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"Bad Medicine" - Excellent Podcast


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An excellent three episode series.  Covers so many interesting subjects, highly recommended.  :thumbsup:

 



 

Freakonomics Radio (WNYC)

 

We have a lot of ground to cover in these three episodes: medicine’s greatest hits, the biggest failures, where we are now and where we’re headed. In the interest of not turning a three-part series about bad medicine into a twenty-part series, we’re not even going to touch adjacent fields like nutrition and psychiatry. Maybe another time. Let’s start, very briefly, at the beginning.

 

  • Bad Medicine, Part 1 - The Story of 98.6
    http://freakonomics.com/podcast/bad-medicine-part-1-story-98-6/
     
    We tend to think of medicine as a science, but for most of human history it has been scientific-ish at best. In the first episode of a three-part series, we look at the grotesque mistakes produced by centuries of trial-and-error, and ask whether the new era of evidence-based medicine is the solution.
     
     
  • Bad Medicine, Part 2 - (Drug) Trials and Tribulations
    http://freakonomics.com/podcast/bad-medicine-part-2-drug-trials-tribulations-rebroadcast/
     
    How do so many ineffective and even dangerous drugs make it to market? One reason is that clinical trials are often run on “dream patients” who aren’t representative of a larger population. On the other hand, sometimes the only thing worse than being excluded from a drug trial is being included.
     
     
  • Bad Medicine, Part 3 - Death by Diagnosis    ("We thought about calling it 'The Doctor Will Kill You Now' but cooler heads prevailed")
    http://freakonomics.com/podcast/bad-medicine-part-3-death-diagnosis-rebroadcast/
     
    By some estimates, medical error is the third-leading cause of death in the U.S. How can that be? And what’s to be done? Our third and final episode in this series offers some encouraging answers.

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EXCELLENT, abcd!!! Thank you very much. I knew about the clinical trials, but there was a lot I didn't realize. What an eye-opener!!! I'm so, so glad that Freakonomics had this three-part series as part of their podcasts!
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I listened to the first one and there is some absolute gold there but at 18:40 they are promoting statin drugs. Statins are another class of drugs that are sold based on bogus science. Not sure how that jives with the general message of the podcast.

 

Looking forward to listening to the other two.

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OUTSTANDING podcast recommendation, thanks...although perhaps not a good sleep aid.  I often wonder if people two hundred years from now (assuming there are any people) will look back at the medical practices of our age and shudder in horror, just as we now look back two hundred (or even fifty) years and shudder in horror.  "What?? They did that to people??" 

 

Every age believes they're the experts, only to be viewed as fools by the next generation.

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OUTSTANDING podcast recommendation, thanks...although perhaps not a good sleep aid.  I often wonder if people two hundred years from now (assuming there are any people) will look back at the medical practices of our age and shudder in horror, just as we now look back two hundred (or even fifty) years and shudder in horror.  "What?? They did that to people??" 

 

Every age believes they're the experts, only to be viewed as fools by the next generation.

 

Very true, PhotoBug!

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[17...]

OUTSTANDING podcast recommendation, thanks...although perhaps not a good sleep aid.  I often wonder if people two hundred years from now (assuming there are any people) will look back at the medical practices of our age and shudder in horror, just as we now look back two hundred (or even fifty) years and shudder in horror.  "What?? They did that to people??" 

 

Every age believes they're the experts, only to be viewed as fools by the next generation.

 

 

So true PhotoBugSF  Thats life, and progress I guess.    :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

 

:smitten:

 

 

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[17...]

An excellent three episode series.  Covers so many interesting subjects, highly recommended.  :thumbsup:

 

 

Excellent information  thanks  :thumbsup:  :smitten:

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Very interesting podcasts!! Thanks for sharing and quite an eye-opener on many levels!!

 

In a perfect world I guess we may practice a consillient approach? Dictionary definition"the principle of convergence of evidence from independent sources that could lead to strong conclusions". Mankind may look back on today's medical practices much like the 'Six Blind Men and the Elephant' fable?  The Three Blind Men and the Elephant  ;)

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Glad everyone enjoyed it!

 

 

OUTSTANDING podcast recommendation, thanks...although perhaps not a good sleep aid.  I often wonder if people two hundred years from now (assuming there are any people) will look back at the medical practices of our age and shudder in horror, just as we now look back two hundred (or even fifty) years and shudder in horror.  "What?? They did that to people??" 

 

Every age believes they're the experts, only to be viewed as fools by the next generation.

 

Photo, that's one part of it but, to me, it's excusable if we're legitimately being fallible human beings doing the best we can with the best we have at the time.  The real travesty, as we all know only too well, is how science/medicine is being so derailed due to nefarious agendas.  It's like erecting a house of cards, trying to build something based on years of flawed, unsound foundations. 

 

Are you familiar with the work of Prof. John Ioannidis (Stanford) "Why Most Published Research Findings Are False".  Good, good guy, also excellent reading/listening, you can find him on Youtube, and maybe I'll try to throw down some links later.

