Categories
Cancer Evolution Intelligent design/creationism Medicine Science Skepticism/critical thinking Surgery

Time to get out the paper bag or Doctor Doom mask again…

Sigh. He’s baaack. Yes, that dualism-loving Energizer Bunny of antievolution nonsense, that “intelligent design” apologist neurosurgeon whose nonsense has driven me time and time again to contemplate hiding my head in a paper bag or even a Doctor Doom mask because of the shame of knowing that he is also a surgeon, that physician who […]

Categories
Cancer Clinical trials Medicine Surgery

The paradox of screening mammography and breast cancer

If there’s one thing that lay people (and, indeed, many physicians) don’t understand about screening for cancer is that it is anything but a simple matter. Intuitively, it seems that earlier detection should always be better, and it can be. However, as I explained in two lengthy posts last year, such is not always the […]

Categories
Clinical trials Medicine Surgery

When surgical dogma is challenged

From my perspective, one thing that’s always been true of surgery that has bothered me is that it is prone to dogma. I alluded to this a bit earlier this week, but, although things have definitely changed in the 20 years since I first set foot, nervously and tentatively, on the wards of the Cleveland […]

Categories
Bioethics Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery Surgery

Confidence, humility, and practicing science-based surgery

After having subjected my readers to all those posts about the antivaccination lunacy that was on display in Washington, D.C. last week, I think it’s time for a break from this topic, at least for a while if not longer. In the run-up to the “Green Our Vaccines” rally events on the antivaccinationism front were […]

Categories
Cancer Humor Medicine Surgery

Praise the colorectal surgeon!

Thanks to the ASCO meeting and meeting up with some relatives here in Chicago, I didn’t quite finish what I was going to post this morning. There have been at least a couple of abstracts presented that I wouldn’t mind blogging about; I just haven’t gotten to them yet. I also haven’t forgotten about Jenny […]