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Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

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Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#121
post #98
post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That we still find new structures within our own bodies should be deeply troubling to anyone in the medical sciences. I for one would be deeply ashamed if I suddenly found that bytes had a ninth bit we never suspected was there in the first place.

Our field is vastly simpler than medicine. We're working on the edge of theory and practice is much, much, much messier. Cut it out with the arrogance. http://johnsalvatier.org/blog/2017/reality-has-a-surprising-...

Agreed. Though, to be fair, I have met my share of arrogant medical practitioners.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#122
post #68

I find this weirdly amazing, as to this day I was reading some medical news and documentaries where it was said that entire human bodies were sliced by millimetre slices. So, somehow I always imagined that each part of body and tissue is 100% known and that only left is to find out what are inner workings on the nano-meter scale, deep molecular levels or genetic level. But in 2018 there was a similar news about Inter…

That we still find new structures within our own bodies should be deeply troubling to anyone in the medical sciences. I for one would be deeply ashamed if I suddenly found that bytes had a ninth bit we never suspected was there in the first place.

Nobody really knows how computers work.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#123
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've suspected for some time that medicine is actually closer to the dark ages than we like to think it is What does that even mean? Nobody's claiming that modern medicine is anywhere close to perfect but the "dark ages" medicine was Humorism, blood letting and faith healing. Surgeons didn't start washing their hands before childbirth until the 19th century. It's really weird to look back at the mind-boggling progr…

Imagine the following. Here's the spectrum of medical knowledge: ----------------------------------------- Here's where we were in the dark ages: --|-------------------------------------- Here's where we are now: -------|--------------------------------- Here's where people like to think we are: ------------------|---------------------- In this scenario it seems like what you're saying and what your parent said are b…

Along these lines I've heard it said that "Doctors don't heal anyone. The get them to the point where their bodies can heal themselves." Sure, there are some exceptions where the body literally can't heal itself, like reattaching something, but the sentiment holds true most of the time.

In another discussion bred from boredom where some friends and I were trying to define entire fields of study in a single sentence (Economics is the allocation of scarcity) one doctor said, "Medicine is about controlling swelling." His response (he was a surgeon) kind of made your point that we imagine that doctors are fixing things and he is saying that he spent most of his time trying to get the body to make it better and not worse.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#124
It's worth noting, for the sake of everyone here in the comments on a tl;dr tanget, that the organ is absolutely not new or 'mysterious' in the least. There are a pair of salivary glands at the back of the nose in a place no-one thought to look at them. They were discovered because they accumulated radioactive glucose, like the other salivary glands, to an extent that was visible when a fairly new and sophisticated scanning technique was used. They revealed macroscopic structure upon examination in two cadavers.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#125
post #85

I find this weirdly amazing, as to this day I was reading some medical news and documentaries where it was said that entire human bodies were sliced by millimetre slices. So, somehow I always imagined that each part of body and tissue is 100% known and that only left is to find out what are inner workings on the nano-meter scale, deep molecular levels or genetic level. But in 2018 there was a similar news about Inter…

We know there's stuff there, but we don't necessarily know what all of it does. In this case the tissue in question was probably thought to be part of a known larger structure, but now it turns out it has a distinct function. Slices aren't going to tell you that.

On top of that, not every one has the same tissues in the same places, or the same tissues at all. Most famous is the palmaris longus muscle in the arm.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palmaris_longus_muscle

~14% of humans lack this muscle.

Other deviations range from colorblindness all the way to lack of a cerebellum entirely.

Humans are quite variable, even when healthy.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#126
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've suspected for some time that medicine is actually closer to the dark ages than we like to think it is What does that even mean? Nobody's claiming that modern medicine is anywhere close to perfect but the "dark ages" medicine was Humorism, blood letting and faith healing. Surgeons didn't start washing their hands before childbirth until the 19th century. It's really weird to look back at the mind-boggling progr…

Imagine the following. Here's the spectrum of medical knowledge: ----------------------------------------- Here's where we were in the dark ages: --|-------------------------------------- Here's where we are now: -------|--------------------------------- Here's where people like to think we are: ------------------|---------------------- In this scenario it seems like what you're saying and what your parent said are b…

I have to agree with this. Before I have to exhaust all the medical resources, in my mind, when people get sick, they go see a doctor, the doctor prescribes medicine, and medicine fixes problems. But in reality we're still largely relying on our own defense, e.g. COVID. We rarely have a drug that directly fixes our problem.

