Two articles in today’s New England Journal of Medicine are the first randomized placebo controlled trials of vertebroplasty, a procedure which involves injecting cement into the vertebrae of people who have suffered from painful osteoporotic fractures of the vertebrae. In the first study 78 patients got either vertebroplasty or a fake procedure. There was no difference in pain ratings measured at several time points out to six months.
Mrs. Bremner and I are at the American Psychosomatic Society (APS) Annual Meeting in Chicago this week where the most interesting presentation other than our poster and talk on brain and heart mechanisms mediating the increased risk for mortality in people with heart disease and depression, is this late breaking data [...]
More bad news about bisphosphonate drugs for osteoporosis, which were bad enough to have readers write in about cases of erosive esophagitis and an incredible case of physician writing a case report (Jennifer Schneider MD, also a reader of this blog) about her own femoral fracture caused by getting out of her seat [...]
Remember this woman?
Well they pay her to be a fake, so I guess we can’t get worked up about it. But before you take this woman’s advice and go out and make yourself toxic on bisphonate drugs for the “prevention” of osteoporosis like Fosamax (alendronate), Actonel (risedronate), and Boniva (ibandronate), read some of the comments from readers, [...]
