Results for: acupuncture
California Acupuncturists Don’t Need to Know English!
English proficiency is not a necessary precursor to becoming a contributing citizen in California’s economy and should not be used by the Board to discriminate against talented and skilled individuals who seek to provide high-quality acupuncture services in California. — State Senators Curren D. Price Jr. and Darrell Steinberg, letter to the California Acupuncture Board, March 22, 2013. To appreciate the recklessness...
The Trojan Horse called Integrative Medicine arrives at another medical school
Medicine is a collaborative practice. Hospitals are the best example, where dozens of different health professionals work cooperatively, sharing responsibilities for patient care. Teamwork is essential, and that’s why health professionals obtain a large part of their education on the job, in teaching (academic) hospitals. The only way that all of these different professions are able to work together effectively is that...
The facts of the alternative medicine industry
People have been living on earth for about 250,000 years. For the past 5,000 healers have been trying to heal the sick. For all but the past 200, they haven’t been very good at it. – Dr. Paul Offit Twenty years is a long time in medicine. I celebrated my 20th pharmacy class reunion last weekend. Of course reunions are time to...
When doctors betray their patients and science-based medicine for money
We spend a lot of time on this blog discussing failures of the medical system. Usually, we such discussions occur in the context of how unscientific practices and even outright quackery have managed to infiltrate what should be science-based medicine (SBM) in the form of so-called “complementary and alternative medicine” (CAM) or “integrative medicine,” in which the quackery of alternative medicine is...
Irlen Syndrome
Is Irlen syndrome real? Probably not, and likely represents yet another form of zombie alternative medicine, immune to science and evidence and almost impossible to stop.
The Overuse of Antibiotics for Viral Infections in Children
“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.” -H. L. Mencken As I sit in an apartment full of unpacked boxes and grumpy children, only a few days removed from driving 1,600 miles to a 3rd floor walk-up and a better life just outside of Boston, I find the task of writing a post somewhat daunting....
Integrative Medicine Invades the U.S. Military: Part Two
An unfortunate side effect (if you will) of states licensing of “CAM” practitioners is their ensuing insinuation of themselves into the nooks and crannies of the American health care system. Sometimes this is voluntary, such as their inclusion as providers of health care services in medical practices and other institutional settings in the form of integrative and quackademic medicine. Where voluntary action...
Integrative Medicine Invades the U.S. Military: Part One
Integrative medicine proponents claim superiority over physicians practicing “conventional” medicine. (Which I will refer to as “medicine” so as not to buy into integrative medicine’s implied claim that medicine can be practiced with two separate standards.) While conceding that medicine is good for treating conditions like broken arms and heart attacks, physicians who purport to practice integrative medicine argue it ignores “the...
Do clinical trials work? It depends on what you mean by “work”
Introduction (Skip to the next section if you want to miss the self-referential blather about TAM.) As I write this, I’m winging my way home from TAM, crammed uncomfortably—very uncomfortably—in a window seat in steerage—I mean, coach). I had been thinking of just rerunning a post and having done with it, sleeping the flight away, to arrive tanned, rested, and ready to...
The Bendectin Controversy Redux?
When I read that a new study had shown that antihistamines were harmful for patients with morning sickness, I cringed and thought “Here we go again.” Hyperemesis gravidarum (HG) is a serious complication of pregnancy. Simple morning sickness is more common and less serious. When I started out in medicine, we routinely treated morning sickness with Bendectin. It was a safe and...