Category Archives: NEJM

Doctors Confirm 1st Law of Thermodynamics

A study just published in the New England Journal of Medicine concludes that reducing calories results in the same weight loss regardless of how caloric reduction is realized. In other words, a calorie lost from reducing fat, or carbohydrate, or protein has the same effect. “Reduced-calorie diets result in clinically meaningful weight loss regardless of…


Read the full entry

Exciting Times

That’s how Jonathan Gruber PhD a professor of economics at MIT views the domestic scene in the US today in a Perspective piece in the NEJM. What he’s excited about are the good prospects for the passage by the congress of universal health care coverage. Professor Gruber rejects the view that adding universal health care…


Read the full entry

Medicine and Inconvenient Truths

Victor Fuchs, a long time deep thinker (no sarcasm intended) about medical economics has a perspective piece in the October 23 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine that presents three “inconvenient truths” about health care. His analysis is likely to represent that which will be applied to medical care over the next several…


Read the full entry

Hypertension in the Very Old

Virtually all physicians treat their hypertensive patients who are 80 years old or more. The evidence for the effectiveness of this treatment in very old patients has up till now been lacking. The New England Journal of Medicine has published a paper, Treatment of Hypertension in Patients 80 Years of Age or Older, that shows…


Read the full entry

Medicine Undefined

The purpose of medicine is twofold. First to prolong life, ie to prevent premature death from disease. The second is to relieve pain and suffering from disease. To many medical “experts” it also appears to include the alleviation of just about anything that can cause distress of any sort. War, murder, crime, and poverty are…


Read the full entry

Money Squawks

The February issue of The ACP Internist contains an article Adding cosmetic procedures lifts internists’ sagging incomes that defines the decline in morale of our country’s most important profession. Click on the link and you can read the whole sad story and make up your mind about what’s happening to medicine. The article reflects a…


Read the full entry

The Amazing Noncollapsing US Health Care System

The above title is from another NEJM article. It’s interesting from a number of perspectives. It admits that medical care is provided to uninsured patients through a network of public and voluntary hospitals, free clinics, etc. It concludes that this safety net has prevented the collapse of the system that many have predicted over the…


Read the full entry

Physicians and Execution

The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) has an editorial with the above title. It takes the position that physicians should not participate in executions. This is hardly a surprising view; one which, I suspect, would be that of virtually all doctors in the US. It certainly is mine. So why write a piece in…


Read the full entry

Categories

twitter facebook rss