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June 17, 2008
I love fountain pens, but I'm far to busy for the regular ritual of cleaning, filling, etc. Most of my day is spent scrawling notes or typing on a keyboard. But there is one task for which only a fountain pen will do.
I've lost a number of patients lately. Most were in hospice, all were elderly…
June 17, 2008
Back in April, a Government Accountability Office report explained how the White House Office of Management and Budget was holding up EPAâs IRIS (Integrated Risk Information System) assessments. OMB had started requiring an âinteragency reviewâ process allowing agencies that might be affected by…
June 17, 2008
Ever been frustrated by an industrial hygienist who just didn't seem to get it? The dude comes in with his air tubes, calibrators, gizmos and gadgets, but barely says a peep to the workers.  I'm not talking about the talented IH's out there---who understand that talking to the exposed…
June 16, 2008
Abel over at TerraSig dug up an interesting story about a man who was "murdered" killed rendered not-living (in the moral if not legal sense) by a "fake chiropractor" (although it's not clear to me what science separates a "real" from a "fake" chiropractor). One of the commenters wondered if lack…
June 16, 2008
In the course of reading the comments in the last several posts, I've come upon many mentions of the "placebo effect". Steve Novella has a few good posts on the placebo effect, but I'd like to take a look at the clinical view.
The placebo effect is a phenomenon often observed in clinical studies…
June 16, 2008
Updated below ( 6/18/08 )
Earlier this month I wrote in "Crashing Cranes, Deaths and the White House's Edict" about the inexcusable inaction by the US Department of Labor and OSHA to address the decades-old problem of crane-related deaths. I am not alone in my disgust at this regulatory system…
June 16, 2008
by revere, cross posted at Effect Measure
Our post on what is behind the Right Wing attack on science drew a lot of attention and numerous comments. I'd like to emphasize some key points that may have gotten lost in the details (for the details, please see the original post). We'll use climate…
June 13, 2008
Tim Russert died suddenly today. I admired his journalism, his ability to press questions that has become so rare. He didn't seem to suffer from the "two-side-ism" that has become so common in today's journalism; he realized that some issues don't have two valid opposing views. But others will…
June 13, 2008
FDA has been in the spotlight this week, and often not in a good way.
Andrew Schneider at Secret Ingredients tracks the ongoing saga of the salmonella-tainted tomatoes.
At WSJâs Health Blog, Alicia Mundy reports that Congress has pressed more money on the FDA, and Theo Francis describes Senator…
June 13, 2008
by revere (cross posted at Effect Measure)
If you want to see what difference environmental protection enforcement makes, just go to eastern Europe or the former Soviet Union. Or China. In the 1970s the US led the world in cleaning its environment and was consolidating its gains with well-staffed,…
June 12, 2008
Todayâs Washington Post includes a great article by Lyndsey Layton that contrasts European Union and U.S. chemical laws and explores how EU actions might affect products on U.S. shelves. Hereâs Laytonâs explanation of EU law and the philosophy that guides it:
From its crackdown on antitrust…
June 12, 2008
My little post on naturopathy was more controversial than I had anticipated. Some of the commenters gently (and otherwise) suggested that I should learn more about the subject, so I've been doing a little reading. Here are the basic questions: what is naturopathy, and what might it have to offer…
June 11, 2008
by revere
Originally posted at Effect MeasureÂ
You know any post that starts out . . .
Gerardo Castillo, 30 years old, had worked at the Blommer Chocolate Co. for 9 years. His family wanted him to quite ever since an explosion in a roaster killed a fellow worker and injured another. He was fearful…
June 11, 2008
Many of you were too busy trying to ace organic chemistry to know what a deus ex machina is. For those of you who managed to squeeze in a classics course, please stick with me anyway.
