[ExI] Evidence-based medicine lacks solid supporting evidence

[Dan]

On Sep 17, 2015, at 9:27 AM, William Flynn Wallace <foozler83 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Thu, Sep 17, 2015 at 10:36 AM, Dan <danust2012 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/context/evidence-based-medicine-lacks-solid-supporting-evidence
>> 
>> Regards,
>> Dan
>> 
>> ​I recall reading that you can take any physician in the world at any time in history and he has seen things that no other doctor has seen.
> 
> ​So - human variability, whether genetically, in their diet, place of living (smog city?), and so on, is so great that all a physician can do is to do what others do, which is to hope that all other factors don't matter, just as we assume that the independent variable in​ 
>> ​an experiment is all that matters between the two groups of people or whatever.

This shouldn't be an astounding point though. It's kind of like using blood pressure readings for healthy make college students not taking any powerful medications in Finland as a proxy for everyone on the planet, especially for people far differing ages, differing conditions.... In fact, as the article points out, the patient is likely to be very unlike the clinically tested population. 

And it also points out that the clinically tested population has variations within it that are often ignored. And do forth. Lots of good stuff in this article, and I agree with the use of mechanistic theories -- though, as the article admits, these have their limits too. (Actually, the article recommends having many approaches, which kind of gels with having multiple lines of support for hypotheses. Something I hope we all agree on.)

> ​Let's face it;  the state of current medical practice, while having spectacular results at times, is still quite primitive.  Any science is only as good as its measuring instruments and right now good ones are just starting to appear.  ​​And even those can be misused.  

See above. It's not merely limits now. Future tech will have limits too. It's about understanding the limits so as to draw better conclusions within them -- rather than postulating future generations will look back and laugh at our clunky devices. Surely, they will, and their heirs will do the same to them. ;)

> For example, thanks to a CT scan my physician and I know that my heart vessels are clear, but that was a the cost of giving me the equivalent of 1000 chest Xray's radiation.  Who knows what that radiation might do to me in the long run?
> 
> They don't.

I think most know enough not to use CT scans routinely and for asymptomatic patients. Then again, folks getting full body scans for the hell of it are going against that. (And sometimes discovering that they have all kinds of abnormalities that seem to have zero impact on health and longevity. Of course, if the risks of scanning were very low, then who cares? But, to my understanding, they are not low.)

Something to ease your worries: there seems to be some evidence that radiation insults can have beneficial effects. Supposedly, they stress the body causing a Herut reaction -- in similar fashion to how eating plants does the same.

Regards,

Dan
 Sample my Kindle books via:
http://www.amazon.com/Dan-Ust/e/B00J6HPX8M/

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