Heart Attack Rareness in Thyroid-Treated Patients

The publication of the book Heart Attack Rareness in Thyroid-Treated Patients by Broda 0. Barnes, Ph.D., M.D. and Charlotte W. Barnes, M. A. can only be taken to indicate that the authors and the publisher believe the American public and her physicians are gullible, uninformed, and lack intelligence. "Written for both the layman and the scientist interested in preventing premature heart attacks" but hastening to point out that "the rise in heart attacks is the greatest blessing in the history of medicine" because "if aging were conquered, total birth control or legalized genocide would be the only alternatives," this book attempts to prove that "low thyroid function is responsible for hardening of the arteries." Using only basal body temperature to test thyroid function, the authors have treated patients with thyroid and say they have prevented heart attacks. Since no data are given and since no controls were employed, no conclusions can be drawn other than being suspicious of work not subjected to editorial scrutiny by one's peers, and perhaps of the editorial policy of Charles C Thomas, Publisher.