WHAT DOES EFFECTIVENESS HAVE TO DO WITH ANYTHING?:

No fountain of youth in pills and patches, study shows (MIKE STOBBE, 10/19/06, Associated Press)

Widely used DHEA supplements and testosterone patches failed to deliver their touted anti-aging benefits in one of the first rigorous studies to test such claims in older men and women.

The substances did not improve the participants' strength, their physical performance, or certain other measures of health.

“I don't think there's any case for administering these” to elderly people, said Dr. K. Sreekumaran Nair of the Mayo Clinic, lead author of the study, published in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.

The case is the same as for the whole moder pharmacopia: egotism and the bottom line.

Posted by Orrin Judd at October 19, 2006 12:00 AM