More harm than good: Effexor is not effective in treating depression in children and may lead to hostility, especially in Major Depressive Disorder, suicide-related adverse events such as suicidal ideation and self-harm.
The Hutton inquiry and MMR: I missed this article in the Guardian by Will Hutton last week. He argues journalists are putting themselves under greater scrutiny in the light of the Hutton inquiry and this may make them more professional and more accountable. He cites MMR as an example of how the media gets [...]
Evaluate a representative: Docnotes has posted information about a useful evaluation form for use after a representative has visited. If you haven’t signed up to nofreelunch.org and do see reps, this might be an interesting exercise to carry out.
There is a nice list of non-rational appeals:
Testimonial ("case report")
Appeal to Authority ("Dr. _______ uses this [...]
Bad writing can lead to bad medicine: Computer prescribing and electronic notes do exist, but doctors still have to use pens and will have to do so for the forseeable future. Clare Hughes, a fifth year medical student, gives some of the background of the risks of poor hand-writing in the the BMJ. She [...]
One Man’s Medicine: Jeff Aronson has a review of a BBC radio series about drugs in the BMJ:
It seems that every broadcast dealing with drugs must have a political agenda. And that seemed to be the problem with the first programme. The second, however, vitiated this view by starting to provide a better balance between [...]
Some Reason about error:A report of a talk by James Reason about medical error. Well worth a read.
Errors are crucially opportunities for learning.
Organisations that are very resilient to slings and arrows of operational fortune have two characteristics, one
they always have chronic unease, they always think today is going to be a bad day, [...]
Sometime ago I made some mention of the inspired decision to run a Benylin advert in the break in the Who Wants to be a Millionaire Special.Well, it has just got better. A company has tried to market a cough syrup called "Tecwen Relief… One answer, one choice". Sadly, this won’t be in on [...]
Buccal midazolam errors: The West Midlands Medicines Information Service in the UK has warned of the potential dangers of confusion between two midazolam preparations in the UK. [PDF]
Oral – or more strictly buccal – midazolam is becoming an accepted option for the treatment of status epilepticus and serious tonic-clonic seizures in the community. The recent [...]
Thumbs vote for MMR safety: BBC’s Watchdog has performed a text message poll about the safety of MMR. A majority think MMR is safe, but….
1,814 members of the Watchdog panel responded to the programme’s questions on MMR. Half thought the MMR vaccine was safe and a quarter thought it unsafe. More than one-third [...]