Wednesday 12 June 2013

Is being an authority important in evidence based medicine?

I was talking with a friend today and he brought up a valid point that I would like to address. He mentioned the idea of authority, so what exactly constitutes someone as an authority on a medical issue. Does a person need a B.Sc, a Master's, a PHD or an MD to be an authority on a medical issue? Am I an authority on medical issues? No I am not. I am in the early stages of my education so even if those titles mattered in our discussions I would not qualify. I would argue that no matter what your title is, it is not good enough to endorse a therapy without evidence to back it up. Randomized control trials are what’s needed to claim a therapy helps; not a title like PHD. All are equal in the eyes of science (at least in theory), so if you can prove it then that's good enough. I don't what anyone to just take my word for it, please read my references and then evaluate the evidence. I am simply providing you with information and then the rest is up to you. 

As an aside I am not saying that you shouldn't trust your doctor. They have spent a decade learning what the medical literature says and applying it. There job is to tell you what science says, if you ever have questions they should be able to direct you to the original research. 

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