Two patients can have identical knee x-rays/MRIs - loss of joint space and osteophyte formation etc. But one has pain and the other does not. Do they both have osteoarthritis? They clearly don't have the same dis-ease.
Patient don't care about having cartilage or bone sclerosis or subchondral cyst formation; they care about pain that stops them moving (which in turn can increase their weight further exacerbating the joint issues).
So, osteoarthritis is a problem in that it causes pain. If something specifically reduces osteoarthritic pain, I am okay with it saying it 'beats' the dis-ease.
The issue that people have here is whether being a pain-killer merely masks the disease temporarily and leads to people ignoring the problem and hence aggravating the disease even more. Pain is usually a signal of a real and valid problem.
I am merely explaining what the issue at hand is - I am not saying that is what the proposed medicine does. Another way to say it, is the compound treating the symptom or the problem - or perhaps both.
Imagine you have a hernia that hurts and you take medicine that masks that pain, do you still have hernia?
It is dose dependent. Use of low powered US for a short period is safe. If you increase power, you can cause damage - either to to break kidney stones as you say, or, when focussed properly, burn bits of the brain to treat tremors.
It depends on one's definition of "safe". Yes, smaller doses will have less of an impact.
I'm simply stating that ultrasound does impact the body. Despite the innocuous sounding name referencing 'sound', it is less like music and more like a microwave, capable of breaking kidney stones, burning tumors.
Re the most common usage, I don't think lots of scans in pregnancy can be beneficial. Perhaps one or 2 scans are worth the risk in special circumstances. Present day scanning machines are way more powerful than historical ones; the dose is not getting safer.
Capable of, but the ultrasound used for that is focused, higher intensity and in bursts.
I mean if you want to fearmonger, there's plenty more examples of things that can cause damage if used in a different way, like water, air, electricity, light, etc.
You seem to want to claim that any use of ultrasound is dangerous, but you fail to provide evidence, you just bring in extreme cases and try to claim equivalence. I'm sure there's a fancy sounding fallacy name for that.
What I am saying that it is agreed that ultrasound does have an impact.
The failure in the provision of evidence, is with those that claim it is safe. Its not for me to prove it is harmful.
Ask yourself, how can a treatment that breaks kidney stones or burn tumours also be 'safe'? It may be that the impact is negligible, but that is not safe. In the womb especially, a slight impact may have a large effect on a growing foetus.
Ask yourself too, what level of radiation is safe? How much microwaving? Is any?
So am I fearmongering, or is this a valid concern? I think it is clearly a valid concern. I do not simply accept medical consensus over the reasoning of my own mind.
I can see use cases where the information that is provided by ultrasound is useful and outweighs the risk. I think that casual, repeated usage of ultrasound for pregnant women, for the 'gender reveal'/colour scans or whatever, with powerful machines, is ill advised though. I don't recommend anyone undertake any unnecessary medical procedures.
I also think that an adult that has awareness of the scope of a potential impact, can do what they want - its their choice to do as they want. I object to inflicting avoidable harm (albeit the harm might not be obvious) to individuals that cannot consent - eg infants, foetuses.
FWIW, I do have kids, and - to my regret - I did scan them before they were born. I wouldn't do it now, knowing what I do.
>FWIW, I do have kids, and - to my regret - I did scan them before they were born. I wouldn't do it now, knowing what I do.
Why are you acting like you have scientific consensus behind what you're saying? There is literally zero proof of anything you're claiming.
>So am I fearmongering, or is this a valid concern?
You're fearmongering. That's it. Nothing else. It's the same kind of attitude that has led to such a self-important, 'I know better than doctors' attitude about vaccines.
> The first mention that ultrasound could be used to produce images of the foetal head was probably in a lecture given by Ian Donald in 1959. Since that time, the use of ultrasound in obstetrics has grown rapidly, and has a generally accepted excellent safety record. However, it is impossible to prove zero risk, and the absence of evidence of harm should not be taken as evidence of absence of harm. The epidemiological evidence that exists is reassuring as to the safety of routine ultrasound scanning, but of necessity it only includes subjects who were imaged with devices that were state of the art at the time (mostly early 1980s). No pulsed Doppler or colour flow examinations are included, and the output from modern ultrasound scanners is considerably higher today than it was at that time. It is, therefore, essential to remain vigilant, and to assess new technologies and applications from a safety aspect as they arise.
So TL;DR: Ultrasound is safe, the benefits outweigh the risks by a large margin, and we should always insist that Ultrasound, and any modern medical technology is held to rigorous scientific testing standards.
Agree in principle with remote diagnostics in this way. But, the number of acute illnesses that can be diagnosed with US and can/should be treated at home is fairly small. Pneumonia cannot be detected by US unless it is up against the chest wall (or perhaps if it causes excess fluid in the pleural space). An otitis media diagnosis would not be possible with US. Appendicitis can be seen with US but it is very operator-dependent and asking parents to fish around for the appendix would be a big ask (even with some rather advanced AI assistance). You can certainly find enlarged lymph nodes but fingers are often just as good.
Patient don't care about having cartilage or bone sclerosis or subchondral cyst formation; they care about pain that stops them moving (which in turn can increase their weight further exacerbating the joint issues).
So, osteoarthritis is a problem in that it causes pain. If something specifically reduces osteoarthritic pain, I am okay with it saying it 'beats' the dis-ease.