Tag: breast cancer
A holiday round in the mammography debate
There are times when the best-laid blogging plans of mice and men often go awry, and this isn’t always a bad thing. As the day on which so many Americans indulge in mass consumption of tryptophan-laden meat in order to give thanks approached, I had tentatively planned on doing an update on Stanislaw Burzynski, given that he appears to have slithered away...
Alternative medicine use and breast cancer (2012 update)
[Editor’s note: It’s a holiday here in the U.S.; consequently, here is a “rerun” from my other super not-so-secret other blog. It’s not a complete rerun. I’ve tweaked it a bit. If you don’t read my other blog, it’s new to you. If you do, it’s partially new to you. See you all next week with brand spankin’ new material. It also...
Rejecting cancer treatment: What are the consequences?
There have been several studies of people who have refused scientific treatments for cancer. The results have not been good.
The mammography wars heat up again (2012 edition)
One issue that keeps coming up time and time again for me is the issue of screening for cancer. Because I’m primarily a breast cancer surgeon in my clinical life, that means mammography, although many of the same issues come up time and time again in discussions of using prostate-specific antigen (PSA) screening for prostate cancer. Over time, my position regarding how...
Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski’s “personalized gene-targeted cancer therapy”: Can he do what he claims for cancer?
Last week, I wrote a magnum opus of a movie review of a movie about a physician and “researcher” named Stanislaw Burzynski, MD, PhD, founder of the Burzynski Clinic and Burzynski Research Institute in Houston. I refer you to my original post for details, but in brief Dr. Burzynski claimed in the 1970s to have made a major breakthrough in cancer therapy...
Death by “alternative” medicine: Who’s to blame? (Revisited)
(NOTE: There is now an addendum to this post.) (NOTE #2: The videos of Robert O. Young’s interview with Kim Tinkham have been removed, as I predicted in this post that they would be. Fortunately, I downloaded copies before he managed to do that. Part 6 appears to be still there–for now.) (NOTE #3: It was announced on the Facebook page Caring...
Oprah’s buddy Dr. Christiane Northrup and breast thermography: The opportunistic promotion of quackery
Dr. Christiane Northrup came to fame as Oprah Winfrey's resident women's health expert. Unfortunately, she's using that fame to promote the unproven breast cancer screening modality thermography during Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
The mammography wars heat up again
PRELUDE: THE PROBLEM WITH SCREENING If there’s one aspect of science-based medicine (SBM) that makes it hard, particularly for practitioners, it’s SBM’s continual requirement that we adjust what we do based on new information from science and clinical trials. It’s not easy for patients, either. To lay people, SBM’s greatest strength, its continual improvement and evolution as new evidence becomes available, can...
Avastin and metastatic breast cancer: When science-based medicine collides with FDA regulation
Not all drugs that prevent progression of cancer prolong the patient's survival. The case of Avastin and metastatic breast cancer reminds us of that simple, unfortunate fact once again.