Information like that contained in the article I’ll link below boggles my mind. How in the world does a modern, allegedly progressive country get away with doing this to us? It’s not right. Oh, it makes money, and I’d guess that’s the driving force. But it’s unethical as all hell.

Get this part: The surgery is “a highly questionable practice without supporting evidence of even moderate quality,” adding, “Good evidence has been widely ignored.” (And this is only talking about one of the surgeries mentioned.)

Please, please, please make time to read the article. You need to be informed. The person most responsible to keep you as well as possible is you. You hand that over, and you’re risking all kinds of misery. Maybe even death. You can no longer hand over that responsiblity to a medical professional. You can ask. You can listen. But you’d better be willing to do some research and other questioning on your own to end up with the right decision for you.

Patient empowerment is more needed today than anything I can think of. True patient empowerment. Where you are in the know, not blindfolded. Not fooled. Not heavily marketed to. And the only way you get that is being willing to do the work to be that person. Not the patient patient. Not the quiet, unassuming patient. The bold, informed, willing-to-piss-people-off patient.

This reminds me of when a well-regarded surgeon wanted to fuse part of my daughter’s spine because of the pain she was suffering in her back. I hesitated. Thank god. It was some inkling of mine coupled with a just-there investigation of alternative methods. The problem with her back? It was remedied with a combo of massage therapy and chiropractic adjustments. ISN’T THAT FUCKING BETTER THAN CUTTING HER OPEN? Potentially causing some damage that is never repairable? That could land her in a wheelchair for life? (Which happened to at least one other patient of his.)

This is why I urge YOU to take the stand of — do no harm first. If none of that helped her, we still could have considered the surgery. The surgery, I realize now, known-to-be worthless. You can’t do it the other way around.

In a nutshell, that’s what this article tells you. That surgeries like fusing a spine have been investigated in no less than four clinical trials and were found to be useless. To not produce any better results than non-harmful methods.

AND YET THEY ARE STILL DOING THEM. Yep, I’m ranting; it royally pisses me off. Shouldn’t surgeons be banned from doing a useless surgery? No, they’re not. It’s up to you, the patient — whom they want to act meek and mild and be conforming — to not be all that and ask the right questions. You don’t? Worthless back surgery (for example) is on your agenda.

It’s wrong. I hope that is remedied some day. But, in the meantime, what you do to save your body and life and health is to become informed and empowered. Your only other choice, if you don’t want to challenge a doctor or don’t want to spend the time? Could be pretty dismal.

This isn’t only about back surgery. Surgery for a torn meniscus, done on nearly a half million of us a year, also is pronounced “next to useless” by a professor of medicine.

And how many more are there? How many more surgeries, other procedures, drugs are harming you more than helping you? I suspect there are plenty. I know of others, when you dig in and read reports — from those in the know — that are dangerous, worthless procedures. But it’s not up to me to tell you what to do and what not to you. It’s up to … you.

Here’s the full report:
Why “useless” surgery is still popular.