Online Public Relations Thoughts

A doctors group has called a diagnosis of "excited delirium" outdated and has withdrawn a scientific paper on it.  It had been used in a number of cases where the arrested subjects had died and police departments around the nation were using it as a defense against police brutality.  The message is that the American College of Emergency Physicians was wrong in publishing the paper in 2009.  Now it can no longer be cited in court cases in defense of the police.  Such is the way of science where results change with new evidence.  It is one more reminder that facts should be used carefully in communicating.