Mandrola on Medscape

 
 
  • Opposing Thoughts on the Residents' Strike in NYC A successful strike by doctors is potentially a good thing, but were the demands of the Elmhurst strikers worth the fight?
  • Who Decides What Is Medical Misinformation? A California law against COVID misinformation may have good intentions, but medicine is replete with consensus recommendations that end up being wrong.
  • Why Is Vitamin D Hype So Impervious to Evidence? Low levels of vitamin D are linked to myriad health conditions, but supplements have never delivered in a randomized trial. Why aren't clinicians and patients persuaded by the data, asks John Mandrola, MD.
  • This Doc Still Supports NP/PA Led Care … With Caveats The rise in nurse practitioner- and physician assistant-led care will not be undone, according to this doctor who sees it as a good thing as long as training and experience are not neglected.
  • Vaccine-Induced Myocarditis Concerns Demand Respect, Not Absolutism With more reports of mRNA COVID-19 vaccine myocarditis, parents and young adults should be allowed to weigh the vaccine decision with their clinicians without being tarred as antivaxxers.
  • Why Long COVID Worries Me Researchers and clinicians focused on long-haul COVID or postacute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection should remember our oath to first, do no harm.
  • Study Showing Masks Aren't Harmful May Do More Harm Than Good The quest to debunk irrational beliefs is foolish and may exacerbate mistrust in science rather than persuade the mask doubters, says John Mandrola, MD, about a recent research letter in JAMA.
  • We Can't Ignore the Harms of Social Distancing With the emphasis on social distancing and mitigating the effects of SARS-CoV-2, John Mandrola, MD, asks that we don't forget to add iatrogenic deaths to our final tally.
  • Dear Gilead: Please Add a Placebo Arm to Remdesivir Trial A randomized trial of the antiviral remdesivir for the treatment of COVID-19 is underway but its open label design and lack of a placebo control raises concerns for John Mandrola, MD
  • COVID-19 and PPE: Some of Us Will Die A storm is coming, and the new fear is the shortage of personal protective equipment, warns John Mandrola, MD, of the COVID19 pandemic as some hospitals bar physicians from complaining.
  • Will the Coronavirus Pandemic Trim the Nonsense? 'From the beginning of this pandemic, I have felt a smallness to much of what I do in electrophysiology,' admits John Mandrola, MD.
  • Independent NPs and PAs: A Doc's View Nurse practitioners and physician assistants increasingly manage patient care independently. While professional physician organizations cry foul, this doctor is not alarmed.
  • Have We Missed the Hidden Cause of Medical Overuse? A recent book suggests that we?re programmed to value the rituals of caring even when there is no obvious medical benefit. John Mandrola, MD, sees a lot of such low-value conspicuous caring in medicine.
  • The Year?s Most Important Study Adds to Uncertainty in Science One data set, one question, yet 29 research teams came to varying findings. John Mandrola, MD, learns that how the data are analyzed is an oft-ignored important factor in evaluating studies.
  • The Physician Behind the PREDIMED Retraction   Dr John Mandrola interviews Dr John Carlisle about the methodology he uses to uncover previously unrecognized flaws in randomized controlled trials.
  • Yes, There Is Low-Value Care in the Very Ill, Despite MIT Study Mandrola and Prasad fear that a study showing high cost of care at end of life but little ability to predict who will die will be misinterpreted and worsen the crisis of end-of-life care.
  • How Hubris Impairs the Care of the Elderly Some conditions in older adults warrant treatment; some do not. The wise physician knows the difference.
  • When Evidence Doesn't Persuade Dr Mandrola debated stenting in stable CAD. He had data on his side, but his opponent triumphed with pictures of scary-looking blockages. Why is the plumbing analogy of CAD so difficult to dispel?
  • In Defense of Less-Is-More Cardiologist and New England Journal of Medicine correspondent, Lisa Rosenbaum, MD recently critiqued the less-is-more in medicine crusaders. One such crusader, Dr Mandrola, respectfully disagrees.
  • Freedom of Speech Is Also Needed in Health and Medicine Suppression of alternative ideas and healthy debate is not just a college campus issue--it's affecting medicine too, warns Dr Mandrola.