Two new things first, an article on the Welfare Reform Bill and Atos in the BMJ – should we really entrust Atos to reassess all people currently recieving Disability Living Allowance? I don’t think so, and here’s why. And a column for Inside Health about medical records and why they come with many perils. The […]

Common Wheel, in Maryhill. Article in the Guardian here.

Inside Health – on bad-for-you high street test kits for gluten intolerance and BMJ article – do you need your telomeres tested – nah.  

  http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1675692   History of benzodiazepine dependence http://www.benzo.org.uk/amisc/lader.pdf   Tramadol dependence http://www.jfponline.com/Pages.asp?AID=1849   Bendodiazapine addiction and effevicness http://www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mentalhealthinfoforall/treatments/benzodiazepines.aspx   NICE and anxiety and benzodiazepines   http://www.nice.org.uk/usingguidance/optimalpracticereviewrecommendationreminders/optimal_practice_review_recommendation_reminders_detail.jsp?o=92   NICE and insomnia http://www.nice.org.uk/niceMedia/pdf/21pressreleaseinsomnia.pdf   All party group on involuntary tranquiliser addiction http://www.appgita.com/index.php/objectives/   Appropriate prescribing http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11767867   http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11044870   Off label prescribing by experts http://pb.rcpsych.org/content/35/3/84.abstract   Benzodiazepine […]

Free link here

Radio 4, the evidence for cough mixtures and placebo effects. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b019rqcq#synopsis UKspends 532 million annually on winter cold remedies http://oxygen.mintel.com/sinatra/oxygen/display/id=479764 Cochrane review of OTC cough medicines http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18253996 Deaths in children using OTC cough  remedies http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17218934 MHRA safety advice 2010 http://www.mhra.gov.uk/Safetyinformation/Safetywarningsalertsandrecalls/Safetywarningsandmessagesformedicines/CON038908 MHRA advice to use honey in children with cough http://www.mhra.gov.uk/home/groups/comms-po/documents/websiteresources/con038905.pdf Journal of the Royal Society […]

Free link to BMJ article here

Free link to BMJ article  here 

Radio 4 Inside Health today – these are the references I used for the column.CPR on television – miracles and misinformation NEJM 1996 http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199606133342406 Survival in cancer patients undergoing in-hospital cardiopulmonary resuscitation: A meta-analysis, Resuscitation, 2006 <http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0300957206001328#foot1> The Influence of the Probability of Survival on Patients’ Preferences Regarding Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation – New England Journal of […]

The Which? investigation into nutritional therapists is ably reported here, on DC’s webpage. The Alliance for Natural Therapies responds by saying that ” Although Dr McCartney’s presence on the panel was presumably to advise on the medical diagnoses involved in the investigation, medical doctors in the UK receive minimal training in nutrition as part of their medical […]