New York Times Report on Radiation: Balanced or too Sensational?
The January 24th edition of the Sunday New York Times ran a Page One Investigative report on the perils and dire consequences on the use of radiation in medical diagnostics and cancer therapies. The lengthy report, put together by an investigative team of six people, left the reader chilled and saddened for the families of the two patients whose experiences formed the substance of the vast majority of the Times’ reporting. Indeed they suffered greatly as a result of what the Times inferred was a result of a human error and/or faults in complex technology. Rare will be the reader who will put the piece down believing as much in the safety and efficacy of radiation as when they began reading.
Yet the Report was both disconcerting and troublesome to me. As a healthcare public relations professional, I have indeed represented companies who had developed both radiation diagnostics and various types of therapies, yet even so, I found I was not biased by my professional associations. What really was disturbing to me was this quote found in the 9th paragraph of the 4 full page article.
“Without a doubt, radiation saves countless lives, and serious accidents are rare.”
OK. I get that—and I believe it. For many years radiation based protocols have been the standard of care and indeed gold standard in more procedures than I have time to list here. And this knowledge, juxtaposed with the Times reporting of yesterday is totally perplexing to me. I feel that the Times reporting was both sensationalistic and severely unbalanced. If they were to use all of that hugely expensive space in the Sunday paper detailing the potentially dangerous applications of radiation, would not a great deal larger amount of space be required to tell the stories of just some of the “countless” number of lives that the Times says radiation therapy has saved. I don’t get it.
Of course medical error and improper use of new and different technologies are serious problems. They deserve to be covered and extensively reported on. But to run such an emotional and one-sided account as the Times did, disappoints me. Not only as a healthcare PR Pro, but also as an informed potential patient. I love the Times. It is my favorite newspaper and a ‘must-read’ every day. But in this case they fell far short of their usually high journalistic standards. And in doing so, carried out an injustice to their readers by painting a picture that only tells a small, small part of the story.
Posted by Lloyd Benson on January 25, 2010 at 5:27 PM
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