Wednesday, May 27, 2015

Dentists (again)

Here's the latest in the bizarre world of children's dentistry.  I can think of  only one reason a dentist would be able to get away with this degree of cruelty and for so long.

Brandi Motley exposed Florida dentist Howard Schneider about his children's practice | Daily Mail Online

Whenever I see a story about torture with people standing around doing nothing but watch somebody scream it says one word to me.  Versed.  Want to bet these drugged up looking children were given a little "sedative"?  I'd like to see what gave this dentist the idea that this much pain and suffering were OK.  Did he really do this without "anesthesia"?  Are they talking about "without novacaine/articaine" or without anything?    Versed is sometimes called anesthesia (it isn't, Versed does nothing to alleviate pain) and sometimes called a "sedative". (it isn't in non medical parlance)

Unfortunately this exhibition of depraved indifference has become quite common since Versed.  The medical/dental providers have discovered that they can torture with impunity because most of the time, the patient won't remember it.  Watch the video if you want to see how people, even innocent children are treated while they are on Versed.  I don't KNOW that the child was "sedated" but I'm thinking the kids would have ratted out this dentist a long time ago if they had remembered the mistreatment.

Wednesday, May 13, 2015

Supreme Court Death Penalty Case Focuses on Versed/Midazolam

The Supreme Court is going to weigh in on Versed as a lethal injection drug.  Due to several "botched" death penalty cases, the convicts and their lawyers are going to argue that the use of Midazolam constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, because the individual isn't unconscious at all and is cognizant of pain and suffering.

Again I ask, why, if this drug is not good enough for lethal injection, why is it good enough for patients?  Why are our medical workers using this torture drug?  Why are they so ADAMANT that they are allowed to use it, knowing that one of the problems with it is that the patient feels all of the pain associated with the procedure.  God help you if you don't get amnesia of the horror.  Anyway here is yet another article.


Supreme Court Death Penalty Case Focuses on Lethal Injection Drug - US News

Here are the documents from the pharma people on Versed/Midazolam 

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In light of this, why are the medical workers still using Versed on their patients?  Remember that this is only ONE of the reasons this drug should be banned for use on humans.

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

Vaccines Ineffective

We have had an outbreak of Whooping cough here which I have previously spoken of.  The outbreak consisted of vaccinated children, which the health board was not forthcoming about.  Here is their spin on just why it was only vaccinated kids who got sick.  So is this a ploy to force people to get more vaccines and help out big pharma?  Or are they going to do some REAL INVESTIGATIONS into vaccines to find out if we are all merely shoveling money at big pharma for dubious benefit?

Whooping Cough Epidemic Hit Vaccinated Kids Hard | Medpage Today


Whooping Cough Epidemic Hit Vaccinated Kids Hard

Researchers found Tdap vaccine effectiveness fell off after 2 to 4 years.

Action Points

The 2012 pertussis epidemic in Washington state affected a surprising number of adolescents who were vaccinated on schedule, researchers reported.
Compared with over 1,200 controls, 450 adolescent cases of pertussis showed similar rates of having received five rounds of their vaccinations on the recommended schedule, but the vaccine's effectiveness rate dropped dramatically over time from 73% within 1 year to as low as 34% after 2 to 4 years from the last dose, Anna M. Acosta, MD, of the CDC, and colleagues, reported in Pediatrics.
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The pertussis vaccine and its schedule have been through several changes in the past 2 decades. Through 1997, children received five doses of a whole-cell vaccination. After 1997, those five doses were switched to an acellular pertussis vaccine. And in 2005, a sixth dose of the tetanus, diphtheria, acellular pertussis (Tdap) vaccine was recommended.
In 2012, Washington state experienced a pertussis epidemic with 2,520 cases reported by June of that year, a 1,300% increase over the previous year.
Acosta's team noticed an unexpectedly high rate of infection among older children and adolescents -- those potentially exposed to either a mix of whole-cell and acellular vaccines, or acellular vaccines only.
For this study, the researchers looked at Washington residents born from 1993 to 2000 in the seven Washington counties that reported more than 50 cases, and matched the adolescent pertussis cases with three controls based on vaccination records.
The participants were grouped by vaccination years, 1993-1997 for children who received five total vaccines in a mix of whole-cell or acellular form, or 1998-2000 for children who received five total vaccines in the acellular form only.
In order to be considered "complete and on schedule" for vaccination, the child had to have records indicating five total doses of diphtheria-tetanus toxoids-pertussis (DTP) or DTaP parsed as doses one-three before turning 1-year-old, dose four on or after the first birthday, and dose five on or after the fourth birthday, but before turning 7.
Within the seven counties, 959 cases of adolescent pertussis were reported. These cases represented 83% of all adolescent cases in the state, and 73% of all healthcare providers reporting cases of adolescent pertussis.
The primary analysis by Acosta's group included 450 cases and 1,246 age- and provider-matched controls with a median age of 14.
In the cohort, only 74% of cases and 75% of controls had proof of five vaccination doses, and only 60% of cases and 58% of controls received the five doses on schedule.
Tdap was given to 81% of the cases, and 90% of the controls, and overall, 84% of the cohort had been vaccinated again at 11 to 12 years of age.
The researchers estimated that Tdap demonstrated vaccine effectiveness at a rate of 63.9% (95% CI 49.7%-74.1%).
When stratified by time since Tdap vaccination, the effectiveness fell dramatically over time:
  • Within 12 months, it was 73.1% (95% CI 60.3-81.8)
  • At 12 to 23 months, the effectiveness rate dropped to 54.9% (95% CI 32.4-70.0)
  • By 24 to 47 months, vaccine effectiveness was 34.2% (95% CI -0.03 to -58)
When Acosta's group performed subgroup analysis limited to confirmed cases of pertussis -- those with on-schedule only vaccinations -- or by excluding those with suspected cases, the results weren't much different from the findings in the primary analysis.
In the mixed group, 386 cases and 1,076 controls, the overall vaccine effectiveness was 51.5% (95% CI 26.1-68.1). But, the authors wrote, a direct comparison of the mixed group and the acellular only group wasn't possible due to differences in the age and time since vaccination between groups (P<0 .0001="" p="">
Although they could only confirm the vaccine brands, Boostrix by GlaxoSmithKline or Adacel by Sanofi, in 76% of study participants, the researchers found that Adacel was used more often in adolescents who caught pertussis (P=0.05), even though Adacel was used in only 17% of cases compared with 59% of cases vaccinated with Boostrix.
And regardless of vaccine group, Boostrix demonstrated slightly higher effectiveness when compared with Adacel. The estimated vaccine effectiveness for Boostrix was 60.1% (95% CI 47.7-69.6), and 48.8% (95% CI 28.8-63.2) for Adacel.
The study authors hazarded a few guesses as to why vaccine effectiveness fell short. One explanation could be suboptimal, post-vaccination, cell-mediated immunity with the acellular vaccine. Another could be that the vaccine prevented symptoms, but not infection and transmission. Also, there could have been genetic mutations in the pertussis strains that were not accounted for in the vaccine.
Study limitations include small sample size in comparison with the overall epidemic.

Sunday, May 3, 2015

Medical Jargon...A Doctors Take On The Same Problem *I* Have

I have had a real problem with the mangling of the English language and the (deliberate, in my case) misinterpretation of certain words.  Words like "amnesia", "pain relief", "relaxing", awake and alert", etc.  We all think we know what they mean, but even the simple word "no" has a different meaning to medical workers.  Here is a doctor who feels the same way *I* do about words.  Words mean something.

In My Humble Opinion



Posted: 26 Apr 2015 06:48 PM PDT
It's metoprolol.

m-e-t-o-p-r-o-l-o-l

The nurse on the other end of the phone sighs as she tolerates my tirade regarding pronunciation.  They all know that I am particular about such things.  For metoprolol is neither metoclopramide or metalazone, and the difference could be life altering.

I live in a world of words.  Trained in a language created to parse pertinent details.  Dysarthria or dysphagia?  Paroxysmal nocturnal dyspnea, dyspnea on exertion, or orthopnea?

Each variant a spectrum of flavor.  A morsel chewed, swallowed, and digested into its basic parts to be rattled off in staccato sentences between physicians.  A meaning conveyed to bring like minds to similar conclusions.   A common language among colleagues to convey a story, to solve a mystery, to make a plan of attack.

And my patients words carry similar weight.  The accent on a particular syllable drawing significance unconsciously to a hidden meaning.  An atypical descriptor pushing the diagnostic engine toward a nefarious path.  The absence of content, words carelessly unspoken.

My patient's future becomes precariously perched on such ambiguities.  My ability to interpret separates durable medical care from chaos.

So you will have to excuse me if I occasionally get caught on words.  If I become stuck on pronunciation or am a stickler about meaning.

I gently correct the cardiologist as we pass in the hall.

It's Rothberg not Rothschild.  R-o-t-h-b-e-r-g.   

And she died two nights ago.