The Mocking Bird

I can still hear the mocking bird. [Meniere’s removes the low pitched sounds, age the high.]

Each morning that I summon the courage to walk slowly up that slight rise in the road to where it crests at Star View Lane, I can hear the mocking bird with my tired right ear.  One can easily recognize other birds by their limited repertoire of songs, and while the mocking bird may occasionally repeat a phrase it finds interesting, it soon tires and begins a never ending, rarely repeating song … full of melodic and rhythmic invention unmatched by the best human composers.  It is then we know it is a mocking bird.  We must resort to violins, trumpets and tympani to enhance our performances!  But … to us the most evocative sound is still the human voice …. singing of life, love, lust or loss … 

Watch out for scare %ages!

According to a new study, regular use of benzodiazepines -- which include medications such as Valium (diazepam), Ativan (lorazepam), Xanax (alprazolam) and Klonopin (clonazepam) -- is associated with as much as a 51 percent increased risk for Alzheimer's among people who use the drugs for three months or more.

This is not the first study to suggest a link between use of this class of drugs and increased dementia risk. Another study published in 2012, also in BMJ, followed 1,063 elderly individuals for 20 years. The researchers in that study determined that the risk for dementia was 4.8 per 100 person-years among people who took benzodiazepines versus 3.2 per 100 person-years in the group not taking the drugs.

Here, if one increases the number 3.2 by 50% (1.6), they get 4.8.   However, the real increase is just 1.6 (100 person-years), 1.6%.

Another study reported on by a reviewer said that an increase of 1 person in 10,000 to 3 persons per 10,000 was a threefold increase, or 300%! Wrong! The correct increase is 0.0001 to 0.0003, or an increase of 0.02%.