Baa Baa, Black Sheep

Let me start off by saying that I have the utmost respect and admiration for medical doctors. They are, almost to a person, bright, skilled and caring individuals who have dedicated their lives for the benefit of their fellow man. Many, many of them deserve to be recognized as heroes – and there are countless patients who have benefited from their care who gladly echo this sentiment.

This being said, it should also be noted that these heroes, like most, have feet of clay. They almost all suffer from the same character flaw – they are conformist. They travel in a herd of consensus. They are sheep. That’s why they all wear white coats – it helps them blend into the flock.



It’s not their fault – the system that produces medical doctors is designed that way. Free thinkers don’t make it through medical school. Independent thought is considered detrimental to the well being of the herd.

The Japanese have a saying: “The nail that sticks out must be hammered down”. This is also the philosophy of most medical schools. Black sheep don’t have much of a chance of getting their medical degree.



This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It helps ensure that standards of care are followed throughout our nation as well as the rest of the world.

However, this ‘weakness’ is exploited by the parties who desire to control medicine, including the pharmaceutical industry.

The world of medicine is constantly changing. Most physicians get their news of medical advancement from drug reps and seminars sponsored by pharmaceutical industries. Trust me on this – all those medical journals you see scattered about your doctor’s office are there for show. No one actually reads them. If they did, they would be in the doctor’s crapper and not on his or her credenza.

Continuing education, for most providers, is supplied over the hot lunch brought in by a pharmaceutical rep, or at a seminar in some hot spot that’s sponsored by (you guessed it) a pharmaceutical company.

Their opinions are shaped by statistics that are generated by Big Pharm. Sociopaths lie to your face – sociopathic corporations use statistics.



Most doctors are scared to deviate from these ‘facts’, lest they be accused of straying from the ‘standard of care’ and be held liable for any poor outcomes. Colloquial evidence – results that they have seen with their own two eyes – is dismissed and discarded. Medical consensus happens very, very slowly – especially when such consensus is contrary to the interests of Big Pharm.

Take the world of vitamins, for example. People have been taking nutritional supplements for years. Up until recently, this practice has been dismissed by most medical providers. Excess vitamins were peed out of the body as soon as they were consumed. Patients were told that they were just ‘making expensive urine’ whenever they told their physicians of their supplement regime.

Over the past few years, however, physicians have made a 180 degree turn on their opinions on some supplements. Big Pharm has gotten into the supplement game by offering ‘prescription vitamins’. These prescriptives are touted as having higher potency and purity then the ones that you might by at the local Wal-Mart – even though all are approved by the FDA. Well, one thing is certain – prescription vitamins certainly cost more then the over-the-counter variety – sometimes 20 times more. Yikes.




However, physicians are now being schooled on the benefits of the prescription vitamins, and they are eagerly writing vitamin and supplement prescriptions for their patients.

Don’t believe me? Just wait until your next office visit. You will be encouraged to add a prescription fish oil supplement to your high cholesterol meds. The next time that you have blood work done, you’ll learn that you have low vitamin D and will be given a prescription for that as well. If you listen closely, you may even hear your doctor bleat as they write your vitamin prescription. BAAAHHH!



Suddenly, vitamins and nutritional supplements are ‘in’. It’s amazing how the human body only pisses out excess vitamins when they aren’t made by a big pharmaceutical company.

Please – don’t get me wrong – I am not blaming the doctors here. They are only a product of their education and environment. It’s actually a good thing that they have standards of care and practice, and that they continually enhance and evolve their education.

The bad thing is that these giant corporations exploit this system and use it to their financial advantage.

And that costs all of us a lot of money.




And, even without taking 'unauthorized' vitamins, that gets me pissed off. How about you?


***** Found this Interesting, Entertaining or Informative? Please read the complete blog at: *****
http://healthcarehullabalo.blogspot.com/

Who are you? Do you agree with me, disagree with me, or have another perspective to share?

PLEASE put your 2 cents in by leaving a comment or email me at HealthcareBlog@SystematixOnline.com



Thanks for reading!

Free Blog Counter

Submit Blog - Promote Blog


blogs jar candles allie marie

Top Stories

A Hairy Proposition

Oh, the wonders of modern pharmaceuticals!

From the most insignificant of problems, to major health issues, there seems to be a pill for everything these days, thanks to the fine folks running our pharmaceutical industry.

Recently, I heard a very sad story on the local news. A young 20-something male was faced with an embarrassing social problem. In his late teens, he started losing his hair.

Many of us have faced a similar dilemma, but few of us have had to face it at such an early age. This young man was heartbroken – how was he ever going to meet and court young ladies with a bald pate?

Fortunately, this young man happened across an advertisement for Rogaine, the miracle baldness cure from McNiel Labs. After a quick visit to his family doctor, he soon began a Rogaine regiment to combat his folliclely-challenged condition. Lo and behold – the Rogaine worked! He soon was sporting a full head of hair.

Unfortunately, that was all he was sporting.

Sadly, the young man failed to read the fine print on the Rogaine label. It seems that a potential side effect of this super shampoo is male impotence. So, even though he was now able to attract the opposite sex with his lustrous mane, he was unable to, er, close the deal, so to speak.



Bummer. All dressed up and no place to go. At this point, his story kind of sounds like a modern day O. Henry tale, doesn’t it? Kinda like ‘The Gift of the Magi’, except that the Magi has been replaced by a smiling pharmaceutical rep.


Sadly, the story doesn’t end here.

Disheartened and frustrated, the young man had a tough decision to make – Did he want to be known as ‘Curly’ or ‘Woody’?





After much contemplation, he decided that ‘Woody’ was the nickname for him. Perhaps he would never capture the heart of his dream girl with his shining tete, but at least he still would have other options (even if those other options left him blind). Besides, perhaps there were some young ladies who were Yul Brynner fans who would like his new look!



So, he stopped using the Rogaine, and waited for his hair to fall out and his best friend to wake up. But it was not to be.

Apparently, even further down in the fine print of the Rogaine label, they mentioned that the male impotence can sometimes become permanent, and this young man discovered that ‘sometimes’, for him, was now. And our little O. Henry story now begins to sound like something out of the twilight zone.




Faced with bald, flaccid future, this young man became extremely depressed. So depressed, in fact, that he decided to voluntarily dispatch himself from the planet at the age of 21.

This is a tragic tale, but a precautionary one as well. While modern medications can be lifesavers for those patients with serious or even life-threatening conditions, are they worth the risk of potentially serious side effects? Are you really willing to risk impotence just to get a fuller head of hair? Is it worth losing your large intestine just to have a clear complexion? Or risk high blood pressure in order to overcome your shyness?

Madison Avenue would have us answer ‘yes’ to these questions. Television commercials and print advertisements naturally show the up side of these medications while downplaying the potential for disaster that many of these medications represent. Drug information packets are written in language that the average person would have difficulty understanding, even if they were resolved to forge their way through all of that fine print.

However, once properly educated, I would think that most of us would answer ‘no’, especially when we are deciding whether or not to take these ‘vanity’ pharmaceuticals.

But, As Dennis Miller often said, that's just my opiniom. I may be wrong.


***** Found this Interesting, Entertaining or Informative? Please read the complete blog at: *****
http://healthcarehullabalo.blogspot.com/

Who are you? Do you agree with me, disagree with me, or have another perspective to share?

PLEASE put your 2 cents in by leaving a comment or email me at HealthcareBlog@SystematixOnline.com



Thanks for reading!

Free Blog Counter

Submit Blog - Promote Blog


blogs jar candles allie marie

Top Stories