the text What is a relationship for?what not written by the doctor🇧🇷 “I die of shame when a friend or acquaintance approaches me to praise one of those texts I didn’t write”, he says in this interview.

Another comment attributed to the doctor (and which was denied by him) associates thyroid cancer with dental x-rays and mammograms. “Modern mammography devices are super targeted to the breast. Tooth too. But they invent this nonsense and put it in the mouths of those who think they have credibility. A person who says this kind of thing should be prosecuted because these people have to pay for the evil they do and they are harming the population ”, he declared in this video.

And you, have you read any texts by Drauzio Varella? Do you follow your health tips? Tell us!