Clinical Decision-Making: Part II
How do doctors make clinical decisions to arrive at a diagnosis? Part 2 of a 3-part series.
Clinical Decision Making: Part I
How do doctors make clinical decisions to arrive at a diagnosis? Part 1 of a 3-part series.
Doctors and Dying
“I intend to live forever. So far, so good.” – Steven Wright The humor in many of comedian Steven Wright’s famous one-liners is that they are simultaneously familiar and absurd. At some level we all know that we are going to die, but as long as we are still alive (or a loved-one is alive) we can cling to the irrational hope,...
SBM e-Books
[NEW POSTS JUST BELOW THIS POST] I am happy to announce that Science-Based Medicine has published three e-Books: Science-Based Medicine’s Guide to Naturopathy Kindle | iBooks | Nook Science-Based Medicine’s Guide to Miscellaneous CAM Kindle | iBooks | Nook Science-Based Medicine’s Guide to Homeopathy Kindle | iBooks | Nook
Mouse Model of Sepsis Challenged
A recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences calls into question the standard mouse model of sepsis, trauma, and infection. The research is an excellent example of how proper science investigates its own methods. Mouse and other animal models are essential to biomedical research. The goal is to find a specific animal model of a human disease...
Dynamic Neural Retraining
Snake oil often resides on the apparent cutting edge of medical advance. This is a marketing strategy – exploiting the media hype that often precedes actual scientific advances (even ones that don’t eventually pan out). The slogan of this approach could be, “Turning tomorrow’s possible cures into today’s pseudoscientific snake oil.” The strategy works because, to the average person, the claims will...
Are You Ready For the Oz Manifesto
“Medicine is a very religious experience. I have my religion and you have yours. It becomes difficult for us to agree on what we think works, since so much of it is in the eye of the beholder. Data is rarely clean. You find the arguments that support your data, and it’s my fact versus your fact.” – Mehmet Oz The above...
Pandemrix and Narcolepsy
Pandemrix has been implicated in inducing narcolepsy in a small number of patients in Scandinavian countries. The mechanism by which this could occur very well may have been found.
The Placebo Narrative
Science journalist Sharon Begley wrote a recent piece in The Saturday Evening Post about Placebo Power. The piece, while generally better than the typical popular writing on placebos, still falls into the standard placebo narrative that is ubiquitous in the mainstream media. The article is virtually identical to a dozen other articles I have read on placebo effects in the popular press,...
Alternative Arthritis Treatments
A recent report commissioned by Arthritis Research UK reviewed 25 so-called “alternative” therapies for arthritis. They found, not surprisingly that there is little evidence to support most the studied treatments. “There’s either no evidence that they’re effective or there’s some evidence that they are not effective. Says lead author, Dr Gareth Jones. It is important to note that we are not just talking...