Best of Medical Blogs - weekly review and blog carnival

The “Best of Medical Blogs - weekly review and blog carnival” is a weekly summary of the best posts from medical blogs. Please email your suggestions for inclusion to clinicalcases@gmail.com. Best of Medical Blogs (BMB) is published every Tuesday, just like the old Grand Rounds.

Choose Wisely when Choosing Wisely http://buff.ly/Wrjs4S

From NBC: "You don’t need an MRI for lower back pain. You don’t need antibiotics for a sinus infection. And you don’t need to be screened for osteoporosis, either, if you’re under 65. A list of 90 medical ‘don’ts.’"

Based on the headlines, one might think that these tests or treatments should never be done. However, this is not what the experts were saying. These are commonly overused tests and treatments, not useless.

Can computers replace physicians? http://buff.ly/WriSUx -- Why we need physicians rather than computers http://buff.ly/WriNAn

Computers might be great if we humans were identical. They might be great if our patients were accurate historians without unknown agendas. But none of those, and many other restrictions exist. We have to weigh each piece of evidence, especially the history. We use complex illness scripts and our experience.

Excellent doctoring requires knowledge (computers can provide) plus wisdom. How can we program wisdom?

“How safe is Z-pak?” With the medicalization of everything, patients and doctors need to better understand that taking medicine or having surgery means accepting trade-offs. http://buff.ly/16cMN76

Dr. Wes: The Generality of the FDA's Recommendations on Zithromax http://bit.ly/ZFKBDo

When 1A evidence is not 1A evidence - A quest to find the truth, via Twitter http://buff.ly/XCrV8s

Answering the critics of atrial fibrillation (AFib) ablation http://buff.ly/ZF6iDp

Dr. Wes: The Importance of Recess in our Era of Sequestration http://bit.ly/ZFKGqp

"In the 11th year of this blog, we just reached the 3 million visit bar" - medrants http://buff.ly/16cMysL