ABC News recently ran a story about a woman who treated her scoliosis-related back pain through yoga, fleshed out with information about yoga as a general treatment for low back pain. That might work for some people, but the framing of the story invited readers to choose yoga in lieu of medical care without considering….
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Counterfeit Equipment for Spine Surgery Spurs Lawsuits
Some sleazy California surgeons and their enablers, it seems, have pulled a General Motors: They used substandard equipment that caused, if not fatalities, at least several thousand injuries to patients undergoing spinal operations. The Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR) discovered that the doctors implanted counterfeit screws and rods manufactured in a small machine shop, into….
Continue ReadingHarmful Spine Treatment Infuse Got an Assist from the FDA
The lawsuit-generating spinal treatment Infuse was approved by the FDA in 2002, and, according to a disturbing investigative report by the Milwaukee Sentinel and MedPage Today, the feds gave it the nod even though concerns about its safety were raised and it had been tested on so few patients as to make conclusions about its….
Continue ReadingStudy Hopes to Draw Spine Surgery Guidelines
As our newsletter, “Better Care for Your Aching Back,” observed in September, back pain is the fifth most common complaint patients bring to their primary care doctors, and inappropriate treatment for back trouble is widespread. This reality is the motivator behind an effort to collect comparative results of upper spine surgical outcomes in order to….
Continue ReadingSuggested Reading—More Reasons to Be Wary of Spinal Fusion Surgery
Regular readers of this blog understand that back problems are not only common, but commonly misdiagnosed, overdiagnosed and overtreated. And that some practitioners are less than ethical in treating back issues (see our blog, “The Going Rate for Compromising a Surgeon’s Principles and Patient Safety: $16 Million.”) A recent investigative story in the Washington Post,….
Continue ReadingMedtronic Spinal Treatment Is Riskier and No Better than Bone Graft
In another example of newer-not-better, two new studies suggest that a controversial product intended to promote spinal bone growth provides no benefits over traditional spine surgery, and comes with the added risk of serious side effects. As reported on AboutLawsuits.com, the independent reviews published in the Annals of Internal Medicine (here and here) analyzed data….
Continue ReadingA Stronger Case for Less Imaging in Back Pain
Few health problems are as frustrating as back pain. Americans spend an estimated $73 billion every year seeking relief from their aching backs, and any disorder as common and intractable as that is ripe for abuse. We’ve written about the less-is-more approach to back surgery, a notion recently reinforced by a study published in the….
Continue ReadingMinding the Gap in Doctors’ Fees between Primary Care and Specialties
It’s a widely, if grumpily, accepted fact that primary care physicians spend less time with patients than either would like. There are only so many minutes in the day, and there’s always more paperwork than time to address it. No medical practitioner is more overburdened than a primary care physician, because in many health plans,….
Continue ReadingThe Going Rate for Compromising A Surgeon’s Principles and Patient Safety: $16 Million
That’s the sellout price for a spine surgeon. Give or take a few million. Like police officers, whose thin blue line separates them from “the other,” medical researchers and doctors are loath to diss their fellow professionals. But this week, the code of omerta was breached with a series of critical reports in The Spine….
Continue ReadingLaser Spine Surgery: Promises Too Good to Be True
It’s a new story but an old story too: For-profit spine surgery centers recruit patients with promises of relieving their long-standing back pain with tiny cuts and high-tech lasers. Then comes a string of malpractice lawsuits from patients crippled by the surgery. Then the journalists mount the evidence: Big profits, many operations, little scrutiny from….
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