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The Irish Medical Times Blog: July 2008

The genetics of the seven deadly sins

Scientists have been debating whether gluttony is genetic, physiological, or sociological for quite some time. Now some scientists in North Carolina are arguing that sloth is in your genes. Wake me when they get to wrath.... Read more

Alzheimer's disease drug shows promise

A new drug may be a significant improvement in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease and slow the progression of dementia, according to the Times.... Read more

Groups fight moving mental hospital to prison

Mankind has spent a long time, and only made progress of late, trying to decriminalise mental illness. Can you believe you live in a country that wanted to undo that work? At least somebody's trying to make a stand.... Read more

Nobody is talking to the patients

A New York Times article on the collapse of the doctor-patient relationship.... Read more

Scientists argue the causes of 'imitative obesity'

Having fat friends may compel you increase your calories intake, according to a new study on obesity. The authors of the study argue that choices about appearance and other major decisions are determined by the choices others around you make.... Read more

Linking neonatal ICUs in far-flung places with specialists in centres of excellence

The practice of transferring venitilated newborns to get EEGs, or sending EEG data via post or courier to specialist centres for analysis, may soon be a thing of the past.... Read more

'This is a big deal' - and other quotes from Dr Phil

Tired of all the coddling and advice your patients/friends/children require? Why not keep this page open on your computer, and hit the links as appropriate?... Read more

What to do when you hear a bad joke (or tell a good one nobody laughs at)

Here's a doctor joke from Profession Jokes. It's not very good: A man went to see his doctor because he was suffering from a miserable cold. His doctor prescribed some pills, but they didn't help. On his next visit the... Read more

Belfast scientist loses two years of research after laptops stolen

A Queens University scientist is asking thieves to return two laptops stolen from his office. They contain almost two years worth of research into the Respiratory Synsytial Virus (RSV), which is a potentially fatal illness in babies. Since it's highly... Read more

Something fishy in the South Atlantic Ocean

A small sum of money listed in the CSO's Irish Merchandise trade figures for 2006 & 2007 may be nothing at all, but to me it seems right out of the X-Files. According to the CSO's own figures, Ireland imported... Read more

Alternative medicine: a 'massive social and intellectual fraud'?

The Guardian wonders if the discovery that Radovan Karadzic re-invented himself as a altmed healer might be a good time to discredit the whole industry. And how would you like to be the guy whose wife and daughters received massages... Read more

Gardai crackdown on 'sickies'

Rogue employees hoping to pull a sickie are logging on to a website, www.doctorsnotestore.com, which promises to deliver "authentic looking doctors sick certificates, written on official stamped notepaper, within 24 hours, for 29.99 euro." The Limerick Post reports that the... Read more

They'll let anybody practise alternative medicine

Alternative medicine was dealt a credibility blow when the second-most important defendant to face trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) turned out to have practised in a private clinic for the last decade or so.... Read more

How did Oscar die?

On his deathbed, Oscar Wilde famously remarked, apropos the wallpaper in his Parisian hovel: "One of us has to go." Modern medicine takes the view that Oscar Wilde died of an ear infection and meningitis and not the classic disease... Read more

Harney is wrong about cuts to services: irishhealth.com poll

Irishhealth.com asked its registered readers if they believed Mary Harney's promise that budget cuts would not affect services for patients. Of those who responded, about 90 per cent said they did not. I want to know where the other 10... Read more

Why do dying people sometimes seek secluded, private spaces?

The blogger in Random Acts of Reality remarks about a badly assaulted man who had wedged himself into tight spot: "There are two reasons why a person wedges themselves in place like that, the first is that they think that... Read more

Scientists grow human blood vessels in mice

US scientists have grown human blood vessels in mice by implanting them with progenitor cells. Sensing a financial opportunity, I immediately went to Google to find out how to buy white mice. This is what I found. (Thanks to Medical... Read more

How far can we go with personalised medicine?

