Results tagged “treatment” from 60 Second Science

The AP is reporting on controversy in California over the way treatment for addicted doctors is handled by the state medical board.

California recently scrapped its system for anonymously treating addicted doctors without informing patients of their physicians’ condition-- following outrage over botched surgery by an addicted plastic surgeon. But its new cure for the problem may be worse than the disease.

For one, what the AP doesn’t mention is that treatment for addicted doctors is one of the shining successes in the addiction world: virtually all treatment (even programs known to contain elements that are ineffective or harmful) produces impressive outcomes.

Continue reading 'The only thing worse than letting addicted docs practice is banning them...' >

Nobody cheer leads their drug of choice more than ravers -- according to them, your ticket to complete and utter bliss is only a dolphin-shaped pill away. Generally, I have trouble following the advice of a 24-year-old adult dressed like an infant who survived a clown explosion, but maybe they really are on to something. The first government-sanctioned experiments in two decades into the potential for psychedelic drugs to treat psychiatric disorders shows that the active ingredient in ecstasy, MDMA, can be quite effective at healing post-traumatic stress disorder.

If more research backs this up, I guess we should start handing out pacifiers and rainbow jumpsuits to soldiers as soon as they step off the plane from Iraq.

Continue reading 'Ecstasy shows promise in treating PTSD, lame dance parties' >

Today the L.A. Times publishes a fascinating article on John Kanzius, a leukemia sufferer and radio man who, after spending years both experiencing grueling chemotherapy treatments and watching it in others, applied his talent for building radios to create a possible alternate treatment method. Kanzius had worked as a radio and television engineer and co-owned stations in the Erie, Pa. area, but he had no medical background — he didn't even have a bachelor's degree.

Kanzius knew how to send radio wave signals around the world. If he could transmit them into cancer cells, he wondered, could he then direct the radio waves to destroy tumors, while leaving healthy cells intact? For months, Kanzius tinkered, using the pie pans to create an electronic circuit, often waking Marianne with his clanging. By day, he sent her out with supply lists: mineral mixtures, metals, wires. His early-morning experiments would lead him to one of the nation's top cancer researcher centers, and earn the support of a Nobel Prize winner.

Continue reading 'Fighting cancer with radio waves, DIY-style' >