Medical Treatments and Procedures

Florida State Senator Says We Need to "Vaccinate" Against Shariah

Republican state senator in Florida Alan Hays is a hero! Hays, who once filed legislation to keep public buses from stopping on streets because one time he got stuck in traffic behind one, says that Islam is gonna Sharia Law all up the state of Florida like polio. And if Sharia Law is the polio, A ... More >>

European Pediatricians: American Academy of Pediatrics' Recommendation to Circumcise Baby Boys Is "Questionable, Weak"

After years of studying all the studies about circumcision, the American Academy of Pediatrics last year updated its policy about circumcision of infant boys. Whereas it had previously been neutral on the matter, the organization started recommending the procedure, advising that the benefits outweig ... More >>

President Clinton's Event Disrupted by Anti-Circumcision Activists

Update, 10:34 a.m.: This post was updated with quotes from Anthony Losquardo, executive director of Intaction. Surely, President Clinton was a little freaked out last night when in the middle of his event -- a Clinton Foundation Millennium Network talk in New York featuring the former president, Che ... More >>

Florida Whooping Cough Cases Hit Ten-Year High

We've been predicting it for months, and new data from the Department of Health now confirm it. Whooping cough cases are the highest they've been in Florida for the past decade, and probably a lot longer than that. As of Tuesday, there have an astonishing 515 cases around the state, a ... More >>

Whooping Cough Cases Continue to Climb in Broward and Across Florida

Broward health officials have now recorded 34 cases of whooping cough this year, according to the latest data. For the whole of last year, there was only one case documented in the county. See also-Broward Whooping Cough Cases Shouldn't Surprise Anyone-Whooping Cough Cases Surge in Broward, Flo ... More >>

Whooping Cough Cases Surge in Broward, Florida

See also "Broward Whooping Cough Cases Shouldn't Surprise Anyone"According to the most recent data from the Florida Department of Health, 260 cases of whooping cough have been reported throughout the state as of the end of June.That's 120 more cases of the highly contagious respiratory ailment than ... More >>

Vincent Colangelo Gets 20 Years in Massive Online Pill-Mill Operation

A 44-year-old Davie man was sentenced to 20 years in prison Friday after pleading guilty to selling more than 660,000 pain pills from seven South Florida clinics -- including one that shared parking with Broward General Hospital. Vincent Colangelo was also ordered to give up six properties worth mor ... More >>

Broward Whooping Cough Cases Shouldn't Surprise Anyone

The Broward County Health Department on Friday afternoon announced that it has confirmed four cases of pertussis, three among school-aged children and one case in an adult. More  commonly known as whooping cough, pertussis is a "highly contagious respiratory disease" that can cau ... More >>

Forbes' Gardasil Story Sheds Light on Why Florida's Well-Meaning HPV Legislation Failed

Florida lawmakers tackled lots of pressing issues this past legislative sessions. They debated whether the barking tree frog should be the Sunshine State's official amphibian. They clashed over making it a crime to pick up pecans that have fallen from privately owned trees. The e ... More >>

Florida Anti-Vaccine Group Ignores Facts, Says It's Not Anti-Vaccine

​The Health Regulation Committee on Wednesday voted seven to zip in favor of SB 1116, a proposal to give parents of sixth-graders information on the human papillomavirus vaccine, which helps protect females from cervical cancer. As discussed yesterday, the original version of the bi ... More >>

Florida HPV Vaccine Bill Gets Watered Down Before Going to Committee; Anti-Vaccine Group Still Not Pleased

​Rick Perry tried making it mandatory. Michele Bachmann insinuated that it causes mental retardation. One of the world's top bioethicists bet Bachmann $10,000 to prove this claim. The human papillomavirus vaccine -- which helps protect women from certain strains of HPV that cause cervical cancer - ... More >>

Circumcision and AIDS: Harvard Doctors Respond to Criticism

​Could a whole coalition of highly accomplished, super educated doctors and researchers -- the ones who work at and advise the Gates Foundation, the World Health Organization, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Harvard School of Public Health -- all be wrong? Or are their critics hinderin ... More >>

Anticircumcision Activists Say Trimming a Bit Off the Top Is Too Much

American Academy of Pediatrics to Come Out More Strongly in Favor of Circumcision, Suggests Dr. Doug Diekema, Member of Task Force

Elijah Caleb Tan via Flickr​To circumcise or not to circumcise? That's a question that few people ever ponder -- until their little bundle of joy is about to arrive and it's a boy. For years, the American Academy of Pediatrics has said that "the existing scientific evidence is not sufficient to ... More >>

What's on the Boob Tube?

