When the dust settles on the repeated mishandling of key scientific issues by Public Health and Infectious Disease leaders, this is going to be front and centre. Science is a specialty, and an MD is not a PhD. You can't just wing it. H/T @RetractionWatch japantimes.co.jp/news/2024/04/0…
@Mark_Ungrin @RetractionWatch Not even a PhD here, but I at least had to complete an undergraduate thesis for my chem eng degree (published, btw) and a full, interdisciplinary thesis for my MES (also leading to publication). Seeing lack of rigour, curiousity, etc from MDs has been surprising and disturbing.
@OhCasavant @RetractionWatch Part of it is just how badly EBM has poisoned the well in medicine. It produces a perfect storm that combines a lack of understanding of science, engineering etc etc etc with the misperception of sitting above all of them. Ignorance plus confidence is a dangerous combination.
@Mark_Ungrin @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch Being involved in EBM I see so many red flags now. I would really like to grow my skills in understanding and fighting the weaponization of EBM.
@nb_covid_info @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch A lot of it is context. The ideal of EBM is great, and it can be very useful if practiced with humility and an awareness of its limitations. It's the intersection with toxic medical hierarchies that's the main culprit. Medicine tolerates and enables shitty people way too much.
@nb_covid_info @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch The real need is to deal with the sense of entitlement to be in charge, and not to be questioned. Similarly, you don't need a PhD to do good research. It helps, but there are people doing great things without one. The problem is when someone figures their MD comes with one.
@nb_covid_info @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch It's that intersection between overconfidence and lack of understanding that's the problem. TBH most of science is realizing you don't understand things as well as you thought you did. Look at the Great WHO Airborne Debacle - basically just overconfidence + ignorance. If only.
@nb_covid_info @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch So I don't think we can fix what's wrong with EBM inside EBM. It's going to take fixing a feudal medical culture that goes back to Semmelweis and before. That will take higher standards inside the profession (especially at the top), but probably also external oversight.
@nb_covid_info @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch It's not all on medicine either. As a society we all hear the stories, and look the other way. Every medical drama has its toxic character (often with some redeeming characteristic that pops up to reassure us). But we hear what nurses, and residents, and students go through,...
@nb_covid_info @OhCasavant @RetractionWatch ...and there's this idea that "doctors will be doctors", so we kind of abandon the people at the bottom of the heap, and let the bad ones run wild (because we know it'll be a fight, and we've got other things to worry about). The "Thin White Line" mentality doesn't help, but...