Hektoen International

A Journal of Medical Humanities

Tag: data

  • Fraudulent medical research and “zombie articles”

    Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden   A misleadingly scaled pictogram, in which there seem to be more bananas collected than the other fruits. “Pictograph not aligned and different size” by Smallman12q on Wikimedia. CC BY-SA 3.0. A correctly scaled pictogram, in which the fruit icons are of nearly equal size. “Pictograph aligned and similar size” by…

  • Mortality data, risk probability, and the psychology of assent in the enlightenment smallpox debate

    David Spadafora Pinehurst, North Carolina   Nicolas de Largillière, Portrait of Voltaire, ca. 1724. Source. The present health crisis is hardly the first to provoke significant controversy about preventing and treating widespread disease. Debate over epidemic-related data, its reliability, and its uses has a long history. So does concern about the psychological elements involved in…

  • Atrocities in Asia: Japan’s infamous Unit 731

    Howard Fischer Uppsala, Sweden   Bayonet practice, wherein Japanese soldiers used dead Chinese for targets. photographed by an Associated Press photographer near Tientsin. Date, 5 September 1937. Source, LIFE, Oct 11, 1937. page 30. Via Wikimedia In 1931 the Japanese army occupied the province of Manchuria in north-east China and continued to invade and occupy…

  • Terminal digit preference

    Marshall Lichtman  Rochester, New York, United States   Figure 1. There are three types of sphygmomanometer; mercury, aneroid, and digital. This figure is of a manual aneroid sphygmomanometer. The rubber pump is used to raise the cuff pressure above the patient’s systolic pressure and then the pressure is released by unscrewing slowly the small valve…

  • Ebola on this side

    Elisabeth Preston-Hsu Atlanta, Georgia, United States   “Ebola in the Dark.” Drawing by Elisabeth Preston-Hsu, 2019, private collection In September 2014, my husband Chris boarded a plane from Atlanta, Georgia for the Democratic Republic of Congo, his first trip to Africa for work. We had just moved back to Atlanta two months before when he…

  • Camus, Meursault, and the Biopsychosocial model

    Liam ButchartStony Brook, New York Since the development of medical literature studies in the 1970s, the field has grown and expanded in many fascinating ways.1 For example, courses in medical schools now encourage students to examine their own biases and emotional responses, and medical literature scholars emphasize the educational and clinical value of learning to…

  • The impact of technology on healthcare

    Singh Yadav Tamil Nadu, India   Double doors swing open as paramedics rush a burn victim into the hospital’s Emergency Department. A nurse checks the patient’s pulse and vitals, while another takes a blood sample and deposits it to a nearby machine. A scanning device determines the wound size and depth and guides an attached…