I started having really bad insomnia more than a year ago. I went to see a bunch of doctors. Initially, I was given low dosage sleeping pills, which didn't help much. I went to a hospital to get a CT scan because I was having mad headaches, which my family doctor wouldn't refer me. The scan was normal. Finally, I found a doctor who's willing to refer me MRI scan. After waiting for couple of months, the result didn't turn up anything again. Keep in mind I've been suffering 2 - 3 hours sleep a day all these time. I also did sleep study, and sleep study mostly care about sleep apnea, so they couldn't identify any causes again. Then I went to see a psychiatrist, more sleeping pills, which are really antidepressants. Eventually, after a long wait, I was referred to a neurologist and sleep specialist. I've done so much research on sleep medicine at this point, I already knew what he's gonna prescribe me - sleep restriction therapy. That didn't really help altho I gave up after trying for two weeks. I intend to try it again but I can't attempt it now that I'm back to work. So one year later, I'm still messed up with no known cause.

I know insomnia in my case is not a traditional disease, but it goes to show you that if you're not having one of the common diseases then you're shit out of luck.

The human body's extremely complex, but instead of using proper debugging tools, doctors are mostly relying on "console logs" or "print statements". Even if a root cause is identified, often time we don't have the necessary tools to fix the problems.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#127
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to look far in health policy to see the lunacy of modern medicine. Using nuclear radiation to "cure" cancer. Giving patients highly addictive narcotics for pain relief. Giving patients broad-spectrum antibiotics. And don't get me started on the insanity of current events, with mass over-use of disinfectants, conflicting and dubious public health guidelines (Covid 19 spreads 3M in Europe but only 6ft. i…

How do you decide to attribute something to "modern medicine" versus "The Game of Telephone, Medical Style"? For example, >Giving patients highly addictive narcotics for pain relief. Is the opioid epidemic modern medicine 's fault? Or is it more the fault of doctors who over-prescribe coupled with the lack of a sane healthcare system? Also, are there viable (read: equally effective) alternatives to opioids for pain r…

If by modern medicine you mean only "the best conclusions derived from the best meta-analyses based on the best evidence" then very little of what any doctor does is grounded in that.

I wouldn't call that medicine. I'd call that, maybe, "research biomedical science".

I think OP's comment is precisely that the practice of medicine has very little to do with what top-quality research would prescribe, and is more like medieval reasoning (like causes like, etc.).

Of course the reason behind this is that we dont have much top-quality research; and what "research" we often have is poorly executed and ambiguous (if honest).

What we "need" is 10k "disposable humans" manufactured on-demand, for 100k RCT experiments. What we have is often much closer to astrology.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#128
post #68

I find this weirdly amazing, as to this day I was reading some medical news and documentaries where it was said that entire human bodies were sliced by millimetre slices. So, somehow I always imagined that each part of body and tissue is 100% known and that only left is to find out what are inner workings on the nano-meter scale, deep molecular levels or genetic level. But in 2018 there was a similar news about Inter…

That we still find new structures within our own bodies should be deeply troubling to anyone in the medical sciences. I for one would be deeply ashamed if I suddenly found that bytes had a ninth bit we never suspected was there in the first place.

You assume all bytes are eight bits, but that hasn’t always been the case. Machines with variable byte sizes were relatively common in the 70s and early 80s. This is why so many RFCs use the word octet instead of byte.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#129
post #12

It seems almost unbelievable that in this day and age we could have missed something like this. In my opinion, it put modern medicine into perspective. I've suspected for some time that medicine is actually closer to the dark ages than we like to think it is, and this report seems like a good validation of that notion.

> I've suspected for some time that medicine is actually closer to the dark ages than we like to think it is What does that even mean? Nobody's claiming that modern medicine is anywhere close to perfect but the "dark ages" medicine was Humorism, blood letting and faith healing. Surgeons didn't start washing their hands before childbirth until the 19th century. It's really weird to look back at the mind-boggling progr…

For one thing, it feels like we're still very much not confident with anything at all because everything has to be tested in real humans, in real time, before it's considered a valid treatment (clinical trials). I understand why clinical trials are needed — because otherwise we'd still be using mysterious compounds and procedures without having a clue if they actually work — but I believe that at some point we'd become so advanced with knowing how the human body works that we won't have to do that, and so could progress much, much faster, while knowing that our treatments work, and theoretically, instead of experimentally, proving that they should work.

Re: Researchers discover new salivary glands in the human head

#130
post #12

It seems almost unbelievable that in this day and age we could have missed something like this. In my opinion, it put modern medicine into perspective. I've suspected for some time that medicine is actually closer to the dark ages than we like to think it is, and this report seems like a good validation of that notion.

> I've suspected for some time that medicine is actually closer to the dark ages than we like to think it is What does that even mean? Nobody's claiming that modern medicine is anywhere close to perfect but the "dark ages" medicine was Humorism, blood letting and faith healing. Surgeons didn't start washing their hands before childbirth until the 19th century. It's really weird to look back at the mind-boggling progr…

I'm of the same mind. The way in which new antibiotics are identified for example.
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