From the Editor

A century after his death, is Dr. Osler still relevant?

This week, there are three selections. First, we start with a look back with an essay on Dr. William Osler. We then look forward: with papers on AI and ketamine.

In the first selection, Drs. Charles S. Bryan (the University of South Carolina) and Scott H. Podolsky (Harvard University) write in The New England Journal of Medicine about Dr. Osler on the 100th anniversary of his death. Contemplating his life and views, they note that he “gave physicians what certain national historians gave their countries: warm feelings of togetherness, pride, and purpose.”

nlc012022-v6William Osler

In the second selection, we look at a CMAJ paper. Considering AI and health care, University of Strasbourg’s Dr. Thierry Pelaccia and his co-authors write about the reasoning of mind and machine. They see a bright future: “AI can assume its place as a routine tool in medical practice.”

Finally, for the third selection, we consider a new paper on ketamine and safety from the Journal of Affective Disorders. Drawing on several studies, NIMH’s Elia E. Acevedo-Diaz and her co-authors conclude: “The results indicate that a single intravenous subanesthetic-dose ketamine infusion was relatively safe for the treatment of [treatment-resistant depression].”

DG

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