Podcasts · Comedy · Health & Fitness
Sawbones: A Marital Tour of Misguided Medicine
Justin McElroy, Dr. Sydnee McElroy
300 episodes
Join Dr. Sydnee McElroy and her husband Justin McElroy for a tour of all the dumb, bad, gross, weird and wrong ways we've tried to fix people.
Episodes page 4 of 6
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Sawbones: The Abortion Pill
Mifepristone, known colloquially as the abortion pill, has recently been in the news as its future availability in the United States comes into question. Dr. Sydnee and Justin go through the history of the medicine,…
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Sawbones: Nose Blowing
Blowing your nose is maybe the only small glint of satisfaction had while having a cold or sinus infection. But is blowing your nose actually good, or even safe? Dr. Sydnee and Justin look through the history of…
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Sawbones: The Great Stink of 1858
The Great Stink of 1858 has highlights from some of the Sawbones Greatest Hits: the controversy of hand washing, the miasma theory of disease. and cholera. Which is all to say: it took humanity a long time to figure…
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2023 BoCo Teaser - Sawbones: Medical Questions for Kids
We wanted to share a little teaser of our MaxFunDrive Bonus Content, so here's a short clip of Dr. Sydnee and Charlie addressing kid medical questions. If you want to hear the whole thing, head over to…
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Sawbones: Marvel Anatomy
Dr. Sydnee and Justin go through the marvelous Marvel Anatomy book, which explains how many comic book heroes' superpowers work. Where does the Hulk's strength come from? How does Spider-Man climb walls? How does…
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Sawbones: Head Lice
Lice aren’t just a longtime annoyance of school aged kids, they’ve actually been around longer than people. Dr. Sydnee and Justin talk about the history of trying to get rid of these creatures as well as some common…
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Sawbones: Is Leg-Length Discrepancy Genetic?
It's another Sawbones: Medical Questions, and we're gonna go full Galaxy Brain on these listener-submitted queries. What is methalated B-12? Can my appendix grow back and give me appendicitis ad infinitum? Does sugar…
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Sawbones: Appendicitis
People have been dying of the inflammation of the appendix long before anyone even knew what this little finger-like organ was good for. Dr. Sydnee goes through the history of the first accidental appendix removal, to…
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Sawbones: Ketchup
There are lots of things that aren’t medicine. Taxes. Pound cake. One thing that is definitely not a medicine but at a time was thought as one? Ketchup! Dr. Sydnee goes through ketchup’s journey from a fermented…
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Sawbones: Grapefruits
Dr. Sydnee and Justin don't actually like grapefruits, so it's irrelevant to them, but grapefruit juice is known to interact poorly with many medications. Given the wide variety of fruits and their juices, it seems…
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Sawbones: Mononucleosis
Have you ever been interrupted on a college campus by someone asking about your latest incident of intimate kissing? That's because they were trying to track the spread of a common infection called mononucleosis, or…
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Sawbones: Asafoetida
If you're like Dr. Sydnee and your TikTok algorithm keeps advertising medical substances at you, perhaps you've heard of asafoetida. It's a pungent resin derived from a plant, and has culinary appeal as well as…
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Sawbones: Anthrax
In 2001, the United States was under a biological attack from strange spores in mailed envelopes. This is a lot of people's first introduction to anthrax, a bacteria often associated with both domestic and wild…
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Sawbones: Super Sawbones Quiz of 2022
The Sawbones Medical Quiz is back and better than ever, with questions about this past year's episodes! What have you learned about bad fast food, Senate contenders, pirate medicine, and owls? Music: "Medicines" by…
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Sawbones: Can I Become the Alpha Period-Haver?
