New Cholesterol Guidelines
On November 15, the American College of Cardiology and the American Heart Association released an updated guideline for the use of statins to prevent and treat atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD). The full report is available online. It has already generated a lot of controversy. The news media have characterized it as a “huge departure” from previous practice and have trumpeted that it...
“Low T”: The triumph of marketing over science
A man on TV is selling me a miracle cure that will keep me young forever. It’s called Androgel…for treating something called Low T, a pharmaceutical company–recognized condition affecting millions of men with low testosterone, previously known as getting older. —The Colbert Report, December 2012 And now for something completely different…sort of. After writing so much about the latest developments in...
A Rational Approach to Managing Acute Pain in Children
Pain is one of the most common reasons for a parent or caregiver to seek medical attention for their child. Children experience pain for a wide variety of reasons, many that are similar to if not exactly the same as causes of adult pain, but historically pediatric patients have been grossly undertreated. I am 37-years-old and, sadly, if I had undergone a...
Do vitamins prevent cancer and heart disease?
The US Preventive Services Task Force has released an update on vitamin and mineral supplements to prevent heart disease and cancer. The evidence was not good and did not support taking vitamins as "nutritional insurance."
Faith Healing: Religious Freedom vs. Child Protection
We have written a lot about people who reject science-based medicine and turn to complementary/alternative medicine (CAM), but what about people who reject the very idea of medical treatment? Faith healing is widely practiced by Christian Scientists, Pentecostalists, the Church of the First Born, the Followers of Christ, and myriad smaller sects. Many of these believers reject all medical treatment in favor...
The Burzynski Empire strikes back
You might have noticed that I was very pleased last Friday, very pleased indeed. Given the normal subject matter of this blog, in which we face a seemingly-unrelenting infiltration of pseudoscience and quackery into even the most hallowed halls of academic medicine, against which we seem to be fighting a mostly losing battle, having an opportunity to see such an excellent deconstruction...
USA Today versus Stanislaw Burzynski
This is an SBM public service announcement—with blogging! Think of it as a bonus post, and don’t forget to read Mark Crislip’s regular biweekly offering, as it’s about an article in Skeptical Inquirer that particularly irritated him—and me, as well. Because, as we all know, the world needs more Mark Crislip. I’ve made no secret of how much I despise Stanislaw Burzynski,...
Irritated by the Skeptical Inquirer. Again.
I have a confession. I have been interested in issues skeptical since high school when I came across a copy of the Zetetic at Powells. In the pre-digital era I had a complete library of Zetetic-Skeptical Inquirers (SI) that a decade ago was tossed in the recycle bin along with a similar collection of MacWorlds. I have been interested in skepticism a...
Journal of the American Dental Association Falls for Tooth Fairy Science
Another venerable scientific journal has fallen prey to “alternative” medicine research. The Journal of the American Dental Association (JADA) has joined the New England Journal of Medicine and Annals of Internal Medicine, among others, with its publication of “A pilot study of a chiropractic intervention for management of chronic myofascial temporomandibular disorder,” in the October, 2013, issue. And what “chiropractic intervention” is...