Results for: homeopathy
Acupuncture, Organic Food, and Other Questions
In this post I respond to some reader mail regarding several different issues - organic farming and pesticides, acupuncture, and herbal supplements. In each case I clarify my position and discuss the evidence base.
Smoking Cessation and the Affordable Care Act
Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death. Each year it kills more than 5 million people around the world, 480,000 in the US alone. And for every person who dies, about 30 more have serious illnesses caused by smoking. On average, smokers die 10 years earlier than nonsmokers. Anyone who is concerned about preventive medicine must consider smoking cessation a priority....
Is the Ebola Crisis a Reason to Skip RCTs?
In a recent “Perspective” article in The New England Journal of Medicine, three physicians (Drs. Cox, Borio, and Temple) make a strong case for not letting the rush to save Ebola patients tempt us to deviate from good science and skip the randomized controlled trial (RCT). Their arguments cut to the essence of the scientific approach to medicine, and they deserve careful...
Reflexology for Babies?
In the fascinating, if not rational, world of so-called complementary and alternative medicine, the age of the patient rarely seems to matter. This stands in stark contrast to the practice of science-based medicine. Sure, there is some physiological overlap across the spectrum of age, but caring for children often requires a vastly-different approach and there are numerous conditions not seen or only...
Hostility towards scientific consensus: A red flag identifying a crank or quack
Deniers of well-established science, such as the anthropogenic climate change, the theory of evolution, and vaccine science, frequently attack the scientific consensus. Some go farther and attack the very concept of a scientific consensus. When you see such attacks, you know you're dealing with a crank or, in the case of medicine, a quack.
Selling “integrative oncology” as a monograph in JNCI
The Society of Integrative Oncology publishes its "evidence-based" guidelines for the supportive care of breast cancer patients, along with a whole lot of musings on integrating quackery with medicine. But are the guidelines science-based? I think you know the answer to that one.
Selective pressures on alternative medicine
(Editor’s note: I was away at Skepticon over the weekend, where I gave a talk entitled “The Central Dogma of Alternative Medicine”. (When the talk’s up on YouTube, I’ll provide a link, of course.) Because of all the fun and travel delays I didn’t get a chance to turn my slides and notes into a blog post yet. Also, I’m on vacation...
Naturopathy vs. Science: Autism
Just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in. My blogging plan was to take a break from my series of naturopathy versus science posts, where I’ve been contrasting the advice from naturopaths against the scientific evidence. From a blogging perspective, naturopathy is a fascinating subject to scrutinize as there is seemingly no end of conditions for which naturopaths...
Oxygen Myths That Refuse to Die
One of my early forays into the world of pseudoscience was an investigation of “Vitamin O” (the O stands for oxygen). The story is hilarious; please click and read; I guarantee you won’t be able to read it without at least a chuckle. Vitamin O is still for sale; it’s even available on Amazon.com. You can read the manufacturer’s ridiculous rationalizations about...
Retconning the story of traditional Chinese medicine
Proponents of "integrating" traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) into medicine paint a tale of an ancient, unified system of medicine that's been tested over at least two millennia and found to be effective. The real story is very different and is best explained with a term more commonly used to discuss comic books. Basically, the "integration" of TCM into "Western medicine" is nothing...