Category: Uncategorized

Podcast – 28th September 2012

Note to medical journalists: correlation does not prove causation

Some nice person sent me a link to this article earlier this week which appears in the UK’s broadsheet newspaper The Telegraph. I mention the fact that this publication is a ‘broadsheet’ because these larger format newspapers generally have a reputation of higher quality reporting compared to the ‘tabloids’. Whether that true or not, I […]

Another reason to avoid sunscreens

One of my last posts pointed to the hazards associated with the use of sunscreens, including some propensity to increased skin cancer risk. Some people have commented that chemicals found in sunscreens might have a direct toxic and cancer-inducing effect in the body. I don’t disagree with this idea at all – it’s certainly plausible. […]

The natural remedy that’s often effective for calming an ‘irritable bladder’

Recently, the British Medical Journal published an article about the management of ‘overactive bladder syndrome’. Symptoms of this can include the sensation of needing to pass urine urgently, frequent urination and the need to get up at night to pass water. Men with these symptoms are often investigated for an enlarged prostate. Women don’t have […]

‘Earthing’ – important discovery or mumbo-jumbo?

‘Earthing’ or ‘grounding’ has been getting a lot of attention of late in certain communities, so about a week ago I decided to take a look. Here, in summary is what I’ve learned. What is ‘earthing’? Earthing is the practice of connecting the body with earth by touching skin to a conductive material such as […]

Got acne? Go primal

Acne is unheard of in populations eating a ‘primal’ or ‘paleolithic’ diet. This has caused some researchers, for example Loren Cordain (author of The Paleo Diet), to question what factors might be at play here. One prominent theory concerns the impact of eating carbohydrates that tend to be disruptive for blood sugar levels. These foods […]

Conflicts of interest rife in those setting diabetes and cholesterol guidelines

One of my aims with this site is to expose health-related misinformation. There’s usually no shortage of material here. Many of the things we’re encouraged to do, like eat margarine, cut back on saturated fat, eat ‘healthy’ wholegrains, have no evidence base for them. So, how come we have this sort of ‘education’ rammed down […]

Podcast – 30th September 2011

Fructose lowers fat burning, statins ‘without known benefit but with definite risk’ for most, and B12 and the brain. For RSS feeds, click on http://www.podcastmachine.com/podcasts/8966 and then the ‘RSS feeds’ button to the right. For help regarding the playing, downloading and subscribing of the podcasts, click here.

Podcast – 9th September 2011

Why we need more actuaries in medicine, another reason to be wary of stomach acid-suppressing medication, and exercise and mental function in later life. For RSS feeds, click on http://www.podcastmachine.com/podcasts/8966 and then the ‘RSS feeds’ button to the right. For help regarding the playing, downloading and subscribing of the podcasts, click here.

A little exercise can go a long way

There’s a new study out, based on research from Taiwan, that shows that exercising for just 15 minutes a day (about 1.5 hours a week) is associated with a 14 per cent reduced risk of death over a the course of the study compared with being sedentary [1]. This study is wildly being reported as […]