A premature infant is born with a form of severe lung injury that carries a 20% chance of survival. Her physician decides to throw a medical “Hail Mary” and try an untested adult technique to bypass the injured lungs. The infant survives, and after a few more tries, the physician realizes that the survival rate may be as high as 80% with this new treatment. Does he know enough that the treatment should become standard practice, or is a randomized clinical trial required?
bioethics
Is it time to re-examine concerns surrounding the intersection of patient privacy and a loved one seeking elected office?
To get us closer to an answer to that question, consider this example: The American Academy of Pediatrics’ recent strategy that makes it acceptable for doctors – as a last resort – to refuse to allow families who decline vaccination to be a part of their practice.
Under the guise of improving care, it can be argued that electronic medical records end up diminishing it. Here's how.
From a security standpoint, the only thing that matters is that our soldiers are effective at killing people and breaking things. Does acupuncture help accomplish that? We presented one opinion last week. Now, here's a second viewpoint on the matter.
A new study thinks the answer is yes. But is it? The old adage "if it ain’t broke, then don't fix it” comes to mind.
No, I'm not speaking of Jonathan Goldsmith, the guy who just pretended to be The Most Interesting Man in the World. I'm speaking of the real deal, my grandfather, Dimitri Berezow -- a man who survived Stalin and Hitler, cheated death on multiple occasions, and went on to live the American dream. His was an impossibly unique story – one that seems too extraordinary to be true (and yet is) – capped with a cautionary tale about modern healthcare.
Before conducting any clinical trial – which is a nice way of saying "human medical experiment" – doctors and scientists first have to demonstrate that there's sufficient biomedical evidence to justify doing it. But a new study suggests that more than half of clinical trials don't meet this essential standard.
A 1% increase in suicide-related search terms resulted in 54 additional suicides in the United States. Do search engines like Google or social media outlets like Facebook have any responsibility to monitor the mental health of their users?
A case report of 22-month-old conjoined twins evaluated and operated on last year at Massachusetts General Hospital was published in today’s New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). The staff and family faced impossible choices requiring a bioethics committee's input.
Scientists are not above hyping data to make themselves look good. Contrary to popular wisdom, studies funded by industry were no likelier to have "spin" than studies that were not funded by industry.
A young man who recently received a lung transplant, following a terrible case of pneumonia that caused his lungs to collapse, has died. He made national headlines because his petition to receive new lungs was initially rejected because he had smoked marijuana.