Blog Entries With Tag: drug

Blog: It's all about the Bee's Knees

From: spark

Having never undergone any major surgery since I was little, wherein I had been hit by a motorcycle and thereby needed stitches, I was rather curious as to what life would be like post-being cut open.  In my search, I found two rather interesting (and somewhat relevant) articles..

The first is a news article released about an hour ago.  It details a man in Idaho who suffered 10 weeks of pain/stiffness because doctors had left a broken device in his knee during surgery.  Though the event occurred in 2007 and the device was eventually found and removed in 2008, it made news today because a lawsuit was just filed by the patient, naming the two doctors responsible for the mistake (Buoncristiani and Pletcher), the Sawtooth Orthopedics and Sports Medicine (where the two doctors practice), and St. Luke's Wood River Medical Center (where the surgery was initially performed). 

Eep. This article makes you realize that something to think about before undergoing surgery is checking up on your surgeon.  Getting recommendations might be the best way.... Just saying.

Anyways, the second article is much more interesting.  It was a humorous, personal account of life after surgery. The author, Michael Gibbons (managing editor at Aiken Standard) recounts the haze and daze that follows surgery. I found it rather well written and gives you a pretty good idea of what it would be like to come out of surgery.  I can only imagine that "drug-filled haze" would be the best way to describe it.  Anyone else have any thoughts on what it would be like (mentally) to come out of surgery?

Blog: Doris' Blog

From: dorisjdickson

The FDA wants drug manufacturers to be more cautious in the approval process of type 2 drugs as noted in this Healthday News article.  They want to know about cardiovascular risk which in and of itself is not a bad thing.

It means that more information will have to be provided to the FDA before approval is granted and that studies will have to be longer and larger, especially on older at risk patients.  This obviously means it will take longer for new drugs to reach market.  That will also mean more cost to pharmaceutical companies and a longer period before they see any return on their investment.

Now ... one question I have is are these people really at more risk by taking the drugs?  Or is the higher risk actually caused by the non-normalized targets and attainment and years at damage levels?  Are they just in really crappy condition anyway?  Or is the problem an aging population with poor eating habits, huge percentages of overweight or obese people and total inactivity? 

The bottom line is there is only one way to know ... properly geared studies of appropriate populations, not studies gear to prove the meds won't hurt people in totally out of control populations.  I'm not sure we'll ever see "proper" studies because of where most study funding seems to originate. 

Take a look at clinical trial detail ... who is paying, the target population, the goal of the trial, what they do to steer the trials/studies in the desired direction.  It's quite appalling.

Doris J. Dickson