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A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

bbc.com

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Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#151

Post by Aurornis »

culi wrote: post #59
throwaway_9879 wrote: post #29

The answer is "nothing" The only common factor between these patients is Dr. Marrero. It is notable that he is not the only physician who works in that clinic, but is the only one diagnosing this condition. The most likely cause is weak diagnostic skills for challenging patients. Unfortunately, a majority of these patients likely have Functional Neurologic Disorder https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/conve…

> The committee and the New Brunswick government also cast doubt on the work of neurologist Alier Marrero, who was initially referred dozens of cases by baffled doctors in the region, and subsequently identified more cases. The doctor has since become a fierce advocate for patients he feels have been neglected by the province. https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/03/canada... It seems to me that it's do…

> It seems to me that it's doctors reaching out to Marrero.

This happens a lot in medicine: One doctor becomes locally renowned for taking in patients with hard-to-diagnose issues and giving them answers, right or wrong. Other doctors take note and then start offloading their difficult patients to other doctors happy to take them in.

It happens all the time with different doctors. Once they find a niche, they start diagnosing everyone with the same thing. A common theme is that their patients don't get better, but are happy to have someone give them a diagnosis.

In the scarier cases, it's surgeons doing this. There have been some sad periods in medicine where certain doctors starting performing unnecessary surgeries on everyone who visited them with vague symptoms. These doctors are scarily popular in a certain type of Facebook health group where patients congregate looking for answers and, lo and behold, some doctor or surgeon becomes their hero with a supposed answer to all of their questions. It usually goes on for several years before everyone realizes that nobody is getting better from these doctors and nobody ever gets rejected for a diagnosis when they visit that doctor.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#152

Post by rfwhyte »

patcon wrote: post #77

I grew up in New Brunswick. It is a strange place politically. I find it wild that the BBC never mentioned the most glaring underbelly of this: New Brunswicks most significant employer for the past 100 years is Irving Oil & Irving Paper and Irving Forestry. They are different arms of a privately held family-run business, run by the descendants of the original founder (whose records are not as public as a traded compa…

The fact the BBC article doesn't even mention the Irvings is a pretty glaring omission.

The Irvings basically own NB like its their own private fiefdom, and if anyone's doing any major polluting in the province its almost certainly them.

They own politicians, they own institutions, and they have an inordinate amount of influence on provincial politics and policy, so personally I have a pretty strong suspicion they are likely responsible for this outbreak, they know they are responsible, and in order to avoid consequence, they are using their wealth and political power to shut down any further investigation into this outbreak.

Its a story as old as time honestly... Some rich bastards do some shady shit in the pursuit of even more money and power, us regular folks suffer, the rich bastards use their wealth and political power to cover it up, and around the world spins until the next act of billionaire malfeasance and none of the rich bastards are ever held accountable.

Seriously, Occam's razor to me at least makes what's going on here pretty damn self evident. What's more likely, that hundreds of people are making up a mystery illness, or that this is just yet another of the innumerable instances of billionaires polluting the earth in the pursuit of profit and making people sick in the process?

I certainly know which scenario I consider most likely.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#153

Post by whatsupdog »

nucleardog wrote: post #51
whatsupdog wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many COVID shots did you get? I noticed my resting heart rate go up after the first one. So I never got another one.

When your immune system activity increases, generally so does your heart rate. It's fairly common to get sick and have an increased heart rate. A quick search for "heart rate when sick" will turn up a number of results explaining this, the mechanisms behind it, and more. Sorry you missed out on simple, effective preventative health measures because of this misunderstanding.

It lasted over 6 months. My resting heart rate has been 52 for over 2 decades. Months after the shot it was up to 75 and stayed there for over 6 months. Slowly crept back to 52.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#154

Post by expedition32 »

VladVladikoff wrote: post #125
sevensor wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, this is also what I hear from my GP when I have no complaints at all. It’s not bad advice, but I think it’s what most doctors tell patients they deem basically healthy. Nobody gets hurt by eating fewer peanut butter cups and taking the dog for a longer walk.

On one visit to my doctor, where the issue was a sports related injury, my doctor told me to get more exercise. Obviously the advice is parroted so often she just blurted it out without thinking. She knows full well I train regularly and if anything get too much exercise.

