WHAT'S UP, DOC?

Modern medicine is out of control, argue the authors of a new book. It’s time, they say, for patients to start asking some tougher questions.

- NICKY PELLEGRINO

Dr Rachelle Buchbinder has been heckled and intimidated. Once, she had an email from a stranger suggesting that she put her head in a microwave and turn it on. And that was relatively mild compared with the more recent harassment she has experienced via email, social media, blogs and letter-writing campaigns.

“They’ve been trying to besmirch my reputation, get me sacked or not funded. It’s been vicious and horrible, and sometimes I ask myself why I’m doing this,” says Buchbinder, an Australian rheumatologist, epidemiologist and researcher.

The microwave-related message was an angry response to a 2002 study in which Buchbinder showed that ultrasound-guided shock-wave therapy is no better than a placebo when it comes to easing the pain of the foot condition plantar fasciitis. And the harassment that continues to this day was the result of her 2009 trial that found a procedure called vertebroplasty – injecting a type of acrylic cement into vertebrae that have collapsed or fractured – is no more effective than a sham treatment.

The abuse isn’t the only thing that has persisted. Both of these procedures continue to be performed, despite the science debunking their usefulness.

Given the personal cost and the apparent lack of impact, you might wonder why Buchbinder bothers. However, rather than allowing herself to be silenced, she has teamed up with Australian orthopaedic surgeon and author Ian Harris to write a book, Hippocrasy, that exposes the many ways modern medical professionals are betraying the ideals of the Hippocratic oath and the commonly associated pledge, “First, do no harm”.