Right or Wrong?

July 28, 2009

When two physicians give you two different answers to the same question, one of them is right and one of them is wrong.

In these situations, what do you do? Blindly accept the advise of one or the other?

No. You become a gumshoe. You read. You investigate. You become Columbo.

I have truckloads of sympathy for those who are hoodwinked and corralled into taking medications that not only do them no good, but do them harm. My dear mother in law is one of them.

Her doctor put her on statins after she had a heart attack last year. She's fine now and doing well but if the doctor bothered to read a smattering of the scientific literature on cholesterol and women, she would know that statins are useless and cause everyone who takes them liver and neuromuscular harm.

What did Hypocrites say again? Do no what?

It's a shame really. And I feel sympathetic towards the doctors too. But when there is conflicting evidence in a particular area of medicine, don't you think that the doctors have a responsibility to know both sides? So very often they don't. They are entirely clueless to the opposing evidence.

To me this is malpractice. It's certainly wildly irresponsible and disgustingly lazy. This medical malaise is hurting and killing people everyday. Our president wants to know how to fix healthcare. How about insisting that doctors educate themselves on issues that have conflicting evidence?

Sometimes when something breaks, you need to throw the item away. There's just no repairing it. Time for a new one.

    

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