The concept of bloodless medicine first arose in the 1970s, when Denton Cooley, the legendary Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine alumnus and cardiac surgeon, performed operations on a group of patients that most other doctors turned away: Jehovah’s Witnesses. According to their doctrine, Jehovah’s Witnesses are not permitted to receive blood transfusions, largely due(...)
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Potential Cuts to Science Funding Threaten US Position as World Leader in Biomedical Research
Posted by | Did You See This?We Americans are privileged to live in a country that boasts the top scientific research in the world being conducted in our laboratories, research institutions and government establishments, like the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The United States is currently considered the leader in biomedical research, but what most Americans don’t realize is that our(...)
The State of Digital Health
Posted by | Did You See This?Digital health is one of the hottest buzzwords in health care. It seems like a new health care app is on the news every day, and big data, we’re told, is on the verge of ushering in an era of personalized, efficient medicine as we’ve never seen before. But what does this mean for the(...)
Planned Parenthood’s Effects on Our Community
Posted by | A Day in the Life, Did You See This?It’s often said that it is hard to imagine what life must be like for someone until you have walked a mile in his or her shoes. It took me less than a mile to venture to my local Planned Parenthood. Located right up the street from the Johns Hopkins medical campus in the heart(...)
Hidden Figures: On Discrimination and Women’s Rights
Posted by | Did You See This?, Events and HappeningsOn Jan. 21, 2017, millions of women around the globe marched in solidarity with women in the United States to protest against various forms of social injustices and misogyny they experience on a routine basis. As I listened to the massive crowds chanting various slogans in repudiation of perceived inequities, one message rose above the(...)
New Statin Guidelines Herald a New Era of Preventive Medications
Posted by | Did You See This?, Perspectives in ResearchIn medicine, we would like to believe that treatment decisions are black and white, evidence is clear cut and uncertainty is a bygone impediment, squashed decades ago by the tight jaws of the scientific method. Yet it seems the more we learn, the more we have to argue about. Uncertainty is here to stay. As(...)
At the Vanguard of the Psychedelic Renaissance
Posted by | Did You See This?, Perspectives in ResearchA priest, a minister and a rabbi walk into Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center to ingest psilocybin, the active ingredient in hallucinogenic mushrooms. Although this probably sounds like the beginning of a great joke, new advancements in the field of psychedelic medicine are no laughing matter. After nearly 50 years of prohibition, academic studies and clinical(...)
Nobel Prize Winning Research May Lead to New Therapies for Cancer, Alzheimer’s
Posted by | Did You See This?, Perspectives in ResearchYoshinori Ohsumi of the University of Tokyo was recently awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work in mechanisms for autophagy. What is autophagy? From the Greek roots “auto,“ or self, and “phagia,” or eating, the word literally means self-eating. In cell biology, autophagy describes the way that cells recycle unneeded(...)
The Making of a Terrorist
Posted by | Did You See This?As we approach the final months of 2016, few would dispute that it has been one of the most politically tumultuous years in recent memory, punctuated by a hugely polarizing election, colossal political shifts, rising domestic gun violence — especially in the form of mass shootings — and horrifying terrorist attacks. Amid this discord and(...)
Implementing Precision Medicine in an Academic Hospital
Posted by | Did You See This?Precision medicine, or personalized medicine, is a growing field that uses big data to treat the individual patient. It uses tools such as DNA sequencing and bioinformatics to ask, “What are the individual characteristics of my patient?” — for example, in her genetic makeup, environment or in the mutation profile of her tumor — and(...)