Some of us like to smile at the health beliefs and medical practices of our forebears. Perhaps it gives us the comforting sense of superiority, and that we have progressed from belief to science.
Medicine is more often a belief system than a science, and doctors invariably cling to practices they know and love, irrespective of the data. Take, for instance, the pulmonary-artery catheter, which doctors cling to as a baby would to his dummy.