Life-Saving Surgery Might Have Killed Woman, Lawsuit Claims

Surgery gone awry? ​A sickle cell anemia patient went to a Broward hospital for a life-saving, emergency surgery, but the operation she received might have lead to her death, according to a recently filed lawsuit.Ashley Polk, then 19, went to the emergency room on August 19, 2010, for abdominal pa ... More >>

Accidental Overdose? Pharmacist's Slip Makes Woman Bleed, Lawsuit Claims

Too much of a good thing.​A Margate woman thought that her anticoagulant medication would keep her healthy and safe -- free of life-threatening blood clots and embolisms. But Fela Netkin claims that a mishap at her neighborhood pharmacy -- in which she may have accidentally been given five times t ... More >>

Rick Scott Throws an Anti-Abortion Party at the Governor's Mansion

Gov. Rick Scott: Party boy.​Add this to the list of awkward party themes: anti-abortion bills.Apparently it wasn't a costume party, but Gov. Rick Scott held a celebration at the governor's mansion this weekend in honor of the four anti-abortion bills he signed into law.Partygoers celebrated the ne ... More >>

Rick Scott's Dirty Deeds That Didn't Make Top 12 List

​This week's New Times cover story, "Enemy of the State," details the dozen worst accomplishments from Gov. Rick Scott's first six months in office. Unsurprisingly, there were plenty of dirty deeds that didn't make the list. Here are a few of the highlights:1. Following a property-tax-cutting prop ... More >>

Weston Cosmetic Surgeon Linked to Two Deaths Is Not Board-Certified

Alyne Medical Rejuvenation InstituteDr. Sant Antonio removes fat, but is it plastic surgery?​Dr. Alberto Sant Antonio, founder of the Weston cosmetic surgery clinic where two patients recently died after fat-removal procedures, is not a board-certified plastic surgeon, according to Florida Departm ... More >>

Dear Women of Florida: Trust Rick Scott on Abortion. He Knows Best

Sorry ladies, I don't trust you.​Dear Women of Florida,As your governor, I feel obliged to write/tweet/robo-call you individually to explain the new law I signed requiring you to undergo an ultrasound before having an abortion.First, I must admit that I've never had an ultrasound myself. No, I've ... More >>

Parents Almost Let Child Die, Fearing Blood Transfusion Would Change His Personality

​When Mr. and Mrs. Rock Sanozier of Plantation brought their son June 21 to Broward General Medical Center, doctors determined that the 3-year-old had pneumonia and that his spleen was clogged with blood. After trying medications, doctors figured the only thing that could save the child's life ... More >>

Fort Lauderdale Ultrasound Tech Pleads Guilty to Sexually Assaulting a Patient During Exam

pregnancycheck.com​Ivo Diaz, a former ultrasound technician at Fort Lauderdale's Holy Cross Hospital, pleaded guilty late last week to sexually assaulting a woman while she was undergoing an ultrasound in 2009.Diaz, now 43, will serve five years in prison and 12 years of sex-offender probation ... More >>

Deaths at One of South Florida's Most Popular Plastic Surgery Centers Raise Questions About the Safety of Cheaper Nips and Tucks

Broward County Passes Model Ordinance to Regulate "Pill Mills" That Don't Actually Exist

neglectedwar.comA pain management clinic, which doesn't exist in unincorporated Broward County​The Broward County Commission unanimously passed a new zoning and regulatory ordinance yesterday for pain management clinics in unincorporated areas of the county.This new ordinance requires all of the s ... More >>

Practitioners of Quack Autism Treatment in Trouble With Governor

David Geier, (not an) MD.​Two weeks ago, the Pulp published a small item about Mark and David Geier -- a father-son team of self-proclaimed autism experts who treat the condition with a powerful chemical castration agent called Lupron. They're from Maryland, but their interests run deep in Florida ... More >>

Anti-Abortion Measure a Waste of Paper

​Do you know what your Senate was doing yesterday?Among other things, it passed HB 1127. This is an anti-abortion measure, I suppose, but it's so profoundly useless that it's hard to imagine it seriously offending even Florida's baby-hatingest abortionists. Here's the summary.

Pro-Life, Anti-Honesty: Mandatory Sonograms For Women Seeking Abortions

Ten weeks. Not a person.​As I write this, Floridian women in the second and third trimesters of a pregnancy must submit to a sonogram before procuring an abortion. In Tallahassee on April 20th, Rep. Liz Porter, of Lake City, stumped for a bill that would extend the requirement to women in the firs ... More >>

Did You Get Your DIY Gastric-Bypass Kit Yet?

