Weekend Reading

16Nov12

Articles, posts and content of interest to the science-based reader:

From Science-Based Medicine:

• Is There a Treatment for Tinnitus?
• Eat To Save Your Life: Another Half-True Diet Book
• Scaremongering to Sell Water Filters
• Chelation is pharmacy-supported snake oil: The result of the Trial to Assess Chelation Therapy (TACT): As underwhelming as expected

From Skeptic North:

• How I lost 40 lbs doing everything wrong
• A lot of people want to suck my duct
• Alt-Med or Alt-Menace? Rachel Corradetti on Urinary Tract Infections

Other posts and links of interest:

Why have several women died under mysterious circumstances in Thailand? Is it poisoning or drug overdoses?

On pharmacy compounding: FDA Wants Two Classes Of Compounding Pharmacies from the excellent Pharmalot blog.

Suboxone (buprenorphine): one pill can kill – The post includes a lists of drugs that can kill a child with a single dose

Don’t overestimate the benefits of screening. Patients’ Expectations of Screening and Preventive Treatments

Transdermal patch “packed with homeopathic energy” may be the most idiotic product ever. Coming to a pharmacy near you.

Evidence-based medicine: More than a “coin flip” – great post from Orac on CAM therapies and typical arguments

Homeopathic cold products win the “Shonky” award in Australia:

The idea of selling water for upwards of $1000 per litre and claiming it’s medicine represents the very essence of shonkiness. But convincing anxious or desperate parents they can use it to treat their children’s ailments takes it to a whole new level. Introducing the Nature’s Way Kids Smart Natural Medicine range, with variants for colds and flu, hay fever and runny nose, pain and fever, and for calming kids down. Already feather-whipped by the TGA for making unsubstantiated claims about the uses and effectiveness of the products, the company has done nothing to temper its assertions the products might actually do something.

Remember the “Eat Alkali to cure everything” gambit? Milk and Acid-Base Balance: Proposed Hypothesis versus Scientific Evidence

What You Need To Know About The Safety Of 5-Hour Energy Drink from my buddy Dr. David Kroll, now blogging at shiny new digs at Forbes.

New Resources

A new website from Dr. David Gardner with mental health resources for pharmacists and other health professionals.

John Greiss, pharmacist and lawyer, has started blogging actively. It’s excellent and recommended.  Follow John on Twitter, too. Here’s some posts I liked:

• What Do Viagra and Tamiflu Have in Common?
• Pharmacists: The Other White Coats
• On OxyContin, It’s Time for the Generic Industry to Step Up and Step Out

Photo from flickr user Cape Cod Cyclist used under a CC licence.

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