On Monday, Unilever announced a limited voluntary recall of Skippy Reduced Fat Creamy Peanut Butter Spread and Skippy Reduced Fat Super Chunk Peanut Butter Spread, after a routine sampling of products indicated possible …
Policy & Industry
How Do Unapproved Drugs Make it to Market?
It may come as a surprise that some of the drugs your doctor can prescribe have not been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). That means that they haven’t been evaluated for safety or efficacy, and there isn’t …
Ibuprofen May Reduce the Risk of Parkinson’s Disease
Ibuprofen is a popular painkiller, which works wonders to reduce inflammation in chronic conditions like arthritis and more discrete hurts brought about by surgery. Now researchers are hoping to add another condition to that list …
FDA Pulls 500 Prescription Cold and Allergy Drugs
DEA’s Emergency Ban on Chemicals in ‘Fake Pot’ Goes Into Effect
As I wrote here last week, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) had previously warned that it would place an emergency ban on five “legal high” substances commonly used in so-called fake marijuana.
For ‘Naturopathic Doctors,’ Licensing Is a Tricky Issue
Only 15 states and the District of Columbia currently license naturopaths — requiring practitioners to attend a four-year accredited, specialized school, pass an exam and log a certain amount of clinical training — but with …
Does South Dakota’s ‘Justifiable Homicide’ Bill Target Abortion Doctors?
A new bill that seeks to expand the definition of “justifiable homicide” to include resisting attempts to harm an unborn child will go to vote in the South Dakota House of Representatives on Wednesday. Does this bill mean what …
The Greatest Risk to Older Patients: Ageist Doctors
At first, Britain’s famed National Health Service (NHS) worked perfectly.
Coming Soon? The 100-Million-Dollar Robotic Arm
Within six months the military plans to begin implanting microchips on the surface of patients’ brains to study a prosthetic robotic arm controlled by the user’s thoughts, via the chip. The $100 million arm, which was developed …
FDA Approves a Smartphone-Based Ultrasound System
FDA Approves the First Ever MRI-Safe Pacemaker
On Tuesday, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the first pacemaker designed to be used safely during magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. The device, the Revo MRI SureScan Pacing System by Medtronic, was first …
NYC Bans Smoking in Parks, Beaches and Pedestrian Plazas
New York’s City Council voted last week to pass a law extending the city’s smoking ban to parks, beaches and public plazas where pedestrians congregate like in Times Square and Union Square.
Mayo Clinic vs. WebMD: Another Perspective
The New York Times Magazine on Sunday included a rather befuddling column by departing writer Virginia Heffernan.