June 20th, 2007 by Dr. Val Jones in Expert Interviews
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There has been a lot of buzz about the new diet pill,
Alli (Orlistat). Gastro Girl and Dr. Val
decided to interview the incoming president of the American College
of Gastroenterology, Dr. Brian Fennerty, about the weight loss drug. He had lots of interesting things to say –
check out these 6 podcast links:
1. Who is a good candidate for Alli?
Answer
2. What should patients know about Alli?
Answer
3. What about oily stool?
Is that a worrisome side effect?
Answer
4. What about people with IBS?
Can they take Alli?
Answer
5. Is there a link between Alli and colon cancer?
Answer
6. What’s the bottom line about Alli?
Answer
Would you like to see more podcasts with experts on this blog? Let me know!
P.S. Want to see what another expert is saying about Alli? Check out James O. Hill, PhD’s blog post.
This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
June 20th, 2007 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs, News
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I was perusing Dr. Hsien Hsein Lei’s blog and noticed a link to a pretty interesting tool. Dr. Lei describes it as a “low tech paternity test” and it’s a probability calculator that relies on 3 traits: blood type, eye color, and ear lobe type. Yep, it’s sometimes possible to exclude certain father candidates based on these traits.
Apparently attached earlobes (that don’t hang) are a recessive trait, so if a child has unattached earlobes, both parents can’t have attached earlobes. And as far as eye color is concerned, two blue eyed parents can’t have a brown eyed child – so there’s some opportunity for exclusion there (I was interested to see that two dark brown eyed parents can have a blue eyed child, though it’s rather unlikely).
Did you know about the genetics of ear lobes? I learn something new every day.This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
June 19th, 2007 by Dr. Val Jones in News
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This was one of the strangest news items in my inbox this week. Apparently, British cattle are catching tuberculosis from the local badger population. Now, the only thing that I thought the two animals had in common was their coloring… but I guess they must hang out together with sufficient frequency to pass on TB infections.
In fact, one BBC News report suggests that farms with larger hedges had lower rates of cattle TB infections… presumably because the hedges kept the badgers from fraternizing as much with the cows. This finding provides a nice alternative to badger culling, a practice that the animal rights folks do not endorse.
But what does this mean for humans? Well, according to the CDC, cattle TB (caused by a special strain of mycobacterium – M. bovis) has been virtually eradicated in the US due to herd culling and milk pasteurization methods. Cattle TB doesn’t tend to infect the lungs, so it’s less transmissible via droplets and such. So even if you’re in England and Bessy the cow sneezes on you, you probably won’t catch TB. But if you drink Bessy’s unpasteurized milk or cheese products, you’ve got yourself a risky situation. As for badgers – they’re not very affectionate anyway, so I wouldn’t try to befriend them.This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
June 18th, 2007 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs
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My friend Dr. Rob tagged me with the “8 random facts” meme. I’m supposed to list 8 little known facts about myself, and then tag 8 other bloggers to go and do likewise. Although I’ve never participated in chain mail, I’m a sucker for a good blog meme and will bite on this one.
Eight little known things about Dr. Val…
1. I once worked for a marketing research firm that regularly sent me and a camera crew to the homes of wet vac owners to videotape their home use technique. That was some entertaining videography, I can tell you.
2. I have 3 citizenships – US, Canada, and the UK
3. My dad once unionized a group of pickle factory workers, and was fired the next day.
4. I worked as a bartender in Manhattan while I was in medical school.
5. My car was hit by a drunk driver once, so I chased him down, forced him off the road and demanded his license and registration. Probably a dangerous move, but I was really angry.
6. As a child I wanted to grow up to be a Hollywood special effects artist. I still love to watch movies like Lord of the Rings and Alien because of the special effects.
7. I was a precocious little kid – when I was 6 years old my mother’s friend asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I said, “a philanthropist.”
8. I worked as a nanny in Quebec for a summer. The kids called me the “monstre de betteraves” (the “beet monster”) because I ate so many beets from their garden. They had a pressure cooker – and the fresh beets were so sweet and tasty! How could I resist?
Ok, well those are my 8 random facts… now I will nominate 8 bloggers to give me the dirt on themselves (if they’re up to the challenge):
Resilient Mom
Sandra Foschi
Dr. Glode
Dr. Silver
Dr. Brown
Dr. Hill
Dr. Herndon
Dr. Poceta
Let’s learn a little about each other, shall we?This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
June 17th, 2007 by Dr. Val Jones in Medblogger Shout Outs
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In response to recent concerns about healthcare blogging (potential privacy violations in particular), a group of bloggers got together to create the first Healthcare Blogger Code of Ethics. All health bloggers who agree to abide by the ethical principles listed in the code will be given the HBCE seal to display on their blogs. If anyone suspects the bloggers of violating that code, they can be reported to the HBCE website for further investigation.
I think this is a great step forward for health blogs – and a good reminder to respect confidentiality, transparency, and courtesy while blogging. To request a copy of the seal for your blog, please write to: healthcare.bloggers@gmail.com
Many thanks to Dr. Rob for taking the lead on this project. Also thanks to Medi-mation who worked on the logo with me.
The 5 principles:
- Clear representation of perspective – readers
must understand the training and overall perspective of the author of a
blog. Certainly bloggers can have opinions on subjects outside of their
training, and these opinions may be true, but readers must have a place
to look on a blog to get an idea of where this author is coming from.
This also encompasses the idea of the distinction between advertisement
and content. This does not preclude anonymous blogging, but it asks that even anonymous bloggers share the professional perspective from which they are blogging.
- Confidentiality – Medical bloggers must
respect the nature of the relationship between patient and medical
professionals and the clear need for confidentiality. All discussions
of patients must be done in a way in which patients’ identity cannot be
inferred.
- Commercial Disclosure – the presence or
absence of commercial ties of the author must be made clear for the
readers. If the author is using their blog to pitch a product, it must
be clear that they are doing that. Any ties to device manufacturer
and/or pharmaceutical company ties must be clearly stated.
- Reliability of Information – citing sources when appropriate and changing inaccuracies when they are pointed out
- Courtesy – Bloggers should not engage in
personal attacks, nor should they allow their commenters to do so.
Debate and discussion of ideas is one of the major purposes of
blogging. While the ideas people hold should be criticized and even
confronted, the overall purpose is a discussion of ideas, not those who
hold ideas.
Happy blogging!This post originally appeared on Dr. Val’s blog at RevolutionHealth.com.
