Why Dont You Blog?

Heather wrote yesterday about some woo-like nonsense published in the opinion piece of the Nursing Times. Basically, the article said that obese patients were the cause of nurses back injuries. It was one of those wonderful articles that the print media so love. It had the air of self evident logic and attacked the current social demons (fat people). I am surprised it hasn’t been syndicated out to the Daily Mail (etc).

I had two main problems with the article (obviously lots of minor ones…). First, and most basic, the author of the article makes many, unsupported, assumptions. Statistical correlations supporting their claims are not shown (if they exist) so I have no idea where they drew the data for the claim made. It is shocking that being told “there is no evidence to suggest a link” was viewed as simply meaning more research is required. While continued research into every field of human endeavour would be fantastic, the line has to be drawn every now and then.

Popularity: 45% [?]

Popularity: 45% [?]

This week’s guest publication is Nursing Times.
It has a Comment article with the heading “It is fair to assume a link between back injury and nurses and patient obesity.” Well, after reading it, you would have to say “it isn’t fair to assume ..etc” There is no evidence in the article to support that conclusion.

It’s getting blogged here just because the argument typifies the increasingly common demonisation of fat people on spurious medical grounds, but from a new direction- obesity isn’t just dangerous to oneself- it threatens others.

The writer refers to HSE statistics on rates of back disorders suffered by nurses and nursing auxiliaries. If one actually examines the HSE data, the rates (31 per 100,000 for nurses and 44 per 100,000 for nursing auxiliaries, in the period from 2003/2005) come with such huge confidence intervals as to be little more than generally indicative of the comparative risks of different jobs. There is no evidence presented here to suggest that these rates are notably higher than those in previous years but this would surely be the first requirement, if the figures are to support an argument that patients are getting heavier and, therefore, healthcare workers are getting injured more.

Popularity: 43% [?]

Popularity: 43% [?]