Another Perfect Example of Why Doctors May Be Wrong

Through my years and my time I have dedicated to some innocent projects, I am always curious as to responses I read to various news articles showing the arrest of a person accused of a certain crime.  I know this is off the subject of my blog but I just read yet another warning on a drug that was previously touted as safe called Zocor. It also reminded me of another drug that not too long ago was issued a black box warning due to unexpected deaths.  Zocor, taken by over 21 million people, has had a new alert issued:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday called for a label warning on the popular statin Zocor because of an increased risk of muscle damage when taken in high doses.

Now there is nothing noted on long term disability or death but it goes to show you that doctors can be wrong.  This drug went through the FDA's rigorous drug safety program of testing in thousands of volunteers.  There have been countless of drugs recalled due to unexpected deaths or other serious outcomes but we're a society that believes at face value anything we hear from doctors and other agencies like the CDC and the FDA without realizing that nothing is an absolute.

Through my experiences helping on innocence projects, I routinely see people not believing what a doctor is providing from testimony if it contradicts popular belief.  I'm always surprised in the inability to understand that the original belief could be wrong but there is never room to hear the other side in spite of both being medically educated and having the same training.  My challenge to anyone reading this is the next time you read something about medicine or the practice of medicine, remember that it's evolving and it's called practicing medicine because they are still learning.  Just because something appears to be one thing, it doesn't mean it's not.