One of my favorite pieces is out again: The NYT’s The Year In Ideas . Interesting on the medical front: an exoskeleton prosthesis that takes the load off your back; eyeball jewelry , which really doesn’t seem that great, and a bit invasive into my freaking EYE; cancer music , where researchers are trying to listen to the vibrations of cells and diagnose neoplasia (how that will differentiate between benign and malignant, the important step, is beyond me); economic theory to encourage vaccine production , and skin literature (I’d have something by Vonnegut tattooed if I had to choose).

Also not to be missed is a short interview with Stephen Hawking . Some of my favorite bits:

What is your I.Q.?
I have no idea. People who boast about their I.Q. are losers.

With all your intense erudition, why do you bother writing pop-science books about the universe, the latest of which is the illustrated version of ”On the Shoulders of Giants”?
I want my books sold on airport bookstalls.

Are you always this cheerful?
Life would be tragic if it weren’t funny.

Seriously, how do you keep your spirits up?
My expectations were reduced to zero when I was 21. Everything since then has been a bonus.

Really puts one’s own challenges and upsets in perspective, huh?

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Damn, Grand Rounds is getting popuplar. We’re up to number 11, and there’s a ton of posts
. Go read to your heart’s content.

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Michael Paulus’s gallery of cartoon character skeletons is not to be missed.

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If you’re not reading Mimi Smartypants , your life is either a) not complete or b) totally lame.

Mimi totally picks me up when I really need it. Like today. When I did really crappy on an endocrine exam, and I have a cumulative Final O’ Death in one week’s time.

She also has a book of her writings. Yes, she’s that good. She’s literally the only weblog/journal/whatever I read that doesn’t have an RSS feed. That means a lot, in my sick little dweeb head.

Also, she lives in Chicago, where I used to be, so brownie points for that.

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From the Washington Post (I like to switch it up every now and then):

Many American youngsters participating in federally funded abstinence-only programs have been taught over the past three years that abortion can lead to sterility and suicide, that half the gay male teenagers in the United States have tested positive for the AIDS virus, and that touching a person’s genitals “can result in pregnancy,” a congressional staff analysis has found.

• A 43-day-old fetus is a “thinking person.”
• HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, can be spread via sweat and tears.
• Condoms fail to prevent HIV transmission as often as 31 percent of the time in heterosexual intercourse.
• One curriculum, called “Me, My World, My Future,” teaches that women who have an abortion “are more prone to suicide” and that as many as 10 percent of them become sterile. This contradicts the 2001 edition of a standard obstetrics textbook that says fertility is not affected by elective abortion, the Waxman report said.

What a crock. If you believe that abstinence-only education is right, then that’s your own problem, but it’s another thing when the supporters of it use blatant lies and mislead people. [via MeFi ]

And if you didn’t know it, abortions increased under Bush last term. Not decreased, and HIV infection rates are staying steady .

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December first. World AIDS Day. Protect yourself and get tested.

I read And The Band Played On (read the first 3 pages at the new Google Print), and it was absolutely excellent. It changed the way I thought about policy, the media, politicians, politics, and celebrity; it still has a lot of lessons that we can learn from. If you’re looking for a new book to read, pick this one up; it’s a page-turner.

I couldn’t help but wonder if we would have reacted to HIV if we only started to really see it now, as opposed to 20 years ago. Would the government continue to deny it? Would the NIH underfund and ignore it for years, only later trying to take credit for isolation and discovery of the virus? (The French discovered it.) Would the president keep from mentioning it for 6 years, or until 16,000 people had died from it, and thousands more were already infected?

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In the spirit of conservation, recycling, and urine fetishes comes Repronex , a drug that comes from the concentrated urine of post-menopausal women. It’s used to stimulate the release of FSH and LH, two pituitary hormones important for sex hormone release and maintenance of most things sexual in the body.

Apparently it’s been around for quite some time, but, like my used car, it’s new to me.

Also in the “abusing nature for all it’s worth category”: Miacalcin , a salmon version of our body’s natural hormone, calcitonin . (The salmon version is much more potent than the human version. Go figger.)

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It appears that some doctors and other medical personel have been involved in “planning of interogations” at Guantanamo . What a disgrace. It’s sad to think that anyone who has had the privelege of becoming a physician-a role designated in this society as healer-could turn against the “first, do no harm” ethic.

The team of humanitarian workers, which included experienced medical personnel, also asserted that some doctors and other medical workers at Guantánamo were participating in planning for interrogations, in what the report called “a flagrant violation of medical ethics.”

Then again, it’s an even larger stain and bigger disgrace that my country-of freedom, justice, democracy, and due process-is involved in torture. How absolutely vile. I’m waiting for the moral outrage, Christian right.

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Osteoporosis is a common disease of bone wasting, predominantly in older, post-menopausal women. It’s an important disease mostly because it predisposes people to bone fractures (hip, femur) after falls, and breaking a bone late in life is correlated with poor recovery outcomes and morbidity.

So we’ve got Fosamax (alendronate) that many people take to prevent bone loss, but it turns out to be a pretty caustic molecule. So caustic, in fact, that you have to take it standing up , and stay upright for an hour after you took it, without food, and with a big glass of water. “After swallowing the tablet, do not lie down, remain fully upright sitting, standing or walking, for at least 30 minutes and until after you have eaten.”

If we can prescribe behaviors associated with prescriptions, I’ve got an idea for an excellent new blood pressure medication: a sugar pill that must be taken along with an hour of playing with a pet . I’m going to make millions.

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In an article about the FDA and its internal conflicts, a Stanford professor is quoted as saying he was threatened by a Merck veep that if he spoke out about Vioxx, his academic career could become much more difficult:

Dr. Gurkirpal Singh, an adjunct clinical professor at Stanford University, said at the hearing that Merck scientists had tried to intimidate him after he publicly raised questions about the effects of Vioxx.

Dr. Singh, a rheumatologist and science officer of the Institute of Clinical Outcomes Research and Education in Woodside, Calif., said: “I was warned that if I continued in this fashion there would be serious consequences for me. I was told that Dr. Louis Sherwood, a Merck senior vice president and a former chief of medicine at a medical school, had extensive contacts within academia and could make life very difficult for me at Stanford and outside.”

Now, here’s my question: who’s the doc at Stanford that Sherwood thought would be willing to damage Singh’s career?

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