It's the last episode of the year, so Dr. Sydnee and Justin set out to answer your important medical questions! How do oral probiotics prevent a yeast infection (or do they)? What's that medicine and Sprite combo you…
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Sawbones: RSV
Parts of the US are currently in the midst of a triple-demic, a very scary phrase, so Dr. Sydnee is here to break down the third illness: Respiratory Syncytial Virus, or RSV. It’s a virus that’s common among everyone,…
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Sawbones: Farts
This week, Justin takes the wheel and finally gets to talk about farts, only tangentially in a medical way. Get ready for some fart etymology, some notable farts in medieval history, fun fart facts, and a little bit…
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Sawbones: Pirate Medicine Chapter Three
In the third and final chapter of the pirate medicine series, Dr. Sydnee and Justin talk about the dreaded Flux. What is the Flux? Well, it involves something coming out of your body in excess . . . and it's not urine.…
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Sawbones: Pirate Medicine Chapter Two
In the second entry in the pirate medicine series, Dr. Sydnee talks about the practice of treating burns aboard a ship. It seems like burns on a ship would not be a problem, but ships are made of wood, and fire + wood…
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Sawbones: Pirate Medicine Chapter One
To celebrate the first new live Sawbones shows since 2020, we're releasing the first in a three-part series exploring the vast array that pirates—in an extremely resource and knowledge-limited setting—tried to keep one…
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Sawbones: Does Shrimp Make My Husband Drunk?
Have you ever wanted to ask a real doctor questions that aren’t really advice? Dr. Sydnee answers listener questions about infecting yourself with a virus, refusing opioids, and difficult veins. And don’t worry - there…
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Sawbones: Anthroposophy
Why not just connect the spiritual and scientific world? That's basically what anthroposophy asks, teaching a philosophical approach to medicine. Dr. Sydnee and Justin talk about the history of this movement and also…
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Sawbones: Iridology
The eyes are the windows to the soul, but could they also be the windows to all the body's ailments? Dr. Sydnee and Justin discuss iridology, the idea that changes in the eye color could possibly indicate different…
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Sawbones: Dr. Oz
There are many people who have been recurring characters on Sawbones. Pliny the Elder. Charlie. But few so notorious as Dr. Mehmet Oz, now running for the U.S. Senate. This isn’t a commentary on his political fitness;…
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Sawbones: Schizophrenia
Is schizophrenia the same as having a dissociative identity? Or anti-social disorder? Or being a murderer? No. No. All of these are wrong. Dr. Sydnee breaks down one of the most misunderstood and maligned mental…
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Sawbones: How Justin McElroy Became a Trusted Source for COVID News in Canada
Podcast history is being made here: There are TWO Justin McElroys in this week's episode. We are joined by Justin McElroy, CBC reporter of municipal affairs in Vancouver and British Columbia, as he discusses his role…
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Sawbones: E. coli
From our earliest days of life E. coli is among us and within us, living in harmony with the rest of our colonic flora. But this week we're here to discuss the multi-dimensional E. coli's ability to really mess all…
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Sawbones News: Vaccine Updates
Extra, extra! It’s the first edition of the Sawbones Medical News, updates on what’s going on in the world of medicine. We’ve got the newest reports on Monkey Pox vaccines and the hot new COVID-19 booster. Plus, an…
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The Sleeping Sickness
Starting In 1915, cases of something known as encephalitis lethargica started popping up around the globe. Symptoms were varied, but included some sort of lethargy or tiredness, with some more extreme manifestations.…
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Rufus Weaver and Harriet Cole
In the 1880s, anatomist Rufus Weaver worked meticulously to extract and mount the human nervous system for study. The nervous system came from a woman named Harriet Cole; but how was it actually obtained? Dr. Sydnee…
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Band-Aids
In this episode of Justin McElroy’s Medical Brand Hall of Fame, Justin and Dr. Sydnee are stuck on Band-Aid brand adhesive bandages. Justin goes through the decades of campaigns and jingles, the evolution of bandage…
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Metamucil
Hank Green in 2018 joked that everyone should take Metamucil, the fiber-rich powder that is supposed to help with your BMs. But is he right? Well . . . “should” is a strong word. Dr. Sydnee goes through the history of…
