Is EBM Compatible with Individualized Patient Care?
Another aspect of the EBM debate that bears close scrutiny is the question of whether it is always in the patient’s best interests to be treated according to standardized EBM protocols. On the surface, it seems obvious that patients will benefit when physicians prescribe only those treatments that have been proven through clinical trials to be effective. However, there are those, like Erich Loewy, MD, a bioethicist and professor of medicine at the University of California, Davis, who argue very persuasively that things are not nearly as black and white as they seem, and that EBM, as it is currently practiced, may actually not serve patients well. In a thought-provoking article for the online medical forum Medscape, Dr. Loewy cites the danger of using EBM as a standard protocol into which any patient with a given disease can simply be plugged. He writes: “To me, as a bioethicist and…a physician who has observed the evolution of EBM, I am impressed with the danger to physicians, patients
