Medical Media? Or Medical Media Monstrous Hysteria?

The media is everywhere. Once just when you chose to open the newspaper. Then when you chose to open the newspaper or sit in front of the television at 10pm at night. Then when you chose to open the newspaper, sit in front of the television at 10pm at night or other assigned times throughout the day. Now, when you choose to exist.

It is powerful, it is persuasive, and it is everywhere.

We have many media channels through which medical information is also posted and shared. I often note incorrect information re-posted (aka via the fine use of copy and paste) from one site to another with great concern. How quickly one poorly supported quote/post/article can be spread through our communities.

The media is also responsible (in my mind) for the downfall of some of our most valued available medical services, putting them out of favour with the public and positioning the population at risk.

To Note:

The MMR vaccination.

The media latched on to the outcomes of a single paper in 1998 suggesting that the combined Measles, Mumps and Rubella Vaccine led to Autism. The producers of this paper later spoke out to disqualify their own work, reporting that it has been summarized in error and that Autism features were evident around the same time that the vaccine was administrated but that the two had no relationship on one another.

However, the media failed to recognize the supporting science and continued to pump the story of a ‘controversial vaccination.’ This led to a drop from 92% uptake in the UK during the mid 1990s to 75% in parts of London post-millennium, putting many lives at risk and seeing a surge in these childhood diseases.

The Liverpool Pathway for the Dying

Unless you have seen death, you can not appreciate the need for a good one. There is frequently a time when someone is so weak, so ill, in so much pain, lacking their dignity and quality of life, that to allow the inevitable to occur, in the most comfortable way possible, is the most humane thing to do. I have always been a big fan of this pathway. It keeps everything in place that will ensure the comfort of a patient, and removes unnecessary blood tests (needles), observations which may disturb and make them uncomfortable and treatments which will no longer be useful and potentially also result in distress.

It does not speed up the process of dying, but does ensure that it is pain free and humane for the patient and their family involved.

The media gained access to story… ‘doctor’s prescribe dying for their financial gain.’ A statement so scary for readers and so far from the truth. Unbeknown to most physicians, the hospitals would receive some money for patients on this pathway. This money would pay for the additional palliative care and pain medications needed to enable the service. Just as the hospital receives money for an asthma sufferer, to pay for their respiratory care and medications.

The pathway was sadly phased out in 2013.

Menopause

Did you know that the risk of HRT on rates of breast cancer are significantly significantly lower than the risk of breast cancer in obesity?

Did you know that HRT can be a life long medication for some patients?

Did you know that HRT can reduce the risks of osteoporosis, diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease? Did you know that a study by the WHI showed that those who take HRT for 14 years had lower rates of all-cause mortality?

Did you know that only 12% of those eligible for HRT are currently taking it?

The media craze that spins around the use of HRT and inflated rates of breast cancer have been circulating for many years and affected not only the general public, but physicians too (who often remain hesitant to offer worthwhile prescriptions.) There was a study in 2002 which demonstrated those at high risk, on high dose oestrogen and older forms of progesterone had higher risks of breast cancer and heart disease. Sadly, this was an unrepresentative study of the HRT population and did not reflect current medicinal regimes.

Yet the information was leaked to the media before the scientific analysis process had begun and 18 years on, women still fear the side effects of such a valuable resource available to them. (If this is a topic of interest, check out the menopause doctor at www.menopausedoctor.co.uk)

The media is not going anywhere. We have the right to read it and respect it but choose to accept it or question it.

As you mum would tell you ‘don’t believe everything you read in the paper.’ Take everything with a pinch of salt and look closely at that bandwagon before you choose to jump on it.

Don’t let the media ruin our medicine.

#media

#hrt #life #wellness #health #medicalmedia #wellbeing #MMR #controversy #liverpoolpathway #palliativecare #support #research #science