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Posts Tagged ‘medicine’

FDA monitors and regulates abuse of drugs and devices ! Who monitors abuse of investigations in medicine ?

Posted in bio ethics, Cardiology -Interventional -PCI, cardiology -Therapeutics, Infrequently asked questions in cardiology (iFAQs), tagged , , , , , on January 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »

                                            The growth of medical science has been phenomenal .It is estimated , the quantum of break throughs  and development  in the  last  50 years  is   nearly equal  to  2000 years of evolution of our  knowledge  put together.  Along with this growth , came the  unavoidable misuse , and abuse of medical science. This  is mainly due to contamination of medicine with commerce . Federal drug authority (FDA) and it’s variants  were formed in all countries to monitor the proper usage of  these technologies for the benefit of mankind. It has an authority to ban a drug or device  , if it is found to bring more injury or side effects  than benefit !

But , unfortunately there is no legal authority to ban an  an  investigation  which is  potentially  or (really  harmful )

or  used  extensively without any valid purpose .

The list of such investigation is increasing in every speciality 

In  cardiology

  • Doing a Troponin assay in patients wuth classical STEMI
  • MDCT in general population
  • Pro BNP in all suspected cardiac  failure
  • Routine C reactive protein for CAD
  • Central venous catheters for all pateints with shock.

Is there a case for banning an investigation (Like banning a drug) for the benefit of  our patients ?

Looking superficially , it  may seem  ironical. But we realise many seemingly  innocuous investigations are responsible for uncontrolled misery for many patients.

This especially true in people who throng the wellness clinic (Also called master health check up)

A incidentally high C – reactive protein   can lead on to forearm blood flow assessment of endothelial dysfunction and carotid intimal plaque  that could  lead onto carotid stents ! and life long anticoagulation , and an  excess INR and sudden cerebral bleed and death !

This is one sample story  in one particular speciality

There is a definite case for banning ( Either total or partial)  some of the questionable investigations  which are done routinely !

Just because these investigation do not have any  physical , visible , adverse reactions like a drug , it should not be allowed to be abused  .The consequence of  false positive results of these investigations could be terrible and worse than the real disese itself !

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Many cancers are curable , While common cold is not !

Posted in Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on December 19, 2008| Leave a Comment »

The irony of medicine is unlimited !  100 years of active clinical  research   failed  to find a specific cure for the rhino virus mediated common cold.In fact  US Govt stopped funding for this .

While ,   complete cure is possible  for many of the cancers, especially hematological ones !

Message 

In medicine there are thousands  of disorder  which have no cure ! 

Cancers ,  constitute  only a  fraction of  them !

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What do we mean by conservative management” ? Why it is often considered as an inferior form of treatment in Medicine ?

Posted in Cardiology - Clinical, Cardiology -Interventional -PCI, cardiology -Therapeutics, cardiology- coronary care, Infrequently asked questions in cardiology (iFAQs), tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on November 30, 2008| 3 Comments »

                                            The science of medicine has evolved over 2000 years since the stone age days.It has  currently reached  a glorious era with  cutting edge  scientifc  technology .Today  one can map the entire human genetic blue print and intervene in the  disease  even before they manifest .One can   keep dying people alive for years with multi organ transplantation. Modern medicine has taught us  how human sufferings can be prevented and life can be prolonged (with or without purpose !)

The term conservative management  conveys two different

meanings for medical professionals.

conservativ-3

For other group of physicians

 

conservative-4

                         

                             Ever since the days of  application of leech over the  head for treating migraine and a crude knife abdominotomy for emergency exit of babies from  pregnant mothers in distress  , healer’s   mind has always  perceived “something  has to be done  urgently when some body suffers”  this sort of  reaction is probably  inherited  and is related to  the primitive flight or fight response .

This may be true in  some of the emergencies but it is untrue in many of the non emergencies.

                                          Unfortunately ,  our mind  finds it difficult   to differentiate  between these  situations . With constant exposure to dramatic medical breakthroughs , modern day physician is made to believe   “Some thing  is always  better than nothing  when illness strikes. Human body is a wonderful machine which has it’s own service station ! in the form autoregulation  and the meticulous  homeostatic mechanisms. Only if the disease process overwhelms,  it needs intervention.( Typical example:In the routine viral fever , you don’t adminster Acyclovir or other antiviral  for all of them !) 