Deus ex machina ("god from the machine") is a literary device. In ancient Greek literature, a complicated…
June 11, 2008
DuPont was busted a couple of years ago by U.S. EPA for failing to report information about adverse health effects associated with exposure to perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA or C8), the chemical used to make Teflon and other non-stick surfaces. Now it seems that DuPont is dutifully submitting…
June 11, 2008
Last week James Delayo, New York Cityâs chief crane inspector, was arrested on the charge of taking bribes to let cranes pass inspection. According to officials, these accusations arenât directly related to the two deadly crane accidents that killed a total of nine people during the last three…
June 10, 2008
A new blogger out there stepped on the third rail. He's a senior law student, blogging about social justice, progressive politics, etc., and he found out that David Kirby, the Minister of Propaganda for the mercury militia, is coming to speak at his school.
This nascent lawyer had the temerity…
June 10, 2008
First, thank you for all the wonderful comments on yesterday's post. I never really know which posts are going to rake in the comments---my favorites are usually the quietest, and some of my quickies bring 'em in by the dozen. According to my uber-seekrit data, I've had two unique visitors to my…
June 10, 2008
Devra Davisâs book The Secret History of the War on Cancer (which we covered favorably here and here) advocates shifting our emphasis from treating cancer to preventing it â and, in particular, focusing on environmental factors implicated in the explosion of certain types of cancer. The book has…
June 9, 2008
I guess it's not just doctors watching this one---an alert reader and a fellow SciBling both picked up on this one. Apparently, in my neighboring state of Minnesota (really, check the map), home to Greg Laden, PZ Myers, and lutefisk, doctor wannabes have legislated themselves into "doctorhood".…
June 9, 2008
An attorney representing a large group of PFOA-exposed individuals sent a letter to EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson and ATSDR Director Howard Frumkin, urging them not to delay any further the release of hazard information and risk assessments on the contaminant perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA, a.k…
June 9, 2008
OSHA's Assistant Secretary Edwin Foulke flopped and fumbled during CBS's 60 Minutes "Is Enough Done to Stop Explosive Dust?" which aired last night. Correspondent Scott Pelley pressed Foulke to explain how the 50 OSHA inspectors who have been trained to identify combustible dust hazards will be…
June 6, 2008
The practice of medicine requires a careful mix of humility and confidence. Finding this balance is very tricky, as humility can become halting indecision and confidence can become reckless arrogance. Teaching these traits is a combination of drawing out a young doctor's natural strengths,…
June 6, 2008
by revere (originally posted at Effect Measure)
Does the Obama candidacy signal a return of "the sixties"? It's possible. What does that mean? Even those us who were there remember the sixties imperfectly. Not because we were permanently stoned. Memory is selective. We remember it as better than…
June 6, 2008
Bloggers have a lot of food worries:
Andrew Schneider at Secret Ingredients reports that most U.S. government agencies arenât checking meat for the antibiotic-resistant bacteria MRSA â but University of Iowa assistant professor Tara Smith (of the blog Aetiology) and her researchers found MRSA in…
June 6, 2008
By Michael Stebbins, originally published at Scientists and Engineers for America Action Fund
The House just passed the National Nanotechnology Initiative Amendments Act of 2008 by a vote of 407 to 6. H.R. 5940 reauthorizes and refines the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI), notably…
June 5, 2008
When a resident of student presents a patient with me and I help them formulate a plan, we call it "staffing" the case. Recently while I was staffing, I was presented with a patient who speaks little English, but speaks another language fluently. Unfortunately for us, this language wasn't Urdu,…
June 5, 2008
If you're around my age, you remember the disappearance of the red M&M. One day, they were just...gone. Apparently, folks worried that a red food dye not even used in M&M's caused cancer.
Well, the red ones came back, but food dyes are back in the news. The Center for Science in the…
June 5, 2008
Do you know of any cases of Parkinson's disease among workers at flavoring companies? Â
David Egilman, MD, Clinical Associate Professor, Brown University, is aware of two cases of Parkinson's disease in men in their fifties who were flavorists at a large flavorings company.  The plant…