Category: Science and Medicine
Report from the SBM Conference
On July 9th we held our first Science Based Medicine conference in Las Vegas. The event was definitely a success – we filled our room to capacity (150 attendees) and almost everyone stayed until the end. It also appeared that most attendees were actually awake, a rarity for a full-day medical conference. The Q&A session at the end was lively and interesting....
“Lifestyle nutritionists”…Mitchell and Webb strike again
Mitchell and Webb take a shot at lifestyle nutritionists. It's hilarious.
Bibliography for my Talk at TAM 7: Why Evidence-Based Medicine is not yet Science-Based Medicine
As promised at the meeting. Let me know by comment if you think I left anything out.
Functional Medicine (FM) What Is It?
Functional Medicine – What is it? After extensive searching and examination, my answer is still – only the originators of “FM” know. Or, at least one must assume they know, because so far as I can see, I certainly see nothing that distinguishes “FM” from other descriptions of sectarian and “Complementary/Alternative Medicine” practices. A difference may lie in the advocates’ assumptions to...
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July 9, 2009
Science-Based Medicine Conference
The Science-Based Medicine Conference has begun! Val is Twittering it at: http://twitter.com/drval Check it out at the tags #TAM7 and #SBM.
NIH Awards $30 Million Research Dollars To Convicted Felons: Cliff’s Notes Version
In case you’re coming late to this discussion (or have ADD), I’ve summarized Dr. Kimball Atwood’s terrific analysis of the ongoing clinical trial (TACT trial) in which convicted felons were awarded $30 million by the NIH. *** In one of the most unethical clinical trial debacles of our time, the NIH approved a research study (called the TACT Trial – Trial to...
Does popularity lead to unreliability in scientific research?
One of the major themes here on the Science-Based Medicine (SBM) blog has been about one major shortcoming of the more commonly used evidence-based medicine paradigm (EBM) that has been in ascendance as the preferred method of evaluating clinical evidence. Specifically, as Kim Atwood (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8) has pointed out before, EBM values clinical studies above all...
Medical training versus scientific training
This month I will begin my third year of medical school, after a three-year break for laboratory research. Living alternately in the worlds of med school and grad school has prompted me to reflect on differences between these training programs. [Obvious disclaimer: I have studied at a single institution, and only for five years.] I am enrolled in a dual-degree MD/PhD program. About 120 US medical schools...
Human Subjects as Political Pawns
When it comes to “alternative medicine” trials, it seems that the NIH is willing to experiment on people in ways that would be unthinkable for real biomedical research. The federal Office for Human Research Protections (OHRP) has posted a preliminary determination letter, dated May 27, 2009, addressing some of the charges we had made against the politics-driven NIH Trial to Assess Chelation...
I get mail–chiroquacktic edition
A long while back, at the original wordpress incarnation of my usual blog, I wrote a piece on the reasons that chiropractic is unscientific nonsense. Because it was popular, I resurrected it. Well, a chiropractor has come to bravely defend his field and left me a comment. A study in the May 2007 issue of the Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics...