TSR Med Students' Society Part III

Quacks.

Poke people with acupuncture needles in places that aren't in the "energy pathways" or whatever. Like literally poking someone with a needle lol.

I've personally seen a guy come in with a pneumothorax thanks to his acupuncturist!

I stand corrected, I read an article in New Scientist years ago. I trust a scientific journal more though. What's your opinion on chiropractors?

Yah, this was only published this month. Good lil article. On Science Direct

If clicking joints was useful, teachers would never have tried to stop you clicking your fingers in primary school. What's the difference between a chiropractor and an osteopath anyway? (As you can tell, I may have successfully skived every CAM session so far).

badtimes.

I take your point - but then how many conventional drugs do we use that we don't have mechanisms for? GA, virtually the whole antidepressent pharmacopia is uncertain in terms of mechanism. We don't really know how many things work, but we still routinely use them on patients, without explaination or justification. If we cut use on the basis of lack of conviction, then the BNF would have to be vastly reduced.

No idea. It came up in MedSoc, my GP couldn't even tell me the difference. Presumably, very little.

Is it necessarily bad to click your fingers? I do it all the time and a surgeon recently told me it was bad for me and that I'd make a rubbish surgeon if I continued to do it. He was a bit of an arse though.

badtimes.

I take your point - but then how many conventional drugs do we use that we don't have mechanisms for? GA, virtually the whole antidepressent pharmacopia is uncertain in terms of mechanism. We don't really know how many things work, but we still routinely use them on patients, without explaination or justification. If we cut use on the basis of lack of conviction, then the BNF would have to be vastly reduced.

badtimes.

I take your point - but then how many conventional drugs do we use that we don't have mechanisms for? GA, virtually the whole antidepressent pharmacopia is uncertain in terms of mechanism. We don't really know how many things work, but we still routinely use them on patients, without explaination or justification. If we cut use on the basis of lack of conviction, then the BNF would have to be vastly reduced.

I don't know... Is the theory that the noise is bubbles in your synovial fluid popping actually true or utter bull?

I seen in a recent paper that antidepressants only have the same effect as a placebo...

It's not about deciphering a mechanism per se, it's more about studying the efficacy of drugs. Trials establishing whether a drug works don't necessarily require a mechanism, they need statistical significance.

It's not harmful and it is gas in your synovial fluids being compressed when you say hyperextend your finger. This raises the pressure in the fluid and forces the gas to form bubbles, that pop. Like a mini-"bends" going on in your finger.

I just hyperextended my fingers in an attempt to test this, and subluxed one of them. That was a stupid idea...

That's a ridiculously generic statement though. Whilst I'd agree that most AD's in mild depression have no effect whatsoever, once you get into moderate and severe depression I don't think you can argue that they don't work, and even then it's dependent on what drug (and class) you're actually talking about.

If clicking joints was useful, teachers would never have tried to stop you clicking your fingers in primary school. What's the difference between a chiropractor and an osteopath anyway? (As you can tell, I may have successfully skived every CAM session so far).

On of the assessments for evidence of causality must include biologically plausible mechanism of action. Otherwise we could just dish out whatever we wanted without studies as potentially everything probably has a statistical effect somewhere. If you shot all the people in a A+E waiting room - there would be no 4 hour breaches on that day, fantastic.

Statistical significance isn't that easy to attain.

There are plenty of drugs out there without a satisfactory mechanism of action, but the vast majority have gone through rigorous clinical trials with large sample sizes to establish statistical significance. Trials need to show that the drugs work, they don't need to come up with a concrete mechanism. It's more difficult to prove that an ineffective drug works that it is to come up with a plausible biological hypothesis for the mechanism.

AFAIK Osteopathy involves 'manipulating the bones of the skull'.

AFAIK Osteopathy involves 'manipulating the bones of the skull'.

And kudos to the quacktitioner hatin' in here.