The American College of Physicians is creating guidelines to control overtesting and overtreatment. They estimate we spend $250 billion in unnecessary tests every year. Some of the reason is that MDs feel they need to practice defensive medicine, but there are also conflicts of interest related to investments they have made in purchasing medical testing equipment. A study in the British Medical Journal in October of 2011 showed that 50% of MDs who were in position to set guidelines for managing type 2 diabetes or cholesterol had conflicts of interest. For this reason we simply cannot trust the recommendations of professional medical societies!
