Results for: "functional medicine"
CAM Docket: Functional Endocrinology
One of the signature abilities of CAM practitioners is the creation of new diagnostic methods and treatments which convincingly demonstrate they have only a superficial understanding of human physiology. Here at SBM, posts have addressed such sterling examples of this phenomenon as cranial sacral therapy, applied kinesiology and chiropractic neurology. Now we have a new one on the horizon: functional endocrinology. I...
The CAM Docket: Boiron II
Five consumer lawsuits are pending in the U.S. against Boiron, the world’s largest manufacturer of homeopathic products. One lawsuit is also pending in Canada. As reported in a previous post, the U.S. plaintiffs claim they purchased homeopathic products, such as Coldcalm, Oscillo, Arnicare and Chestal Cough Syrup, based on Boiron’s misleading and false statements that they are effective for various ailments. Therefore,...
Night of the living naturopaths
Colorado’s “degreed” naturopaths (NDs) are nothing if not persistent. Starting in 1994 they have tried seven times to convince legislators that the Colorado’s public needs protection from what “traditional” naturopaths (traditionals) do, and that the best way of providing that protection, they claim, is to bestow licensure on the guys with the college degrees. The irony in this is that the NDs...
Steven Fowkes (Part 2 of 2): Nutrients for Better Mental Performance
Last week, in part 1, I covered Steven Fowkes’ “cures” for Alzheimer’s and herpes. In part 2, I will cover a video where he goes further afield. It is titled “Nutrients for Better Mental Performance,” but he also discusses sleep, depression, hangovers, and a lot of other topics. Some of what he says are simple truisms: mental performance is affected by everything...
CAM practitioners react to Andrew Weil’s proposal for a board certification for integrative medicine. It isn’t (all) pretty.
About a month ago, I discussed a rather disturbing development, namely the initiative by Dr. Andrew Weil to set up something he was going to call the American Board of Integrative Medicine, all for the purpose of creating a system of board certification for physicians practicing “integrative medicine” (IM), or, as I prefer to call them, physicians who like to integrate pseudoscience...
CAM In Medical Schools
A recent US News and World Report article on the incorporation of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) into US medical schools credulously repeats the pro-CAM marketing hype. There is no evidence that the author, Meryl Davids Landau, spoke to a single critic of CAM, or is even aware that such criticism exists. The result looks more like marketing copy than serious journalism....
A University of Michigan Medical School alumnus confronts anthroposophic medicine at his alma mater
Anthroposophic medicine is the creation of Rudolf Steiner, who also founded Waldorf Schools. It's a form of medicine that is vitalistic and full of quackery. Unfortunately, my medical alma mater, the University of Michigan, has a program in anthroposophic medicine. It's a small program, but that it exists at all is a disturbing reminder how quackery can infiltrate even the best medical...
Naturopathy and science
Naturopathy has been a recurrent topic on this blog. The reasons should be obvious. Although homeopathy is the one woo to rule them all in the U.K. and much of Europe, here in the U.S. homeopathy is not nearly as big a deal. Arguably, some flavor of naturopathy is the second most prevalent “alternative medical system” here, after chiropractic of course, and...
Personalized Medicine Bait and Switch
Mark Hyman, a proponent of so-called “functional medicine” promoting himself over at the Huffington Post (an online news source that essentially allows dubious medical infomercials to pass as news) has posted a particularly egregious article on personalized medicine for dementia. In the article Hyman distorts the modern practice of medicine, the current state of genetic science, and the very notion of “disease.”...