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Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
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Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#112Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
That introduction Haldane quote: > You can drop a mouse down a thousand-yard mine shaft; and, on arriving at the bottom, it gets a slight shock and walks away, provided that the ground is fairly soft. A rat is killed, a man is broken, a horse splashes. "A horse splashes". That's some mental imagery right there.
Then I wonder what would happen if a Roc fell asleep midflight…
It would fade
Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
>The fact that mice don't appear to deliberately jump off high things as a way to get down tells me that they probably do get hurt... Isn't this how bats have evolved though?
Not directly. There was one or more intermediary stage, probably jumping between trees. Outside my window, the squirrels are busy doing just that. I have a vague recollection of reading that most squirrels have evidence of trauma from falling, such as healed bone fractures.
The grey squirrels in my UK garden routinely make what we call the 'leap of death' between two trees whose upper branches are a few feet apart, at different heights. I've seen two falls - one because the target branch snapped when the squirrel landed, the other during a high-speed chase where one of the squirrels apparently mis-jumped. In both cases the squirrels fell into lower level bushes and disappeared (no subsequent bodies). It's not unusual to see a squirrel with one one useless leg but still managing to feed and get around, so I can quite believe that they can recover from a broken limb given sufficient time.
* * *
We also had a pheasant who routinely visited the garden and one day showed up with a broken leg, that survived for ages before eventually disappearing. Initially he sat quietly in the undergrowth but started hopping around and doing short flights (with clumsy landings). I put out bird seed for him and he incredibly quickly learned to hoot and flap outside my back door when he was hungry. He once followed me into my shed when he was expecting feeding and had to be shoo'd out.
Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#115> Only two options exist. The first is that we accept that, under exceptional circumstances, common sense might be applied when considering the potential risks and benefits of interventions. The second is that we continue our quest for the holy grail of exclusively evidence based interventions and preclude parachute use outside the context of a properly conducted trial. Both options may be true for different cases. I…
Both options may be true for different cases. That's option one. Or do you insist on some particular definition of exceptional circumstances?
It’s like the difference between civil law and criminal law. In civil law the balance of probabilities is used. In criminal law the accusation should be proved beyond reasonable doubt.
Option one means treating something like civil law cases. Option two means treating it like criminal law cases.
Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#116Unclear why this is in the bmj. Might be of use to students learning how to structure a paper?
It's a follow-up to a previous satire, which questioned whether or not we need RCTs for time-tested, common-sense interventions. The original paper suggested that the most die-hard EBM fans organize and participate in a RCT of the parachute. Several years later, tongue planted firmly in cheek, they did.
https://healthjournalism.org/blog/2019/02/breakthrough-resea...
Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#117Honest question: is this satire or gpt?
It's a satirical response to a well-known prior paper critiquing Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM) that essentially said "we have no evidence to support the use of parachutes, so we should re-evaluate our use of parachutes", and concluded with a suggestion that people demanding evidence for simple things should themselves participate in a randomized controlled trial of the parachute.
Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#118Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
Makes me wonder if a bunch of the world's smallest flightless mammal (a fraction of the house mouse's mass) were released at altitude, would they survive? (Not proposing that this be done but thought experiments and/or simulations): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Etruscan_shrew
At altitude it's very cold, the shrews don't work well in the cold due to the same thing that makes them suitable for this experiment - they are very small, thus they lose heat to the environment easily. So, it's possible they freeze to death first. But yes, I imagine that if they survive the cold and aren't falling onto a hard surface (e.g. they land in grass, not a car park) they would survive. For them other than…
Research is obviously warranted on the possibility of shrew blankets that can automatically detach when they touch down.
Re: Parachute use to prevent death, trauma when jumping from aircraft (2018) [pdf]
#120> individuals were screened for inclusion in the PArticipation in RAndomized trials Compromised by widely Held beliefs aboUt lack of Treatment Equipoise (PARACHUTE) trial. Brilliant.
I learned a new word, "equipoise". That is, there an ethical dilemma when conducting a controlled trial: it's not ethical to withhold treatment from the control group, if the treatment is already known to work. You'd be basically sacrificing peoples' health for the sake of trial results - to get data that's not worth much (since the treatment is already known to work). This seems to be a big issue in medical trials.