                                        The problem with early aggressive approach is,  it fails to give an oppurtunity  for the body’s natural defence forces  to respond. Further , we will  never ever know how the administered treatment is going to fare vis a viz the natural response.( With due respects to RCTs).   While the field of medicine   has  so much  evolved , our thought process,  especially  the  aspect of clinical  reasoning  has always been lagging behind .It is now considered  as inferior or even unscientific  treatment  if  some one follows a conservative approach to a problem even if  it  provides   same outcome of that of an invasive or aggressive approach ( The classical example is PCI for chronic stable angina The COURAGE study).

The other major issue is the hazards of unwarrnted  invesitigations , drugs and procedures

Classical example:No one knows how much morbidity or mortality the routine Swan ganz catheter  caused when it was rampantly used for over two decades to monitor central venous pressure .It is estimated  that in modern medicine  there are at least  few  drugs or devices  in each speciality waiting  for the same fate  as that of  the swan ganz catheter.

No body knows when it will be exposed .Our EBM will take it’s own time . . .Till that time humanity need to suffer.

This thinking is not new  The concept  “First do no harm is over 2000 years old”

hippocrates-primum-non-nocere

Questions in search of answers

 Does law of conservation of energy applicable to human body and medicine  ? 

 Can we defy death with modern medicine ?

Final message

  • Conservative management is still  a great medical concept  in many situations  and one should not allow it to die  by the whims and fancies of the modern scientific forces.
  • Whatever you do on the patent’s body  do it ,  only if it is going to helpful for him /her. If you are unsure  Whether a given  treatment  is going to help or not ask this question to an expert .
  • The widely prevailing  dogma  of aggression is always better than  non aggression  has absolutely no evidence.
  • So approach a clinical issue disease by disease ,  individual by individual.
  • Now , in this era  high tech  medicine  ,  It is lot more tougher to choose a conservative path as the pressure to do more and more  looms  larger ! It is easier to follow the crowd  than a path of your own .
  • Always remember it needs a  stronger  mind to  act according to our conscience !

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Herd behavior in medical profession

Posted in cardiology-ethics, tagged , , , , , , , , on October 31, 2008| Leave a Comment »

What is herd behavior ?

It is a behavioral pattern where in animals and humans in large numbers , tend to behave in the same way at the same time without application of mind .


Herd behavior in human societies

Herd behaviour describes how individuals in a group can act together without planned direction. The term pertains to the behaviour of animals in herds, flocks, and schools, and to human conduct during activities such as stock market bubbles and crashes, street demonstrations, sporting events, episodes of mob violence and even everyday decision making, judgement and opinion forming. This is very much applicable to medical profession also.(Ref:Wikipedia)

Herd behaviour in animals and human how they are different ?

“surprise ! surprise ! There is  very little difference  noted , according to Hamilton”

A group of animals fleeing a predator shows the nature of herd behavior. In the often cited article “Geometry For The Selfish Herd,” evolutionary biologist W. D. Hamilton said each individual group member reduces the danger to itself by moving as close as possible to the center of the fleeing group. Thus the herd appears to act as a unit in moving together, but its function emerges from the uncoordinated behavior of self-seeking individuals.

Among humans for example when panicked individuals confined to a room with two equal and equidistant exits, a majority will favor one exit while the minority will favor the other.

Medical professionals as a herd


The practicing habits of  medical professionals  move , symmetrically as a herd . When a top journal or a opinion leader utters something every one tend to move in that direction .

If a herd leader says a particular treatment is great, every one will say yes . If he says nay every one will say nay !

No one will really question the direction they move ? Unless the correction occurs from within the herd. No external forces usually are effective.Herding is also benefitial many times as rapid propogation of scientific facts needs such behavior ,but it needs constant scrutiny.

 

Herd behavior example 1 : The most  typical example is the drug prescribing pattern of anti hypertensive agents over the past half century.The movement  from diuretics to beta blocker , from beta blockers to calcium blockers and to ACE inhibitor and again to diuretic  , then to ARBs and currently shying strongly away from beta blockers, in between  have a brief encounter with alpha blockers and finally  back to diuretics.

