Acronyms are a scourge. Neurology.com can get away with using acronyms, since they're talking to specialists. But people also use them when talking to a public who doesn't know what the fuck the letters refer to. It's sloppy.
Of course, authors are supposed to given the long form and abbreviated form in parentheses. The trouble is in printed journals it can be difficult to find the first use of the abbreviation. Fortunately viewing articles in an electronic medium it's usually possible to do a search which is a real time-saver.
Furthermore, an abbreviation can have multiple meanings, especially across disciplines. For example, PSA can stand for prostate specific antigen, pressure-sensitive adhesive, public service announcement and probably some others too. Anyway I try to be mindful of the ambiguity abbreviations can produce. By all means, spelling out the term(s) abbreviations refer to should be considered mandatory.