Emergency Physician, Educator, Researcher, interested in the microbiome, evolution, and medicine
The 2016 ISEMPH meeting held in Durham, North Carolina, just finished up today. We had over 250 attendees from a dozen countries (at least) and great representation by physicians, nurses, evolutionary biologists, anthropologists, evolutionary psychologists, historians, science writers, residents, and graduate students. I was happy to see old friends and […]
Recent discoveries have highlighted the importance of the human microbiome to human health in 1) shaping normal gastrointestinal and immune development, 2) regulation of healthy body weight, 3) prevention of gut and other infections, 4) providing necessary vitamins, 5) influencing mood and normal brain function. These insights have led some […]
A recent study showed that germ free mice have altered olfactory epithelial development and function. This makes sense if one of the functions of olfaction is to detect and direct responses to the microbiome. (Alternatively, advocates of the super-organism concept of microbiome-host evolution might view this as microbes assisting the […]
Currently, there is space for novel evolutionary approaches in medicine because most physicians are not taught to think (or communicate) in terms of natural selection, adaptation, and evolutionary trade-offs. If the medical community is given concrete examples how evolution can improve health care, I expect that things will change rapidly. […]
Helen Wasielewski and Athena Aktipis and I recently published “Resource conflict and cooperation between human host and gut microbiota: implications for nutrition and health” in Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. We explored the idea that that human fitness is not always be perfectly aligned with the fitness […]
This entry builds on the last post, which criticized overzealous antibiotic use. I argued that antibiotics are more harmful than good in self-limiting infections, and gave an evidence-based rationale for withholding antibiotics. Many of the arguments against antibiotics relate to negative effects on the microbiota. If killing part of our […]
The discovery of penicillin by Alexander Fleming ranks as perhaps the most important medical discovery of all time. Certainly antibiotics are one of the most powerful lifesaving tools in a physician’s toolkit. As we know, power can corrupt, and the indiscriminate use of antibiotics comes with a variety of downsides. […]
About 30% of the US population gets an annual doctor exam. But what is the benefit of getting a check-up if you feel otherwise healthy? What does evidence-based (and evolutionary) medicine suggest you should do?
Drugs derived from microorganisms have a long history of use in medicine. One example is Streptokinase, derived from a strain of Streptococcus sp., which was found to be useful in treating patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI). The clot busting drug Streptokinase is essentially a bacterially derived enzyme that converts […]
Imperfect Reproductions Our huge heads make birth painful. Mother and fetus battle for nutrients. Sometimes evolution settles for ‘good enough.’
EvolutionMedicine 