Personally, when I go to see my doctor, whether it’s for a check-up or for an illness, I always trust what they say. I don’t have a medical degree or anything, so of course I cannot properly diagnose myself. They went to school and studied to become a doctor, which I of course, have not done. Now, it may not be the best idea to leave your health in someone’s hands, but what do I know? Yes, I know some small things here and there, but any doctor’s knowledge far exceeds mine. For example, when I separated my AC joint in my shoulder last fall during a football game, I went to see my orthopedic doctor. To fix my shoulder, I needed my orthopedics’ help and expertise; there was no way I knew myself what to do to get healthy. So naturally, I put my faith with him to help heal me. It wasn’t really a “leap of faith”, as I was used to trusting doctors, but it got me thinking; do doctors’ always know what’s best for you? Is it wise to just blindly agree with whatever they say?

My intrigue led me to a study about the effects of aspirin on your heart. Prescribing aspirin to patients in order to reduce the risk of a heart attack or stroke is a common practice among doctors that has been occurring for quite some time. However, a new study from Japan suggests that this drug isn’t all that is cracked up to be. The study that was published in the Journal of the American Heart Association observed the effects of aspirin on the heart, and the results were astonishing. The trial took around 14,000 male and female subjects between the ages of 60 and 85, and split them into to groups. One was the experimental group that took one aspirin a day, and the other was a control group. The results showed that in the first group, 58 people died due to heart related issues, and 2.77% suffered a fatal or non-fatal heart attack or stroke. In the other group, there were 57 deaths and 2.96% had a heart attack or stroke. Evidently, these results demonstrate that the aspirin had pretty much no effect in aiding the heart. Basically, doctors were giving patients telling patients to take medicine that did nothing. The numbers recorded from this experiment depict that the only differences were due to chance. This was a completely randomized experiment, and it’s results showed that aspirin did not help prevent heart problems.

When I read about this trial, I immediately thought of our discussion in class about antiarrhythmics. The aspirin and the antiarrhythmics are very similar, because on paper they seem like they should work well. As we learned, this was not the case. However, giving aspirin to patients was not as bad as the antiarrhythmics, as the antiarrhythmics were detrimental to people’s health, and the aspirin just had little effect. While it is tough to conduct a double blind placebo experiment with such things as antiarrhythmics, it is vital for any new form of treatment to be rigorously tested. This stood out to me because it demonstrated how doctors are not always correct. New information and new clinical trials occur every day, and constantly bring new information. It is imperative for one to understand that sometimes doctors do make mistakes. Now, this doesn’t mean I will not trust my highly trained doctors, but it will force me to be wary of any experimental or new procedures that one of my doctors may recommend. Consequently, in the future I will be more careful and cautious regarding medical decisions about my health. 

http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1936801

https://www.yahoo.com/health/new-study-finds-aspirin-does-not-lower-risk-of-103116286772.html