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The Brompton Cocktail
In the late 1800s, Dr. Herbert Snow observed cancer patients and considered that a mix of different medications might do the trick for slowing down its progress. The Brompton Cocktail, as it was called, was mostly…
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Hand Sanitizer
Around the early 1900s, it was discovered that a high percent of ethanol was useful for killing germs, and worked great if there was no available soap and water. Dr. Sydnee and Justin go through viral internet stories…
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Answering Your Questions About the Roe Verdict
The overturning of Roe has created an astounding number of questions and problems, and the fact is that we don’t know for sure how the landscape will change in the next few years or even months. This week, Dr. Sydnee…
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Radium Girls
Back in 1917 radium was all the rage. The fact that it glowed made people believe it was healthy and important, so they included it in things like toothpaste, cosmetics, even water. The Radium Girls, factory workers…
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Vomiting
What’s the deal with vomiting? Justin and Dr. Sydnee meditate on the various ways we get nauseated, from smelling something gross to getting hit in a sensitive spot, and what we’ve done over the years to help alleviate…
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Is it Safe to Eat This Plutonium?
We’re back with Sawbones Medical Questions! Justin acts as stand-in for the listeners while Dr. Sydnee answers questions about tall people getting COVID, eye goop, nose goop, labor organizing in the medical field, and…
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Monkeypox
You may be worried we’re headed into another global health crisis in the form of Monkeypox. But it’s not new, and we already know quite a bit about it. Dr. Sydnee explains what it is, how to treat it, and the…
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History of Abortion
With the recent news about Roe v. Wade, it’s important to talk about the history of abortion in the United States. The right to autonomy over one’s own body in regard to medical care is one of the basic tenets of…
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Infant Formula
The United States is currently in a dire formula shortage, and people are taking to the internet to propose some less than ideal solutions. Dr. Sydnee talks about the origins of how formula came about, how the shortage…
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Harry Beno: The Poison King
Harry Beno (not BEAN-o) one day walked into a barn hungry for biscuits and emerged the poison king. Believing himself immune to strychnine, Beno took to eating poison for an audience. From there his act escalated to…
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Testicle Tanning
Some people believe that men in the world are getting softer and masculinity is under attack. But not to worry, there’s a solution: tanning your . . . nethers. Although the idea of exposing your soft bits to the sun…
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Cereal
Remember when the Cheerios box said it would lower cholesterol and prevent heart disease? Well, it doesn’t say that anymore because cereal isn’t medicine. But this is just one example in a long history of breakfast…
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The World of Warcraft Plague and COVID
A very long time ago, in 2019, we talked about the Corrupted Blood plague, a pandemic within the World of Warcraft. How it affected the digital world was used as a model for how people might behave during an actual…
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Bach's Flower Remedies
In the mid-20th century, Dr. Edward Bach developed a series of diluted tinctures from ingredients of the natural world to combat negative emotions, and by extension, disease. Bach supplied that these remedies were…
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Food Dye and Behavior
Do artificially colored food dyes make your kids behave badly? This sounds like it could be true, and is certainly alluring to parents as an easy fix. But are they actually related? In the 1940s, Dr. Benjamin Feingold…
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Spring Medical Questions Are in the Air
It’s time to do a little bit of inbox spring cleaning with all these listener medical questions! Justin reads and Dr. Sydnee answers medical questions about things like healing hickeys, eating all of the meat,…
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Star Jelly
Have you ever gone outside and found gelatinous goop on the ground? It’s jelly from the stars! But actually . . . what is it? As far back as the 14th century, people have noticed mucilaginous goo that has been…
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Update: Havana Syndrome
Havana Syndrome has been in the news lately, so we've brought an update. The CIA has continued to look into people experiencing the symptoms of this strange illness and have found . . . there is some sort of cause…
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