Given that insurers use backdoor access to your data (and the law has been unable to keep up, to prevent it), you may want to pay cash before you purchase your next bag of chips or condoms. And you ought to think twice when completing forms seeking demographic data on your race, or when you make a formal name change.
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Some activists are claiming that a "cocktail" of harmless chemicals is somehow doing something greater than the individual harmless chemicals can. These people don't just deny chemistry, toxicology and biology. They deny simple arithmetic.
Enrollment in the humanities is collapsing. Why? Probably because (1) there's a widespread belief that humanities degrees should be avoided; (2) the humanities generate too much nonsensical research; and (3) the humanities, and academia in general, are politically biased.
Rather than be critical of a study that produced unsurprising results, they can instead be leveraged to help address the problem. That can be done by family members using the findings to engage hospital personnel, in order to get their assistance in making sleep more of a priority for loved-ones under their care.
1. Jamie Wells, MD, testified at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last week in favor of more transparency in science. The debate over putting an end to "secret science" and "sue-and-settle" agreements is solely a political one, but that has not prevented some scientists from circling the wagons defending a lack of transparency at the agency.
Covering some 40,000 square miles with an average elevation of 13,000 feet, the Atacama is located mostly in Chile. But its outer regions stretch into nearby Peru, Bolivia and Argentina. What's more, it's home to the driest spot on Earth.
When ideology not medical reasoning guides infant feeding policy, nobody wins.
Trial lawyers are cheering that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in California ordered EPA to finalize its proposed ban on chlorpyrifos but the science is even less settled than the court case is. If you are not familiar with American law, the 9th is the most overturned appeals court by the Supreme Court of the United States, because their rulings are often overtly political, and therefore not grounded in evidence.
Those who oppose vaccinations represent a form of tyranny, which occurs when a vocal minority overrides a complacent majority. Therefore, logic dictates that it's time to be less complacent.
Another study, this time with female patients experiencing heart attacks, suggests female physicians have better survival outcomes than their male peers. What does this mean for pay inequity?
Diabetes is not one monolithic disease. A new study shows that age of onset, and duration, can make a big difference in the presence and effect of diabetes' frequent companion: cardiovascular disease.
With drastic shifts taking place in the medical profession, those weighing whether to enter it have had to grapple with two major issues: immense student debt and choice of career specialty. While NYU hopes that waiving tuition for its medical students will encourage them to join the thinning ranks of family-focused medicine, our veteran medical expert is skeptical.
Gender disparity can and does occur. A study of the outcome of a heart attack based on both the gender of the patient and physician tries to make a case for outcomes disparities attributable to gender. It casts no light and is deeply flawed.
When does repeating research studies surpass confirming known findings, for the purposes of validating legitimacy, to entering the world of the redundant and wasteful? When does more become less?
A vitamin allergy? Sounds strange, but some people are really allergic to Vitamin B12, which is necessary for all cells in the human body. What's going on? There is a hint in an alternate name for B12 - cyanocobalamin. The allergy to B12 is really an allergy to cobalt.
Results of a study about soccer and the effects that "heading" the ball has on the brain delivered one key message: women's brain matter appears to be more sensitive than men's. While this may be true, it's important that we be somewhat cautious in making too much of this, given the many limitations of the study.
Obstetrical Violence refers to the coerced treatment of a mother during childbirth, without an informed, voluntary consent. But the coercion is by the State, not a physician. And the words will inflict unnecessary violence on the doctor-patient relationship.
There are signs that the devastating opioid crisis we're experiencing here is spreading to other nations – including the United Kingdom. Germany had the closest rates to those in the U.S., while in the U.K. doses per million people, per day, more than tripled.
Probability and odds play a large role in explaining the results of medical studies. Yet, they are not the same, and knowing how to understand odds will make it easier to separate the signal from the noise.
Aging at home rather than in a nursing home can be more satisfying for individuals and their family and may reduce the cost of care. But what to do when Mom and Dad are not at the top of their game? Passive monitoring will play an increasingly larger role.
The pain relief counter in your pharmacy can be a confusing place ... enough so to give you a headache. But actually, it can all be very simple. There are four over-the-counter painkillers, some of which can be taken together and some of which can't. Here's the scoop, presented in a way that's easy to swallow.
GM crop adoption has been facilitated in developing countries through the development of biosafety frameworks, allowing for thorough risk assessments to be completed. Significant benefits from these crops have come in the domain of socio-economics.
Causing trouble keeps Russia relevant. It's as if nihilism and cynicism are the two guiding principles of Russia's foreign policy. And if that's not enough, as part of its global mischief-making Russia is assaulting American science and technology.
In 2017, more than 72,000 Americans died from drug overdoses. That's a staggering number -- almost double the number of car crash fatalities and nearly quadruple the number of homicides. Most drug overdoses involved some type of opioid.
For those looking for another way to sculpt their bodies, there's a new, high-tech device that has great promise. But to use it, you'll need to get naked in front of a full-length mirror-scanner-computer that sends all your measurement data to the Cloud. Is this amazing – or is the idea so intrusive that, in the name of getting in better shape, this has really gone too far?
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