Category: Science and Medicine
California Acupuncturists Don’t Need to Know English!
English proficiency is not a necessary precursor to becoming a contributing citizen in California’s economy and should not be used by the Board to discriminate against talented and skilled individuals who seek to provide high-quality acupuncture services in California. — State Senators Curren D. Price Jr. and Darrell Steinberg, letter to the California Acupuncture Board, March 22, 2013. To appreciate the recklessness...
The Trojan Horse called Integrative Medicine arrives at another medical school
Medicine is a collaborative practice. Hospitals are the best example, where dozens of different health professionals work cooperatively, sharing responsibilities for patient care. Teamwork is essential, and that’s why health professionals obtain a large part of their education on the job, in teaching (academic) hospitals. The only way that all of these different professions are able to work together effectively is that...
Survey Says… Infectious Disease Docs and CAM
Surveys are evidently a popular way to get a paper published. Put “complementary alternative medicine survey” into Pubmed and get 2,353 hits. I would have trouble coming up with a hundred groups about whom I would be interested in their use of SCAMs, but I tend to be a lumper rather than a splitter. But if you want to know about SCAM...
A Different Perspective: Placebo, SCAM, and Advertising
Summertime, time, time Child, the living’s easy. Fish are jumping out And the handicap, Lord Handicaps high, Lord so high ~ Janis Joplin It is summer. Time for the kids and the outside, not the computer. What follows is a summertime blog entry, for which I admit to feeling guilty for the comparatively little time I have spent on it, but as...
Irlen Syndrome
Is Irlen syndrome real? Probably not, and likely represents yet another form of zombie alternative medicine, immune to science and evidence and almost impossible to stop.
“Postnatal depression blood test breakthrough” or Churnalism?
“Postnatal depression blood test breakthrough” proclaimed the headline. The UK Guardian article then declared: British doctors reveal ‘extremely important’ research that could help tens of thousands of women at risk. Here it comes. Readers were going to be fed a press release generated by the study’s authors and forwarded undigested by the media but disguised as writings of a journalist. If only...
The Overuse of Antibiotics for Viral Infections in Children
“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.” -H. L. Mencken As I sit in an apartment full of unpacked boxes and grumpy children, only a few days removed from driving 1,600 miles to a 3rd floor walk-up and a better life just outside of Boston, I find the task of writing a post somewhat daunting....
Yoga Woo
Yoga is an increasingly popular form of exercise in the US. According to Yoga Journal more than 20 million Americans use yoga as their form of exercise. As a form of exercise yoga is fairly straightforward, involving stretching and holding poses that strengthen muscles. It also carries the generic benefits of any exercise in terms of calorie-burning and cardiovascular health. Yoga, however,...
Religion and SCAM
I do not worry much about being dead although the process of getting there gives me pause. I have witnessed a few unpleasant deaths and I hope to never see the Grim Reaper coming my way. One of the more awful and pointless deaths occurred early in my career. I had a patient with hepatitis C and cirrhosis. He had low platelets,...
Researching SBM Online
The internet is a fabulous resource of information. It is one of those technological innovations for which you soon can no longer imagine how you lived without it. I certainly cannot imagine a project like science-based medicine prior to the web. The web, however, is also a tremendous source of misinformation, opinion, and ideology. Also the volume of information, good and bad,...