Tag Archives: medicine

Lies, Damned Lies, and Tissue Culture

Posted on August 14, 2011 by Joe

I originally wrote this in Feb 2008, and later updated it for the old Lay Science. While making sure that this website was up-to-date, it occurred to me that this post would have disappeared with the rest of the Lay … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Cycling abuse

Posted on August 8, 2011 by Joe

I stumbled upon an article in The Lancet, volume 138, issue 3554, of the 10th October 1891, which it seems has been overlooked by the internet so far. It celebrates the rise of the bicycle, but warns against its abuse … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Won’t somebody please think of the children?

Posted on July 28, 2011 by Joe

In December 2005, an article of massive importance was published in the British Medical Journal. Doctors counted up the number of children being admitted to A&E with musculoskeletal injuries (breaks and sprains — many of which would have been caused … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Appendix: Bad Science Bingo in the BMA’s “safe cycling” pages

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Joe

This is just a crude brain dump of a post that comes after the serious series — posts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven and eight. Sorry, I just can’t get over these extraordinary pages on the BMA’s website. … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: How did the BMA get bicycle helmets so wrong?

Posted on July 27, 2011 by Joe

In 1958, the UK licensed a drug for treating morning sickness. It worked very well. The studies all showed that pregnant women suffering from morning sickness received much relief with the drug. Three years later it was withdrawn, but not … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: The BMA, the BMJ, and bicycle helmet policy

Posted on July 26, 2011 by Joe

The reason I pick up the bicycle helmet theme again this week is that the BMJ is running a sidebar poll of their readers (or, more accurately, of cycling tweeters and recipients of Robert Davis’s emails ), asking whether it … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Risk compensation and bicycle helmets

Posted on July 25, 2011 by Joe

Some months ago I left a series on bicycle helmets hanging while I got distracted with other things. We had looked at what the best evidence for the efficacy of helmets in preventing injury in the event of a crash … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Second hand; unused

Posted on July 1, 2011 by Joe

Thinking about how the Cycling Embassy might go about trying to generate political will to progress cycling, I’ve been researching previous failed attempts to advance cycling in this country.  So on Amazon I snapped up a second-hand copy of an … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Passive driving

Posted on May 9, 2011 by Joe

“The ideal of the ethical man,” wrote the great Victorian scientist and liberal Thomas Henry Huxley, “is to limit his freedom of action to a sphere in which he does not interfere with the freedom of others.” At Bath Skeptics … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: @bengoldacre on bicycles

Posted on May 4, 2011 by Joe

Like my googlereader and my drafts folder, my podcast app has a frighteningly large backlog.  This evening while on random play it stumbled on an episode of Little Atoms from 2008, with Ben Goldacre, in which he talks about the … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: That’s not what I said, say scientists

Posted on April 29, 2011 by Joe

According to SCIENTISTS, “pollution is not improved by c-charge.”  (“Improved”? These scientists are so sloppy with their language.) Journalists all over the city are this week reporting that the congestion charge has not reduced air pollution problems in central London, … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Would a helmet help if hit by a car?

Posted on April 18, 2011 by Joe

The doctor’s representatives BMA and the “Road Safety” charity Brake both say “yes”.  The Automobile Association and the cyclists say “no”.  They can’t both be right.  Unless the answer is “yes and no”.  Find out how that could be so, … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: What is a bicyclist?

Posted on April 18, 2011 by Joe

A good review of a medical intervention starts by explaining the population being studied.  The Cochrane review of helmets for preventing head injuries in bicyclists explains that its population is the set of bicyclists who sustained an injury that was … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: Headline figures

Posted on April 16, 2011 by Joe

In rare events like bicyclist injuries, odds ratios can be used as an approximation of relative risk: that is, how much a medical intervention changes the risk of a specific outcome.  An odds ratio of 0.3 is interpreted as a … Continue reading →

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AWWTM: So what’s the best evidence we have on bicycle helmets?

Posted on April 15, 2011 by Joe

According to the Cochrane Collaboration — the source that most doctors will go to for their summary of the evidence — it is five studies from the 1980s and 1990s. Continue reading at At War With The Motorist…

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