 

And speaking of nefarious agendas, leads to FG's comment ...

 

 

 

I listened to the first one and there is some absolute gold there but at 18:40 they are promoting statin drugs. Statins are another class of drugs that are sold based on bogus science. Not sure how that jives with the general message of the podcast.

 

Looking forward to listening to the other two.

 

FG, that's funny, I had the exact same reaction as you, I thought, "Uh oh, now they're losing me".  But, thankfully, it was the only blunder I heard, have you listened to the rest yet?

 

 

 

 

Very interesting podcasts!! Thanks for sharing and quite an eye-opener on many levels!!

 

In a perfect world I guess we may practice a consillient approach? Dictionary definition"the principle of convergence of evidence from independent sources that could lead to strong conclusions". Mankind may look back on today's medical practices much like the 'Six Blind Men and the Elephant' fable?  The Three Blind Men and the Elephant  ;)

 

Exactly right, Harmonee.  I actually used that fable sometime ago here, trying to knock some sense into some BB armchair neurobiologists running amuck.  It fell on deaf ears, unfortunately, they *insisted* they positively, unequivocally *knew*.  (Of note, what made it even more absurd was that one of the "experts" was touching a giraffe (AD), had never even touched an elephant.  It's nuts, everyone pretending to know things they don't. 

 

By the way, check your link, lol, did you mean to throw down something else?

 

 

 

EXCELLENT, abcd!!! Thank you very much. I knew about the clinical trials, but there was a lot I didn't realize. What an eye-opener!!! I'm so, so glad that Freakonomics had this three-part series as part of their podcasts!

 

Terry, my memory's shot.  Did they speak to high blood pressure here?  If not, I heard something else on another podcast that I'll try and dig up for you because I thought of you at the time, thinking it might give you a lot of peace of mind listening to another viewpoint.

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The real travesty, as we all know only too well, is how science/medicine is being so derailed due to nefarious agendas.

 

The real travesty is the fact that the general public is blind to these nefarious agendas. I know I was. I always had this thought in the back of my head that there was something wrong based upon the way doctors would throw drugs at me without much if any thought to getting to figuring out or addressing the root cause of the issue. It was always "Here, try this drug. If that doesn't work come back and I'll give you a different one."

 

Had no idea that it was possible to have my life absolutely decimated by a common prescription drug though. I always thought everything was thoroughly tested and all major side effect would be disclosed. I always thought that if a drug was truly unsafe that the FDA wouldn't allow it to be sold. Now that I know how the drug approval process works I think everyone should be educated as to how that process works before they take prescription drugs.

 

FG, that's funny, I had the exact same reaction as you, I thought, "Uh oh, now they're losing me".  But, thankfully, it was the only blunder I heard, have you listened to the rest yet?

 

I listed to the second one last night but it was while I was working and I have a hard time assimilating any information unless I focus on that directly so I might go back and listen to it again before I listen to #3.

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abcd, no, nothing on bp. But thank you for thinking of me!! I wish I could get some peace of mind. I'm thinking I have dysautonomia. It's terrible with the constant yanking back and forth...
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Very interesting podcasts!! Thanks for sharing and quite an eye-opener on many levels!!

 

In a perfect world I guess we may practice a consillient approach? Dictionary definition"the principle of convergence of evidence from independent sources that could lead to strong conclusions". Mankind may look back on today's medical practices much like the 'Six Blind Men and the Elephant' fable?  [/url]  ;)

By the way, check your link, lol, did you mean to throw down something else?

  ::):-[ Lol...."BB armchair neurobiologists running amuck.  It fell on deaf ears".....blind eyes too? Oh!!! And my dopey link error, ha ha...But what's worse, I can't even work out how to modify it  ::) It's kind of a "cute" version and short.  https://youtu.be/qPlJWk8-b4E

 

 

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FG, I was also incredibly gullible and naive, it took a very short AD stint to startle me from my heavy slumber!

 

Terry, okay, give me some time and I'll try to find it again, I wish I'd saved it on the spot, I never learn. :(

 

Harmonee, you probably couldn't edit your post because there's an imposed time limit ... not 100% sure how long we have, maybe a couple of days or so. 

Very cute video.  Here's the graphic I posted.

 

 

 

elephant_pic.jpg

 

The Blind Men and an Elephant

Moral of the Story:

 

So oft in theologic wars

The disputants, I ween

Rail on in utter ignorance

Of what each other mean

And prate about an Elephant

Not one of them has seen!

 

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ABCD says:  <<Are you familiar with the work of Prof. John Ioannidis (Stanford) "Why Most Published Research Findings Are False".  Good, good guy, also excellent reading/listening, you can find him on Youtube, and maybe I'll try to throw down some links later.>>

Yeah, the old "p-value" fraud problem in research and academics.  Lying about statistically significant results to get 1) recognition 2) tenure and 3) grant money.  People are so damned corruptible. 

 

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