Thanx Wonder...
Just a quick comment about this quote in the Polish article:
He (who?) also did a statistical review of 1,026 operations (REVIEW not REPORT is this relevant?) and determined that the risk of surgery in patients of the Jehovah's Witness group was not substantially higher than for others [6, 13]
"Who" refers to Dr. Cooley in this context. The reference is to the Dixon/Smalley article and does not cite the Colley 'review' itself:
6. Dixon JL, Smalley MG. Jehovah's Witnesses the surgical/ethical challenge. JAMA. 1981;246:2471–2.
The next quote in the Polish article also cites the Dixon/Smalley article:
Similarly, DeBakey communicated that in the vast majority of situations involving Witnesses, the risk of operation without the use of blood transfusions was no greater than in those patients on whom he used blood transfusions [6].
This is what theDixon/Smalley article actually said:
Similarly, Michael E. DeBakey, MD,
communicated "that in the great
majority of situations [involving Wit
nesses] the risk of operation without
the use of blood transfusions is no
greater than in those patients on
whom we use blood transfusions"
(personal communication, March
1981).
So here we have evidence that this 'evidence based' article really doesn't have evidence at all - all it has is the word of two WT men who claim that the reviews/reports said what they say the report/reviews said. That is all. Hearsay evidence.
Constructed 'evidence'. Not backed up by evidence simply because the evidence isn't accessible. We have no way whatsoever of testing those claims. We have no way of knowing what those report/reviews left out.
What is really weird about all this is that these citations have been accepted by peer reviewed journals. Nobody has challenged the Dixon/Smalley claims. Nobody has demanded proper citation and reference to original reports/reviews themselves.
I want to see those 2 reports. I want to read them for myself. I want to know the context of the conclusions and what the reports actually said. I want to see the statistical analysis. Scientific investigation demands that. Without those reports being produced, the interpretations of the WT men do not stand the rigors of scientific investigation.
Wonderofyou, I will have to spend some time reading the entire article...and chasing down the citations. Thank you for posting it.