Quick Links: Oral Piercing Problems, Organic Food Quality, Compact Fluorescent Bulb Safety & More Pharma Phollies

Warning for Teens: Teeth and Jewelry Don’t Mix (Science Daily) Is Organic Food Really Healthier? (Earth Land Journal, via Alternet) Are Compact Fluorescent Lightbulbs Dangerous? (Scientific American) Key Opinion Leaders: Independent Experts of Drug Representatives in Disguise? (BMJ) 6/24 Addendum – Re: the SciAm article on fluorescent lightbulbs, Dr. Verigin adds, If mercury is that …

Book Review: Comfortably Numb

Over the past few years, dozens of books critiquing Big Pharma and industrial medicine have come and gone – many of them excellent, a number of which we reviewed in our office newsletter Biosis: Overdosed America The Truth About the Drug Companies Generation Rx Selling Sickness Hope or Hype Thus, when new titles come along, …

Big Pharma, Big Medicine

It wasn’t enough for Big Pharma to pitch its poisons directly to consumers (DTC ads), hoping that they’d insist on prescriptions, whether they were appropriate or not. Now they’re marketing medical devices DTC-style, starting with stents. Maggie Mahar and Niko Karvounis provide a good discussion of the issue at Health Beat, reporting on a May …

Video: Big Bucks, Big Pharma

An excerpt from the new Media Education Foundation documentary Big Bucks, Big Pharma…

Stat! Nursing Home Relaxation or Sedation?

Percentage of U.S. nursing home patients on antipsychotic meds: 30 Percentage on antipsychotics at Providence Rest in the Bronx, where massage, aromatherapy and other alternative treatments are the norm: 2 to 3 Source: A Touch of Grace: Massage Therapy Aids Retired Nuns (WSJ)

Eminently Quotable: Martin H. Fischer

“Half the modern drugs could well be thrown out the window except that the birds might eat them.” Image by incurable_hippie, via Flickr (CC)

Quick Links: Tooth Loss and Cancer; Drugged America

Study: Over Half of Americans on Chronic Medicines (PhysOrg) Tooth Loss Linked To Esophageal, Head and Neck, and Lung Cancer (Medical News Today) Drug Marketing Shifts the Doctor-Patient Relationship (LA Times)

A Drug to De-Numb? Dumb!

Photo by Vaprotan, via Flickr (CC) New Drug Reverses Dentists’ Anesthesia The FDA has approved OraVerse, the first drug indicated for reversing the effects of local anesthesia used by dentists. In the clinical studies, the patients who got OraVerse regained normal sensation in their lips faster than those who got the placebo. Within an hour …

Quick Links: Plasma Needles, Drugs, Nitrates, Junk Foods

Cold Plasma Needles for Dentists Edge Closer (New Scientist) Drugmakers Need to Rein in Ads, Hearing Told (Reuters) Psychiatry Handbook Linked to Drug Industry (NY Times) Nitrates in Vegetables Protect Against Gastric Ulcers, Study Shows (Science Daily) Top 10 Junk Foods in Disguise (Mark’s Daily Apple) How Much Sugar Do You Consume? (Diet Blog)

The Irony: Bone Death in the Jaw after Osteoporosis Drugs

Science Daily reports on the latest research on the link between taking biophosphonates – drugs like Fosamax and Boniva used to treat osteoporosis – and jaw infections leading to osteonecrosis: Microbial biofilms, a mix of bacteria and sticky extracellular material, are causing jaw tissue infections in patients taking bisphosphonate drugs, said Parish Sedghizadeh, lead researcher …