History is the sum total of things that could have been avoided … Konrad Adenauer A few years back, I heard Rosalyn Carter speak at a dinner. Her talk was organized around just one simple fact. "The largest mental hospital in America is the L.A. County Jail," she said. And I thought about Philippe Pinel and […]
History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon. … Napoleon Bonaparte In on history 1 … I was musing about my own early look at psychiatry when I arrived from internal medicine. I think I read those dusty old books trying to understand how it had become so different from […]
Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it … George Santayana It’s pretty easy to criticize medicine, but psychiatry is particularly vulnerable because of its position at the subjective edge. Forty years ago, when I changed specialties, my friends had heart to heart talks with me, trying to help me understand that […]
[apropos of nothing, this evening’s sunset] At my daughter’s graduation, the seniors were scheduled to march in through a historical arch on the side of the college square, but instead, carefully walked around it. It was a monument to ten student missionaries who had been killed in 1900 in the Chinese Boxer Rebellion. It took […]
Sometimes, it’s not the weight of a single piece of evidence that confirms an impression, a diagnosis, or a jury’s decision. It’s a series of things that rises above being just a suspicious trend into the range of an obviously motivated pattern. In my own criticisms of the DSM-5, I’ve stayed away from allegations that […]
The Honorable Jacob J. Lew Chief of Staff The White House Washington, DC 20500 Dear Chief of Staff Lew: In March 2010, President Barack Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law, which included the Physician Payments Sunshine Act (PPSA). We applauded its passage but, nearly three years later, we are disappointed that the PPSA […]
I was twenty-one and in one of those spaces life sometimes bring. College was behind me and I was living at home in Chattanooga for the last time, though my childhood friends were by then scattered to the wind. One weekend, I drove to Memphis where I would be be entering medical school in the […]
Something very right is trying to happen: Editor Fiona Godlee’s BMJ decision [God Save the Queen!…, in praise of Fiona Godlee…], the European Medical Authority’s plan [any news is good news…], the TEST Act in the US [the TEST Act…], AllTrials [click it and sign it…], the Cochrane Group’s negotiations with Roche about Tamiflu, etc. […]
Dear Dr Nardo We have always said who funded us when they funded us. The SourceWatch page you reference is at least 7 or 8 years out of date. Our most recent funding information is on our website here: http://www.senseaboutscience.org/pages/funding.html The £15,000 from companies is not £15,000 from pharma. Contributors are listed on our website, […]
ex·pert [kspûrt] ·noun a person who has extensive skill or knowledge in a particular field ·adjective 1. skilful or knowledgeable 2. of, involving, or done by an expert – an expert job [from Latin expertus – known by experience, from experiri – to test…] Last year, a friend called from the road, driving back from […]