'Cause if you didn't, you're out of luck, bub.​Up until yesterday, for about $265, you could order one on Amazon. They work great. Anyone can install one in seconds with a penknife and some packing tape.Actually, the kit contained a scalpel, a syringe, and some other medical-like doodads. And, app ... More >>

Look Kids! Mammograms!

What the New "Pill Mill Bill" Will (and Won't) Do

​Broward County's thriving experiment in free-market health care -- pain pill clinics -- faces tougher regulations as of last Friday, when a piece of statewide legislation went into effect. The real title of the "Pill Mill Bill" is two single-spaced pages long. Suffice it to say that while the law ... More >>

[UPDATED] Public Hospital District Spent Thousands on Machines That Didn't Exist

Flickr: Suubi TrustA SonoSite ultrasound in action.​UPDATE: Broward Health just e-mailed new information containing its explanation for the strange entries I cite below. In short, they say they're the product of a computer glitch. I've copied that explanation on the bottom of this post.Since 2001 ... More >>

Finally - Some Swine Flu Vaccine!

​Here's a cut-and-paste press release about where and when you can -- finally -- get the swine flu vaccine. Officials at the Broward County Health Department announced Broward County's first H1N1 Vaccination Clinic which shall be open to all members of the public starting Monday, November 30, 2009 ... More >>

Lake Worth's Roy Foster One of CNN's Top 10 Heroes Worldwide

Foster: Proving South Florida still has a few good men​What are the odds? Of 10 extraordinary people chosen from around the globe as the finalists for CNN's Heroes of 2009,  two of them are doing their good deeds based in South Florida. And until this Thursday the 19th, you can click here to ... More >>

Lauderdale Dr. Gary Snyder Argues Against Flu Vaccine

Snyder's home flu repellent: Vitamin D​Historians will look back some day on the autumn of 2009 as a period of mass hysteria over a relatively innocuous strain of flu called H1N1, which so far has killed 1,000 Americans (normal seasonal flu averages 36,000 U.S. deaths per year, according to the CD ... More >>

Waiting for Swine Flu Vaccine? Just Skip It.

Don't want it. Don't need it.​In what may come to be called the Great Swine Flu Fuck-Up, local health officials have vaccinated thousands of schoolkids this year with the regular seasonal flu nasal mist -- a vaccination which unfortunately promises to protect them not at all. The seasonal flu vacc ... More >>

Swine and the Seniors: A Frightening Couple

flickr user: Brent and MarilynnSwine fear has arrived.​South Florida's senior citizen population has had a rough few months. What with the fear-mongering about death panels in Obama's health care plan, and worries that cuts in Medicare will leave them penniless on bingo night, the news has not bee ... More >>

Attacking Swine Flu Before It Attacks Us

Flickr: dabby1This fellow hopes to get in your bloodstream before the vaccine.​The past few months, this blog and Broward Health have had a strained relationship, to put it mildly; but hey, global pandemics make for strange bed partners. Juice is glad to report that the north county's $1 billion p ... More >>

Abortion Bill Seeks Ultrasound Requirement; Lord Baby Jesus Approves

Flores and pro-ultrasound Baby Jesus.If you believe that the Lord Baby Jesus is in heaven looking out for all the unborn zygotes out there, then you'll support South Florida state Rep. Anitere Flores. She's got a bill in Tallahassee that would require women seeking abortion to get an ultrasound. To ... More >>

Slim and Slimmer

Patti Austin

The Protection Racket

And the band plays on

Letters for April 1, 2004

Criminals: We Love 'em

Cardiac Cronies

Enough waste and mismanagement to make you blow a valve

Cuts You Up

As the number of cesarean section deliveries in South Florida soars, some women use midwives to learn to trust their bodies and give birth naturally

A Screw Loose

Sein Lwin is a political expert. Medicine? Well, that's something else altogether.

Dying to Be Thin

Like other "super morbidly obese" people, Marc Patterson would do almost anything to slim down

The Best Shot at a Cure For Cancer

Cancer vaccines are the hottest thing in oncology. Dr. Howard Abel is bringing the experimental treatment to South Florida.

Taking a Scalpel to Plastic Surgery

"Body Buy Back: A Temporary Installation Reflecting on the Practice and Social Dimensions of Cosmetic Surgery"

The Straight Dope