Category: Medicine

(This one is cross-posted over at Science-Based Medicine. FYI. –PalMD) If you’ve been a regular reader of SBM or denialism blog, you know that plausibility plays an important part in science-based medicine. If plausibility is discounted, clinical studies of improbable medical claims can show apparently positive results. But once pre-test probability is factored in, the…

A letter from a reader (thank you, Mr. “Smith”) got me thinking—could the fight against improbable medical claims be aided by a better knowledge of science? In another attempt to bring complicated science to the masses, today we will learn a bit about how we breathe. The first thing we need to understand is what…

As a physician, I have a lot of politically conservative colleagues. Much of this stems from our experience with the government. The influence of Medicare helps set prices, which we are not at liberty to change, and affects how we practice. On the other hand, Medicare is usually pretty good at paying its bills—except when…

I’ve written quite a bit about diabetes here and at my old blog, and I’ve explained to you how controlling blood pressure and cholesterol in diabetics prevents macrovascular disease, such as heart attack and stroke. I’ve also explained how controlling blood sugar prevents microvascular disease such as kidney failure and blindness. In type II diabetics,…

Yesterday, we looked at how real science works; today, in a repost from my old blog, we look at some really bad science. –PalMD I’ve been meaning to touch on “Morgellons disease” (a form of delusional parasitosis) for a while, but haven’t figured out how to approach it. Thankfully, others have. In the first referenced…

In my earlier post about HIV therapy (a post I strongly recommend), I wrote, “After entering a cell (never mind how for now), HIV needs to find a way to makes copies of itself, which requires DNA.” Because of some recently released data, it’s time to look at how HIV enters the cell, and to…

As I continue to fight the good fight against my first respiratory infection of the season, I will serve you a few portions of learnin’ from the old blog. –PalMD Cupping goes back millennia. In the U.S., the marks of cupping are often seen in immigrant communities, particularly those from Southeast Asia, and are often…

As I continue to fight the good fight against my first respiratory infection of the season, I will serve you a few portions of learnin’ from the old blog. –PalMD We’ve spoken a bit lately of the micro- and macrovascular complications of diabetes. Let’s see what that means in real life. One of the most…

If you’ve spent any time at all reading science and medicine blogs, you know that many of us are quite critical of the way the traditional media covers science. The economics of the business allows for fewer and fewer dedicated science and medical journalists. In the blogosphere, writers have a certain freedom—-the freedom not to…

I’m off to the west coast (of Michigan) for a few days, and if I don’t blog, I shall die…or something. So I have a few posts from my old blog to share with you. Often in the discussion of cult medicines such as homeopathy, acupuncture, and reiki, supporters fall back on “the wisdom of…