Blind Spots: When Medicine Gets It Wrong, and What It Means for Our Health

The medical establishment suffers from a reluctance to reexamine its own beliefs in light of new evidence, according to this impassioned cri de coeur. Makary (The Price We Pay), a surgeon at Johns Hopkins Hospital, discusses how a 2002 study on hormone replacement therapy reported that the treatment causes breast cancer, even though its data didn’t support that conclusion. Though the initial error may have arisen from a rushed publication process, the lead authors still insist on the erroneous correlation despite not being able to point to any supporting evidence in their own study. Elsewhere, Makary argues that the modern epidemic of deadly peanut allergies can be attributed to the American Academy of Pediatrics’ misguided recommendation that young children be shielded from nuts (subsequent research has shown that “peanut abstinence causes peanut allergies”), a suggestion drawn from a misreading of a single research paper. The sensational case studies demonstrate the depths of doctors’ intransigence, and Makary’s clinical experience offers penetrating insights into the psychological mechanisms at play, as when he attributes a colleague’s stubborn refusal to accept that appendicitis can be effectively treated by antibiotics to his urge to believe that the countless appendectomies he had performed previously were necessary. Incisive and damning, this is a much-needed wake-up call. Agent: Glen Hartley, Writers’ Representatives. (Sept.)