palmd | July 20, 2010You can follow me at the old-new location. Just follow this link. There I will keep you annoyed, entertained, and updated. You can also grab my new feed there.
palmd | July 19, 2010My formal ethical training began in medical school with an introduction to the basic concepts of medical ethics. This training continued as I encountered difficult cases and thought through them, often with the help of the hospital ethics committee. While I haven't continued my formal education in ethics, I've continued my own reading, and I enjoy writing on ethical conundrums.
I've been blogging now for over three years, which, in internet time, is quite a while. During that time, I've begun to take the writing itself more and more seriously. I've begun to recognize the implications of…
palmd | July 18, 2010The Midwest loves extremes. Our spring is a quick, cold bucket of water to the face, and the fall a brief but intense set of umber and auburn brush strokes on the landscape. Today is neither of those, but still, hot, and humid enough to make breathing uncomfortable. So I'm looking out the window, rather than sitting outside, and I see something heartening: a crow.
I've noticed---really noticed---the crows and blue jays this year. Several years ago, when I was a young attending physician, the hospital seemed filled with a new ailment. The victims were often elderly, had high fevers,…
palmd | July 16, 2010I shouldn't see any cases of pertussis ("whooping cough"), but I do. We have a safe, effective and affordable vaccine. But still, people are getting this disease. In the age group I see (adults), immunity has often waned, and if they haven't been revaccinated, they can get the disease and pass it on. In adults it often looks like a cold, but not in kids. Most properly vaccinated children are immune and remain so until there little airways are large enough to cope with the illness. But a certain percentage of kids either don't get vaccinated or aren't successfully vaccinated, leaving…
palmd | July 16, 2010Since the Pepsipocalypse, several excellent science writers (some of the best, really) have sought out new homes online. You really shouldn't miss them.
SciCurious: special shout out to Sci who is one of the best pseudonymous science writers out there, and if she were under her real name would probably be one of the best non-pseudonymous science writers
David Dobbs
Brian Switek: Brian is one of the new "greats", and is far too talented for his age.
Eric M Johnson
Highly Allochthonous
Alex WIld
palmd | July 15, 2010Catherine Shoichet, a reporter at CNN, is reporting on a unique (as far as I know) public health intervention. For a few bucks, a randy Switzer can have a three pack of condoms delivered by bike in one hour.
How cool is that?
palmd | July 14, 2010I credit my youngest sister for introducing me to these guys playing this piece, but it might have been my father. I've listened to several different musicians playing this, and none matches these two. None.
The vid starts in the middle, but it's still worth watching Rostropovich make the cello weep.
palmd | July 14, 2010I was a bit torn when trying to figure out how to approach this piece. A reader emailed me about an article in the Huffington Post, and there is so much wrong with it that I felt overwhelmed. My solution is to focus on a few of the problems that can help illuminate broader points.
There is a small but vocal movement of people who refuse to believe that skin cancer caused by sunlight is a significant health risk. These people tend to also believe that the risk is being purposely hyped by others, and that our current approach to skin cancer prevention is causing an epidemic of vitamin D…
palmd | July 12, 2010Bach's first solo cello suite looks deceptively simple on the page. It doesn't call for virtuosity as such, but to sound like more than an étude requires someone like Pablo Casals.
palmd | July 12, 2010Yes, this is a repost, sort of. I first put this up on denialism blog in December of 2008. For various reasons, I haven't had a chance to crank out anything fresh this weekend, but this is still a good one, and I've edited it to freshen it up a bit, so don't complain until you read it. --PalMD
It's July again, and that means I have a crop of new interns. I love new interns, because every topic is fresh, every moment a teaching moment. I'm sobered by the statistic that predicts that only about 4% of American medical grads will chose primary care, but even when I work with the…
palmd | July 8, 2010This article is going to be about sex. I promise. But first, some reflections.
Well, Pepsipocalypse continues. The Management pulled the ill-conceived PepsiCo nutrition blog, which is a Good Thing. This doesn't change my misgivings about what has happened. As many other bloggers have already stated, the Pepsi fiasco is a single, highly-public event, but there are non-public problems that are important to some bloggers, including me.
