SUBJECTS medical theories

The correlates of attitudes toward lithium compliance in bipolar patients were studied by Cochran and Gitlin (189). This questionnaire study was part of a larger design looking at factors in lithium prophylaxis. The questionnaire packets were sent to 146 patients, 48 of whom were ultimately included in the analysis. This study evaluated the usefulness of Ajzen and Fishbein s Theory of Reasoned Action to explain the relationships among lithium-related beliefs and attitudes, normative beliefs, behavioral intentions, and self-reported compliance with treatment. According to the model, lithium patients normative beliefs (i.e., beliefs that other relevant people such as family, friends, personal psychiatrist, and lithium experts want the patient to take lithium) predict their subjective norms, which is the expectation that others want them to take lithium. Subsequently, both the subjective norm and the evaluative behavioral attitudes (i.e., positive nature of treatment) were predictive of the patients reported intent to take lithium. This, in turn, was predictive of concurrent self-reported compliance with the medication regimen. These results underscore the importance of the patient-physician relationship in lithium compliance. 

The Federal Rules of Evidence (ERE) were adopted in 1975. Subsequently most states (at least 37) have adopted their own codified rules of evidence modeled closely on the FRE. For scientific evidence, the most relevant of the Rules are found in Article VII of the FRE in a section known as Opinions and Expert Testimony. Prior to 1993, some federal appellate courts had applied Rule 702 of the Federal Rules of Evidence to medical and scientific experts. (Rule 702 authorizes scientific testimony whenever it will assist the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to determine a fact in issue.) In 1993, in Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc., 509 US 579, the Supreme Court of the United States issued an important interpretation of Rule 702. Seven of the nine justices ruled that judges must serve as evidentiary gatekeepers who determine whether proffered evidence is scientifically valid and relevant. The Court suggested several factors for judges to consider in determining whether to admit a particular theory or technique Is the theory or hypothesis testable Has it been tested Has the theory or technique been subjected to peer review and publication For a particular scientific technique or methodology, what is the known or potential rate of error What (if any) are the standards that control the technique s operation To what extent is the theory or technique generally accepted in the scientific community ... 

These are but a few of the possibilities for antiviral agents. Many more lie in the myriad plant substances called phytochemicals or plant chemicals, a subject that is part of medical folklore. It does not take long to see why there is dissension about the complete role of nutrients and foreign substances in body biochemistry, in that it has not all been figured out yet, at least not in commonly accepted terms and theories. In other words, the completed rationale hasn t made its way into the treatises and textbooks. 

In theory, the loeal ehemieal soeieties could have become nuclei of a national society. But in the reading eireles ehemistry was just a subject of study, and not the eore of the professional identity of the participants. They were pharmacists in the first plaee. When Duteh government in 1841 installed an official commission to prepare pharmaeeutieal reforms, eonsisting of medical doctors only. 

Pierre Thouvenel (Lorraine, 1747-Paris, 38 February 1815), General Inspector of Mineral Waters in France, fugitive to Italy in the Revolution, physician to Louis XVIII on the Restoration, published on animal nutrition, on mucous bodies and on medical chemistry, and was the first French author to write on galvanism. He made analyses of cantharides and woodlice and with his brother wrote a prize essay on saltpetre (see p. 466) Pierre Thouvenel also gained a prize on this subject. Rewrote on the phlogistic and antiphlogistic theories. ... 

However, there were downsides to this theory. One problem can be related to Kuhn s criterion two, consistency the three-principle system was a local theory, popular and useful only in medical and alchemical practice, and fundamentally different from the larger framework of natural philosophy. Even alchemists themselves often tended to look at the tria prima pragmatically, rather than philosophically. Another problem was related to Kuhn s criterion one, accuracy, and referred to the degree of experimental precision alchemists were not able to obtain the pure principles in the laboratory, as there were always traces of the other principles in them [13]. Thirdly, the tria prima was not a standardised account. Variations on the subject seemed endless [14]. 

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