Doctors in my country get 15 minutes per patient. Anything more and the insurance company doesn't pay.

Modern medicine is basically a factory line that never ends.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#155

Post by devmor »

OutOfHere wrote: post #131
devmor wrote: post #56

This is such a frustrating situation to read about, because it is clear that Dr. Marrero is out of his depth, but it’s also clear that whatever this cluster is - real or imagined - was horribly mismanaged by the health officials in charge. The fact that the investigation was disbanded simply because the patients had symptoms that can be tied to existing diseases is utterly asinine. As if there’s no reason to investig…

The doctor is a distraction that keeps tripping up everyone here. Once the real cause is discovered, he will move on. If a real cause is not discovered, it's probably due to an insufficient investigation, in which case the investigation should continue.

That's the problem, though. There was an in-depth investigation planned, thanks in part to that doctor. It was then cancelled by the officials in charge, with the excuse that the doctor's work was improperly conducted.

That action with that excuse was arguably more harmful than anything else in this entire story.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#156

Post by sd8f9iu »

0xbadcafebee wrote: post #72

This is a textbook case of mass hysteria. A whole lot of people in one place, all coming down with a mystery illness, with no apparent cause, and everyone has different symptoms. Instances like these have been reported multiple times in the past 20 years, as well as for thousands of years in the past. They all genuinely feel the symptoms. But the cause is clearly no physical thing in the environment.

That's not what the article says. Patients actually died, which doesn't make sense for hysteria. The study found the patients have existing known conditions, which are being mis-diagnosed by this doctor as a mystery illness. It sounds more like malpractice to me.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#157

Post by skrebbel »

whimsicalism wrote: post #150
skrebbel wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fwiw I downvoted you because you didn't even bother to specify which of the GP’s many statements you think are controversial, nor why.

fair enough. i didn't really feel like getting in a back-and-forth about ME/CFS as i find they generally never end. CFS does not appear to impact energy to engage in online arguments.

You're doing it again. Either you argue a point, or don't.

> CFS does not appear to impact energy to engage in online arguments.

Seriously man, you can't say you don't want to get in a back-and-forth and then drop flamebait like this. It's disrespectful and borderline trolling.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#158

Post by kravossedonna »

I was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease a year ago at the age of 67. For several months I had noticed tremors in my right hand and the shaking of my right foot when I was sitting. My normally beautiful cursive writing was now small, cramped printing. And I tended to lose my balance. The neurologist had me walk down the hall and said I didn't swing my right arm. I had never noticed! I was in denial for a while, as there is no history in my family of parents and five older siblings, but I had to accept I had classic symptoms. I was taking amantadine and carbidopa/levodopa and was about to start physical therapy to strengthen muscles. I used different supplements that didn't work, so last July, I tried the PD-5 protocol—the best decision ever! My tremors eased, my energy returned, and I sleep soundly. I feel like a new woman, and I can walk and exercise again. I got the PD-5 from limitlesshealthcenter. com

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#159

Post by OutOfHere »

devmor wrote: post #155
OutOfHere wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The doctor is a distraction that keeps tripping up everyone here. Once the real cause is discovered, he will move on. If a real cause is not discovered, it's probably due to an insufficient investigation, in which case the investigation should continue.

That's the problem, though. There was an in-depth investigation planned, thanks in part to that doctor. It was then cancelled by the officials in charge, with the excuse that the doctor's work was improperly conducted. That action with that excuse was arguably more harmful than anything else in this entire story.

If not that excuse, they would have come up with another excuse to not investigate. What we are missing is the reasons behind the coverup.

Re: A battle over Canada’s mystery brain disease

#160

Post by culi »

RobotToaster wrote: post #95
throwaway_9879 wrote: post #29

The answer is "nothing" The only common factor between these patients is Dr. Marrero. It is notable that he is not the only physician who works in that clinic, but is the only one diagnosing this condition. The most likely cause is weak diagnostic skills for challenging patients. Unfortunately, a majority of these patients likely have Functional Neurologic Disorder https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/conve…

FND is itself basically a trashcan diagnosis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wastebasket_diagnosis

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