Removing the "advertorial" blog was the right thing for SEED to do. It removes a clear ethical conflict (remember, this isn't about PepsiCo, it's about…
palmd | July 7, 2010The crack SEED management team has made some significant changes on the new Pepsi nutrition blog. They have placed a small, grey band on the banner that says "Advertorial" (a word I abhor, but whatever). They have also placed the Pepsi logo everywhere and made it fairly clear that it is Pepsi content.
This is a move in the right direction as far as transparency and ethics are concerned. As I read the extensive comments being left across the blogosphere I see some that show a misunderstanding of the problem here.
The problem is not that Pepsi is "corporate" or "commercial". This is not…
palmd | July 6, 2010One of the wonderful things about blogs is their independence. Most are hosted by wordpress or blogger and there isn't much advertising or sponsorship. Notable exceptions are blog collectives, such as ScienceBlogs and the Discover Magazine blog network. These networks have significant advantages, including technical support, increased reach, and collegiality (your results may vary).
One of the potential disadvantages is advertising and sponsorship. Here at Sb, we've been very fortunate in that our content is completely independent. We control anything in the center column. The top and…
palmd | July 6, 2010First, I'd like to thank you all on commenting on the weekend's de-lurking post. I really appreciate your taking the time to leave a note. While I write what I feel like, it's nice to get an idea about what sort of things people are reading. For various reasons, I've preferred to write on diverse topics, and it turns out that this attracts readers with diverse interests.
Now down to some serious business. I'm sure that many of you remember the Simon Singh case. Simon is a well-known and well-respected science journalist in England. Last year, the British Chiropractic Association…
palmd | July 4, 2010It's worth re-reading this remarkable document from time to time, especially given that it says something very different from what many on the Right and in the Tea Party seem to think. It does, for example, give special importance to representative government; that is, in fact, one of the main purposes of the document. It does not call for a "right" to toss away any government someone disapproves of but lays out specific grievances and makes its declaration through the representatives of the people, not by mob action.
The document's wording was very carefully developed and has specific…
palmd | July 2, 2010DrugMonkey has revived a blog meme that originated with uber science writer Ed Yong. It is basically a request for readers to "de-lurk". On any blog, the majority of readers never comment, and the people who do comment tend to so over and over again.
Writers are inherently narcissistic. As bloggers we can get an idea of how many people are reading us, but not that much else.
So for the sake of the community, I'd like to ask you all, without revealing any important identifying information, who you are. Just leave a comment, even if you never have before. Don't worry about the email…
palmd | July 1, 2010In February, a young woman visited an urgent care clinic complaining of painful vaginal ulcers. The differential diagnosis of genital ulcers is interesting. Common sexually transmitted infections such as gonorrhea and chlamydia don't cause ulcers, but syphilis, herpes, chanchroid do (as do other diseases, but they are not common in the U.S.). Syphilis is typically painless, so most painful genital ulcers turn out to be herpes, and sometimes chanchroid. She revealed to the doctors that she had recently had sex with her boyfriend, a soldier who had just been vaccinated against smallpox. …
palmd | June 30, 2010
ZombiePal, thanks to Ataraxia Theatre
Scene: Harpo Studios, Chicago, IL, under heavy guard
Dramatis personae: Oprah Winfrey, talk show host; Jenny McCarthy, famous person; Erica Turner, un-dead North Sider
Oprah: Jenny, you have been such a maverick. It takes a brave person, one with great inner strength, to say things that are unpopular. How is that adorable boy of yours?
Jenny: Well, he's just great! I have him on a new diet and it's done wonders!
Oprah: That's great! I need to ask you all about it, but first, what do you say to those folks out there who say such negative things…
palmd | June 30, 2010Many of us who are involved in social media have bemoaned the sluggishness of our own professions in adopting new media. There are two notable developments in my own field that seem to be holding up.
The first is the twitter stream for the American Medical News. This is an online and print newsletter put out by the American Medical Association, but in true social media fashion, the feed is not simply a conduit for their own articles. The feed retweets frequently and tweets stories from other media outlets and blogs.
The second is a blog from my own specialty organization, the American…