Year: 2008

Homeopathy and Evidence-Based Medicine: Back to the Future–Part III

“Symptoms,” Continued Part II of this blog† introduced the homeopathic understanding of “symptoms” as they pertain both to “provings” in healthy subjects (now called “homeopathic pathogenic trials” or “HPTs”) and to histories elicited from patients. Hahnemann conflated “symptoms” and every random itch, ache, pain, sniffle, feeling, thought, dream, pimple or other sign, and anything else that might occur to a subject or...

/ January 18, 2008

Collision of Incompatibles

Last week’s post was about a recent (October 2007) meeting held at Harvard University on the subject of fascia. The purposes for commenting were several. First, the organizers were partial believers in some forms of “Complementary and Alternative Medicine” (“CAM”), now being called “Integrative” but more realistically called sectarian or anomalous, aberrant medicine. The meeting is another in a long series of...

/ January 17, 2008

The Placebo Effect

Recently the Federal Trade Commission went after the makers of the Q-Ray Ionized Bracelet for their claims that their device was a cure for chronic pain. Last week Seventh Circuit judge Frank Easterbrook handed down his opinion on the company’s appeal, writing that the company was guilty of fraud and ordering them to pay 16 million dollars in fines. One of the...

/ January 16, 2008

Dr. Judah Folkman (1933-2008): The epitome of what a science-based physician should be

The name of this blog is Science-Based Medicine. The reason it is so called is because we, the bloggers who will be contributing, believe that “the best method for determining which interventions and health products are safe and effective is, without question, good science.” Sadly, one of the people who best represented this very sort of philosophy, Dr. Judah Folkman (1933-2008), has...

/ January 15, 2008

No-Touch Chiropractic

Some time ago, I learned that a Seattle chiropractor, Johanna Hoeller, had been featured on a local TV newsmagazine show. She was so proud of the segment that she had it posted on her web page for all to see. Unfortunately it is no longer there, so I’ll have to tell you what it showed. She demonstrated her techniques on-camera. She put...

/ January 15, 2008

On the nature of “alternative” medicine cancer cure testimonials

No doubt you’ve come across them before, either on the Internet, printed advertisements, or radio and TV ads: Alternative medicine cancer “testimonials.” They are the primary means by which “alternative” therapies for cancer (or just about any other disease) are promoted and the primary “evidence” that is used to “prove” the efficacy of non-evidence-based therapies. There’s no doubt that they sure can...

/ January 14, 2008

Homeopathy and Evidence-Based Medicine: Back to the Future – Part II

Part I of this blog† summarized the origin of homeopathy, invented in 1790 by Samuel Christian Hahnemann. It discussed Hahnemann’s first two “homœopathic laws of nature,” similia similibus curantur (like cures like) and the “law of infinitesimals,” and showed that his rationales for each have long been refuted. Hahnemann proclaimed a third doctrine, the “law of psora” [“itch”], said by him to...

/ January 11, 2008

A Meeting of Incompatibles

On October 3,4, 2007, a conference at Harvard University School of medicine, the first annual “Fascia Research Conference“ was held, sponsored by a notable group of organizations. Organized by Thomas Findley, MD, Phd, Prof. of Physical Medicine and physiatrist at Veterans Administration Hospital East Orange, New Jersey. It was notable for several reasons, and is of interest to medical objectivists – also...

/ January 10, 2008

Can Magnets Heal?

Belief in the healing power of magnets and magnetic fields has existed since the discovery of magnets several thousand years ago. In the late 18th century, Franz Anton Mesmer, an infamous charlatan, promoted the notion that he could heal with “animal magnetism.” In the 19th century magnetic healers were common – D.D. Palmer was a magnetic healer prior to founding chiropractic. Magnetic...

/ January 9, 2008

Snake Oil Science

For my first blog entry, I wanted to write about something important, and I couldn’t think of anything more important than a recent book by R. Barker Bausell: Snake Oil Science: The Truth About Complementary and Alternative Medicine. If you want to understand how medical research works, if you want to know what can lead patients and scientists to false conclusions, if...

/ January 8, 2008