Andrea K. Westby, MD
The practice of medicine—the traditions, diagnoses, treatments, and guidelines—is ever-changing, with new research and information flowing into clinical care at a pace that rivals the turbulence and abundance of a mountain stream in the spring. We now acknowledge human papillomavirus infection as the primary driver of cervical and now oropharyngeal cancer. Hormone replacement therapy is no longer routinely recommended for postmenopausal women. Rate control is preferred over rhythm control in atrial fibrillation. Prostate cancer screening is no longer reflexively ordered for adult men.
However, as we look back at the past hundred years, our profession has been glacially slow to release the vice grip that the concept of biological race has had on our science and our medical practice.
STFM Blog 