Last week we wrote about the commercial and regulatory shortcomings concerning acetaminophen in general and Tylenol in particular. The investigative news outfit ProPublica followed up that comprehensive story with others about how the risks of Tylenol are not well understood by consumers, and how acetaminophen drugs can be made safer. Approximately 150 people die every….
Continue ReadingArchives for September 2013
Five Myths About Obamacare
Here’s another post in our series to help consumers understand the Affordable Care Act for health insurance (ACA, or “Obamacare”) for which people may begin signing up starting Tuesday. Today, we knock down some persistent myths about the law. Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) enlisted Lawrence Jacobs, professor of political science at the University of Minnesota….
Continue ReadingConsumer Group Calls for Warranties on Artificial Hips and Knees
Many car buyers are familiar with what’s known as a “lemon law”-the obligation of a car dealer to make good if the car you buy is defective. Consumers Union, the policy arm of the nonprofit that publishes Consumer Reports, is championing the idea of a lemon law-otherwise known as a warranty-for the artificial hips and….
Continue ReadingCDC Report on Antibiotic Resistance Sounds Ominous Note
Building strength through adversity is an optimistic response to difficulty that serves some people well. Unfortunately, it also applies to microbes. A bug’s ability to resist antibiotics is a long-documented problem (see our blog, “We Don’t Know Enough About Antibiotic Use in Animals”) that’s due largely to our overuse and misuse of drugs we hope….
Continue ReadingFeds Demand Stronger Warning on Opioid Labels, But Is It Enough?
Every day in the U.S., 100 people die from drug overdoses. Many drugs are abused, but as documented by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), there’s an epidemic of prescription painkiller abuse. Nearly 3 in 4 prescription drug overdoses are caused by these narcotics, known as opioid pain relievers. Since 1999, the sale….
Continue ReadingAcetaminophen Continues to Rack Up Casualties and Escape Regulatory Control
Readers of the blog are familiar with the risks of acetaminophen, the active ingredient in Tylenol. Although this widely available, over-the-counter analgesic (pain medicine) is considered to be safe when taken at recommended doses, certain ordinary uses can damage or destroy the liver. A described in a blockbuster investigative report by ProPublica.org, the FDA has….
Continue ReadingResistance to Vaccinations Spawns Outbreak of Measles
We’ve been among the consistent voices decrying the anti-vaccination movement, a misguided, misinformed, willfully ignorant campaign to encourage people not to immunize themselves or their children against widely recognized threats to public health. A story published last week by KaiserHealthNews.org and The Texas Tribune perfectly illustrates the consequences of this stupefying resistance to solid science….
Continue ReadingScary Tobacco Ads Work
If you’ve seen the TV ads, you probably responded with a mixture of horror and compassion. A woman is going through her morning routine of inserting false teeth, donning a wig, putting a speaker into a hole in her throat that she covers with a scarf. She’s a smoker whose addiction left her with the….
Continue ReadingThe Costs of Catching an Infection in the Hospital
When a patient contracts an infection in the hospital, the cost is always high, whether it’s measured by dollars or the impact to the person’s health. We’ve visited the topic many times, and the incidence of infections is a primary measure of health-care quality. A recently published study has quantified the financial cost of infections,….
Continue ReadingComplications of Robotic Surgery Are Under-Reported
By now, the problems stemming from use of the Da Vinci robotic surgical device are well known. We’ve blogged about its adverse outcomes for hysterectomies, prostate cancer, and a host of other disorders. Now, a study published in the Journal of Healthcare Quality finds that of the approximately 1 million robotic surgeries performed since 2000,….
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