Tag: Stanislaw Burzynski

Is the ACCME cracking down on quackery in continuing medical education (CME) offerings? Richard Jaffe thinks so.

Richard Jaffe, a lawyer who has made a career out of defending quacks like Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski, thinks that the ACCME, the main accrediting body for continuing medical education (CME) credits, is cracking down on "complementary and alternative medicine" CME courses. That would be a very good thing indeed, but is it really happening? More importantly, would it be enough?

/ March 20, 2017

The Texas Medical Board lets Stanislaw Burzynski off lightly: A cautionary tale of the failure of regulating medicine

After three years and countless twists and turns, the final decision by the Texas Medical Board on the sanctions to be imposed on Houston cancer quack Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski were announced on Friday. Sadly, they were not enough. The Burzynski saga should serve as a cautionary tale that the regulation of physicians and medicine is too lax, not too strict.

/ March 6, 2017

Corrigendum. The Week in Review for 02/19/2017

More poorly done acupuncture studies. Burzynski eats just desserts. Italians like homeopathy. New Jersey is going after Oregon. And more

/ February 19, 2017

False balance about Stanislaw Burzynski and his disproven cancer therapy, courtesy of STAT News

One common theme that has been revisited time and time again on this blog since its very founding is the problem of how science and medicine are reported. For example, back when I first started blogging, years before I joined Science-Based Medicine in 2008, one thing that used to drive me absolutely nuts was the tendency of the press to include in...

/ June 5, 2016

Stanislaw Burzynski and Robert O. Young: How two quacks of a feather illustrate how poorly states regulate medical practice

One of the weaknesses in our system of regulating the practice of medicine in the United States is that, unlike most countries, we don’t have one system. We have 50 systems. That’s because the functions of licensing physicians and regulating the practice of medicine are not federal functions, but state functions. Each state sets its own laws and regulations governing the practice...

/ November 23, 2015

As in 2014, “right-to-try” laws continue to metastasize in 2015

Last year, I did several posts on what I consider to be a profoundly misguided and potentially harmful type of law known as “right-to-try.” Beginning about a year and a half ago, promoted by the libertarian think tank known as the Goldwater Institute, right-to-try laws began popping up in state legislatures, which I likened to Dallas Buyers Club laws. Both Jann Bellamy...

/ May 18, 2015

The Hippocrates Health Institute: Cancer quackery finally under the spotlight, but will it matter?

I first came across Brian Clement, the proprietor of the Hippocrates Health Institute in West Palm Beach, Florida, a little more than a year ago based on the story of Stephanie O’Halloran. Ms. O’Halloran was—word choice unfortunately intentional—a 23-year-old mother of an 18 month old child from Ireland who was diagnosed with stage IV breast cancer in 2013, with metastases to her...

/ February 23, 2015

Using the fear of Ebola to promote the placebo legislation that is “right to try”

Libertarians and free market fundamentalists generally detest the FDA and want to dramatically decrease its power in the belief that the free market can guarantee the safety of drugs better than a government agency that requires strong scientific evidence of efficacy and safety before approval. Not surprisingly, they're at it again, this time in the service of promoting "right-to-try" laws and using...

/ November 2, 2014

The Texas Medical Board vs. Stanislaw Burzynski, 2014 edition

Here we go again. I'll give the Texas Medical Board credit for one thing. It's persistent. It's going after Stanislaw Burzynski's medical license again. Will this finally be the time the TMB puts a stop to Burzynski's abuse of the clinical trial process and patients? Or will this be a replay of the 1990s, with Burzynski slithering away yet again?

/ July 14, 2014

The Center for Inquiry weighs in on the FDA’s mishandling of Stanislaw Burzynski’s clinical trials

The Center for Inquiry points out how what Stanislaw Burzynski is doing corrupts the clinical trial process and harms patients.

/ July 3, 2014