Announcer:
0:00
Welcome to the MedEvidence! Monday Minute Radio Show hosted by Kevin Gettings of WSOS St Augustine Radio and powered by Encore Research Group. Each Monday morning, Dr. Michael Koren calls in to bring you the latest medical updates with insightful discussions. Medevidence MedEvidence! is where we help you navigate the real truth behind medical research, with both a clinical and research perspective. So sit back, relax and get ready to learn about the truth behind the data in medicine and healthcare. This is MedEvidence!
Kevin Geddings:
0:30
Dr. Michael Koren joining me live on the studio line. Of course, he is our medical doctor, who's part of our family here, cardiologist research scientist and heads up the show at ENCORE Research Group and their offices here in St. Augustine in the Whetstone Building. And he's also very involved in a website we'll talk about a little bit later called MedEvidence. com
Kevin Geddings:
1:19
Dr. Koren is with us, though, and we wanted to talk a little bit about the legitimacy right of clinical trials and research and what goes into that. Just a little bit, right.
Dr. Michael Koren:
1:30
Yeah, yeah. So each week you and I talk about what the quote "theme of our conversation will be and I do a little free association when we come up with those ideas. And we had the Saturday Night Live 50th anniversary this weekend and it's also President's Day. So in my free-association mind frame I said, okay, what happened 50 years ago in science and how is that related to a president?
Dr. Michael Koren:
1:59
And it turns out there's a very interesting story that I think is relevant for today and relevant for people who are considering participating in clinical research, and that's the story of a very famous person in our world called David Baltimore, Dr. David Baltimore, and he was president of Rockefeller University, which is a very elite think tank that's part of Cornell Medical Center, and I actually spent a fair amount of time at Rockefeller University when I was a cardiology fellow doing data analysis for some research that I was doing. So it's something that personally resonates with me, and David was the president at that time, but he also resigned his position at that time because of a scandal. So let me explain a little bit more about the scandal. So David Baltimore is very famous in that he won the Nobel Prize in medicine in 1975, which is 50 years ago and he won it for discovering that viruses can cause tumors and he figured out the mechanism by which that occurs, and this was considered an absolute breakthrough, an important way of understanding how viruses affect our body and ultimately
Dr. Michael Koren:
3:11
trying to figure out if that knowledge will turn into cures for viruses, which there has been some success with. But at the same time, he was working with a group of people that we call postdocs. These are people that have gotten their PhDs, that are still working in the laboratory, of people who have gotten their PhDs that are still working in the laboratory, and one of them was a woman, a scientist named Imanishi Kari I think I pronounced that correct, Imanishi Kari who was accused of fraudulent behavior by another postdoc in the lab, and this was related to the fact that Dr. Imanishi Kari would make notes in her book, and those notes didn't seem to be the exact same information that it turns out to be in a published publication. These are very famous publications. So this scandal went on and on for many, many years and at the end of the day, all the work that Dr. Baltimore did in his lab with Dr. Imanishi Kari was validated. It was found to be accurate, but there was still concerns about the note-keeping and whether or not that was all done correctly.
Dr. Michael Koren:
4:16
So this was investigated by Congress and there was multiple news stories about it, and what happened in light of all this is that the standards for research got even more strict. So nowadays, Kevin, when we do research, all the data points are looked at by two or three people and verified before we put them in a computer database, and me and the other physicians have to verify each data point in a computer record. So there's this incredibly exacting process before any data goes into a database, which ultimately goes to the FDA and ultimately goes to scientific publications, in part based on this story related to Dr. Baltimore. So I think it's a fascinating part of what we do and also should be a level of assurance for people that we take this data incredibly seriously. We take the accuracy of the information incredibly seriously and because of all this, research is an incredibly nurturing process for people in which all the details are looked at very carefully.
Kevin Geddings:
5:19
Yeah, absolutely, and it also gives us, who are not involved in it at that level right, some degree of confidence in the results.
Dr. Michael Koren:
5:27
Absolutely, and that's so important and that really is the crux of the matter, which is that when we make scientific conclusions or present data, it's gone through really a crucible of evaluation. So we know that at least the facts that go into our conclusions are accurate.
Kevin Geddings:
5:49
Let's talk a little bit before I let you go about MedE vidence! That's a great resource in this period of people questioning everything online, right?
Dr. Michael Koren:
5:57
Yeah, it's so interesting from a number of points of view, but the truth is that you put something into Google or your favorite search engine, which is now AI-driven these days, and the answer you get is driven by algorithms. And you have to question who designed these algorithms and whether or not the algorithms are set up to move your thought process in one direction or another, and the unfortunate truth is that, in fact, those algorithms do exactly that. So what we're trying to do with that evidence is create something that's objective, and the best way of doing that, in my view, is to have two knowledgeable physicians, or two knowledgeable people discuss the issues in detail, and then people can glean the insights from that conversation and realize what's true, what's not true or, in many cases, what we don't know, so that people can make good decisions for themselves and their family.
Kevin Geddings:
6:57
Yeah, absolutely. Well. Once again, check out the website. It's intuitive, very easy to use. The information is presented in a variety of different formats, depending on whether you're at the gym or just driving. We encourage you to learn more by going to medevidence. com that's medevidence. c om so you can get the truth behind all this data that's swirling around out there on the Internet. Dr. Michael Koren, any closing thoughts before we let you go on this President's Day.
Dr. Michael Koren:
7:22
Enjoy President's Day and hopefully come by the office and learn more about clinical research. I think people that take that step and discover it will really appreciate the fact that they're a part of this incredible process to get the truth out, and we do value our subjects and we value their participation, so give us a call.
Kevin Geddings:
7:41
There you go, Dr. Michael Koren, once again, encoredocs. com, the website we want you to check out, encoredocs. com.