If a  particular physician by his insight , had clinged onto  diuretics ( Away from the herd ) for over three decades he is a real exemption , although branded old timed  and unscientific , he has been the most scientific medical professional indeed !

Herd mentality example 2 : Every one says so !  so it must be true ! Hormone replacement therapy good or bad goes with the leader of the herd . 

Herd mentality example 3: Very few cardiologists will be ready to agree the fact that , simple digoxin and diuretic ,ACEI, beta blocker,  administration could be as effective as  the costly cardiac resynchronisation therapy in atleast some of patients with wide QRS cardiac failure ( As we know up to 30 %  wide QRS CHF population do not respond to CRT) 

Defying Herd mentality resulted in major break throughs in medicine

               When every one was  saying beta blocker was harmful in CHF one person from Briton defied it ( Wagenstein, and now beta blockers are the mainstay in the management of CHF! )

There are hundreds of treatment modalities popularised by such herd behavior

Who is the watch dog  , whether science is moving in the correct direction ?


Read this land mark article  how medical research can be distorted by such learned behavior  and how scientific research should not be done .

Click on the image .

 This post is not intended to hurt anyone . It  reflects , human beings are not  fully evolved  yet , in the onging  process of evolutionary biology.

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Guideline violations in cardiology practice : Every body does it , so do I !

Posted in Cardiology -Interventional -PCI, cardiology- coronary care, cardiology-ethics, tagged , , , , , , , , , on August 24, 2008| Leave a Comment »

All is not well,  that ends well !

                                       Treatment guidelines in cardiology  practice  are periodically published by ACC/AHA/ESC.These guidelines  represent the current scientific practice. They are called some times as recommendations. Medical professionals tend to adhere to this guidelines whenever possible.They are not legally binding in most of the countries.In USA some states believe it, to be legally binding.

 

The problem with these guidelines  are , they are classified as class 1 ,class 2 , class 3 recommendations.

 

Class 1, A  drug , device  or a procedure  Is definitely useful and must be prescribed.

Class 3,   A  drug , device  or a procedure  Is not useful and should not be used .

Class 2*, A  drug , device  or a procedure  may be useful  or may be harmful , and hence may be used or may not be used . (Vaguest possible guideline!)

 *Altered to convey the meaning

What are the  guideline violations that can be sued in court of law  ?

A person with established  CAD who is not been prescribed a  statin (Cholesterol lowering drug)  can be sued straight away,  even if the patient has no adverse outcome due to the nonprescription of that drug. The issue here is , the doctor  has not prescribed  a drug which has  proven benefit .The law is clear on that .Most will  agree that,  the  doctor is at fault ,  and he  is never protected  even by their  colleagues .He  can’t defend his action.

What are the medical errors that can never* be sued in court of law !

But the same doctor who opens up a totally occluding coronary artery in an asymptomatic patient(CTO -chronic total occlusion) and lands up  in a complication and the  patient dies. This could be  major guideline violation as opening a CTO in an incidentally detected , asymptomatic patient is a class 3 recommendation. Neither the physician, patient , institution  nor  the regulatory authorities bother about this even though there is strong case for censure , in reality it never happens. Number  of  experts from leading hospitals do this procedure in live work shop all over the world with full media glare, It is an irony the same  experts are only  writing  in their  guidelines  that  these procedures should not be done inappropriately.

And this medical  error ( Should we call it a  crime if it is knowingly done ! )   keeps growing as the physician never feels guilty about it .

The message here is

 A physician of a state of the art hospital,  in a scientifically advanced  country  goes scott free and guilt free  even if he openly violate the scientific guidelines and do a inappropriate procedure that result in a patient death. Mean while a small time physician in a remote place in the same country can be taken to task  for not prescribing a officially  recommended drug (By standard guidelines) .He will be labelled unscientific and unethical even if his non prescription , had not caused any untoward health outcome .

In short , in today’s modern medical practice 

 Even a  ” Minor error of  ommision”   attracts guilt and perceived fear among the physicians. Meanwhile  many  of the ” Major errors of commission”  done by professionals are rarely frowned upon and thus these  mistakes continue to perpetuate !

*There should be a strong provision in medical law to address the issue of inappropriate procedures even if the procedure has not resulted any untoward effect to the patient.

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