A PhD in Pharmacy talks about the "promise and the limitations of personalized medicine," on ScienceRoll.... Read more

Review confirms breast cancer self-exams have no effect on survival

There is still no evidence that monthly breast self-examination improves the chances of surviving breast cancer, but doing so does almost double the risk of undergoing biopsy, according to an update of a 2003 review on breast self-examination.... Read more

'Birthin doc' tells story of a patient's drug-free second birth

"I don't want to have the baby with my butthole up in the air," a patient tells Rural Doctoring. Thanks to Unprotected Text for the link.... Read more

Putting the elderly out of sight

Is it a coincidence that the day after I spent my lunch hour reading Daniil Ivanovich Kharm's "The Old Woman," in which an old woman visits a young man's apartment and dies, and he becomes so angry at the woman... Read more

Tummy tucks unaffected by credit crunch

Seems the credit crunch hasn’t cut numbers seeking tummy tucks. Irish women have stopped spending money on holidays and their homes, but they're spending more on themselves, according to the Belfast Telegraph. The number of Irish women undergoing tummy tucks... Read more

Are teenage mothers making long-term financial decisions by becoming pregnant?

An impassioned editorial in the LA Times has asked people to eliminate "teen pregnancy" form their vocabularies, arguing that "teenage motherhood may represent a rational long-term economic choice for poorer women." Evidence for this was quashed because it "wasn't what... Read more

Studies show concern over long-term use of bone-building drugs

A possible link between an unusual fracture pattern in the femur and long-term use of bisphosphonates has got doctors asking questions, according to the New York Times.... Read more

Cubans are very proud of their health service

Talk to any Cuban and the top three things they will mention as a source of national pride are their state-funded, universally free healthcare; the country's free education system; and their prowess at sports. When health isn't top of their... Read more

Mindless compulsive pleasure seeking

Gambling, shopping, hypersexuality, pornography, overeating. According to Brain Stimulant: "Mindless compulsive pleasure seeking sounds like it's kind of fun, but in reality it has completely destroyed some people's lives." The case against pharmaceutical companies over the link between gambling and... Read more

Forget illness prevention; try 'treatment prevention'

Financial cutbacks to the health service may hurt patients, but what if there were no patients? "From July 31st 2008 it will be illegal to be sick in any way. This covers a broad range of the population and will... Read more

Who needs illnesses when you have hospitals like these?

A chilling account of night in a paediatric emergency department, from Fiche Focal.... Read more

Beating couch-potatoism, one phone call at a time

Researchers have discovered that frequent phone calls telling people to stop watching tellybox and get off their a*se for a 10-minute walk actually works.... Read more

Are you a useful doctor?

Is being a good doctor the same as being a virtuous one? asks Deborah Kirklin in the BMJ blogs. Any medical blog that quotes Chekhov's "Ward No. 6" is worth passing along.... Read more

Pigs prevent Crohn's disease, sort of

Germans have long associated lack of hygiene with personal insults. If a German doesn't like you, he will call you a pig, or a goat. If he really doesn't like you, he will call you a goat pig. (In English,... Read more

Twins should be 'goal of IVF' - US fertility specialist

American IVF specialist Dr Norbert Gleicher has caused controversy at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology's recent conference by arguing that twins should be the goal of IVF treatment, as it is no more dangerous than two single... Read more

Raw footage of woman's last minutes in NY hospital

ABC News is providing raw footage of a woman who collapsed in a waiting area in a New York Hospital as was left for 45 minutes before a medical professional came to her aid. Warning: the video is disturbing. The... Read more

When homicide cases get bogged down

Supposing you worked in forensic medicine and a killing you thought was a recent homicide, in fact happened 2,000 years ago. How would you react? During an Irish investigation, medical examiners working the case revealed that the dense bog had... Read more

Ten healthy foods you don't eat

Add turmeric to your scrambled eggs, sprinkle cinnamon on your coffee, and a handful of other ways to add new foods to your diet.... Read more

Health tourism fears debunked

A good article, from the Times, about the effect of the new EU Directive that codifies the rights of patients to travel abroad for treatment.... Read more

What do the HSE and Mohammed Saïd al-Sahaf have in common?

The Irish Times today reported that the HSE plans to revert to devolved regional managers. Irish Medical Times ran the same story three months ago (March 18, 2008). Here's how the HSE responded to the story by our reporter, Gary... Read more