How Good Medicine Can Be Bad For Your Health

[Indy51]

Very interesting public lecture by Prof Dee Mangin of University of Otago, Christchurch and McMaster University on the dangers of rigid guidelines and polypharmacy. Some very interesting statistics regarding the number of medicines most patients are taking, diabetes, statins, etc.

 

[Brunneria]

Thank you @Indy51
- very thought provoking.

 

[Winnie53]

I live in the US and in my mid-50's now. At a doctor visit last year, the nurse was surprised I wasn't taking any medications. After watching this lecture, I became curious as to how many people my age take medications...

Age 50-64.....67%
Age 65-74.....89%
Age 75+........83%

This is according to a survey conducted in 2004... http://assets.aarp.org/rgcenter/health/rx_midlife_plus.pdf

Earlier this year, a friend and I were talking about my nurse's reaction. She and her husband are perhaps a decade older than me. He's a pilot. Something concerning his heart was noted during his medical exam, so he was grounded from flying until he saw a cardiologist. When the nurse learned that neither were taking any medications, she and the doctor joked that they should take their picture, frame it, and hang it on the wall.

I'm continue to be amazed by how many diabetics are able to reduce, sometimes eliminate medications they're taking with diet changes alone. It's exciting.

 

[JohnEGreen]

I find it strange to say the least that medical professionals find it hard to believe that many can control their diabetes by diet alone when they have been insisting that T2 is caused by life style mainly diet in the first place.

 

[JasminDolly]

Very interesting public lecture by Prof Dee Mangin of University of Otago, Christchurch and McMaster University on the dangers of rigid guidelines and polypharmacy. Some very interesting statistics regarding the number of medicines most patients are taking, diabetes, statins, etc.

Thank you for posting this was so interesting!!!

 

[eddie1968]

I get two dosette boxes and take 8 separate repeat medications for other conditions as my diabetes is managed by insulin. There is a bit of reluctance now to add any more pills in my case. Years ago they would just fire tablets at you regardless of what else you take. I've noticed doctors reluctant to prescribe antibiotics now due to resistance. I am usually prescribed antibiotics as I am prone to sepsis.

 

[LucySW]

Very interesting public lecture by Prof Dee Mangin of University of Otago, Christchurch and McMaster University on the dangers of rigid guidelines and polypharmacy. Some very interesting statistics regarding the number of medicines most patients are taking, diabetes, statins, etc.

Great lecture, Indy, thanks.

 

[DavidGrahamJones]

Allen Roses, a senior executive of GlaxoSmithKline, was quoted in a national newspaper as saying more than 90% of drugs only work in 30-50% of people.

And the year was? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2003

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3299945.stm for fuller story.

 

[donnellysdogs]

I think a good GP is one that looks at alternatives to the drugs industry.. Not for their budgets but for the patient. My current GP is like this..I value her more than any GP ever.

 

[mollykins]

Thank you for posting this was so interesting!!!

I agree

 

[mollykins]

I agree very interesting.I am new to this its nice to have hope to improve your diabetes with the help from such positive people.
Thank you.

 

[Indy51]

More on polypharmacy and our over-medicated population - an interview with Dr Aseem Malhotra:

http://volteface.me/features/aseem-malhotra-interview/

 

[Winnie53]

Great article Indy51. I'm reflecting now, and asking questions. When did I recognize that pharmaceuticals are helpful, particularly for acute conditions, but that they may or may not be for chronic conditions, and worse yet, they may be damaging?

I think it happened a little bit at a time...

Marrying a man who used nutritional supplements to improve is ailing father's cognitive functioning, who from that point forward began taking nutritional supplements himself. (Now age 65, he's healthier than I am, and I'm 10 years younger).

In my early 30's, the surgeon's wife who told me she was trying different nutritional supplements and, in some cases, was getting good results for a condition we both took medication for.

Throughout my 30's, meeting people who had been prescribed a medication, for a non-life threatening condition, known to cause liver damage and/or failure in a small percentage of patients without first trying safer drugs that were equally effective. Alternately, beginning to take nutritional supplements myself, and discovering that taking a multi-vitamin, a B-complex, and vitamin C made me feel so much better, both mentally and physically.

Learning at age 39 that I now had a pre-ulcerative colitis (UC), a condition that led to my father having numerous surgeries from age 3 to 17. And at the same time, learning from my gastroenterologist that there was a diet, the Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD), that might put my pre-UC condition into remission, and he was right. It did. In sixteen years, I've only had two flares, and I can tell you what caused each, also how I got myself back into remission each time, and with no drugs.

Learning at age 54 that my primary care physician and my endocrinologist withheld from me, either knowingly or unknowingly, that I could put my type 2 diabetes into remission with the low carbohydrate/ketogenic diet described by Richard Bernstein, M.D. in his book, Dr. Bernstein's Diabetes Solution, first published in 1997.

My eyes are fully open now, thanks to Dr. Aseem Malhotra and others like him.