Year: 2013
Homeopathy First Aid Kits
$55 for a box of sugar pills? How on earth can anyone sell homeopathic first aid kits?
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...
New help page for commenting and login issues
Earlier this year, after getting hacked, we made some major changes. It all had to be done, but of course there are some new headaches. We’ve published a new help page explaining the changes, why you do not have to have a Facebook or Twitter account, and why some comments are held for moderation (one normal reason, one buggy reason). Obviously we...
A Different Perspective: Placebo, SCAM, and Advertising
Summertime, time, time Child, the living’s easy. Fish are jumping out And the handicap, Lord Handicaps high, Lord so high ~ Janis Joplin It is summer. Time for the kids and the outside, not the computer. What follows is a summertime blog entry, for which I admit to feeling guilty for the comparatively little time I have spent on it, but as...
Integrative Medicine Invades the U.S. Military: Part Three
Nobody seems to know exactly how to define “integrative medicine” (“IM”) or to demonstrate what it does that is superior to the “conventional” kind. There is a lot of talk about addressing the “whole person” and not just the disease, patient-centeredness and the like, all of which are already aspects of conventional medicine. But, however defined, the central idea seems to be...
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.
Cunnilingus, Michael Douglas’s Cancer, and the HPV Vaccine
Conservative Christians are calling for banning oral and anal sex between consenting adults, claiming that the practices allow for the spread of disease. Radio host Brian Fischer says that a rise in head, neck and throat cancers “among millennials” is a direct result of the influence of “Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky.” He compares oral sex and homosexual sex to drug trafficking,...
Launching the SBM Facebook Page
As the medical student leading the charge on SBM’s social media presence, I’m happy to announce the creation of the Science-Based Medicine Facebook Page! After we recently revived the Twitter account – which everyone should follow for the latest in SBM goodness – this page was the next logical step. It will serve as a platform for complementary and alternative media (CAM) to...
A favorite tactic of the antivaccine movement: When science doesn’t support you, use the law
As I’ve joked about before, I’m a bit like Dug the Dog from the movie Up whenever a squirrel goes by. In other words, I’m easily distracted by things that interest my primal urge to chase pseudoscience. I originally had a cancer-related topic in mind for this week’s foray into science-based medicine, but then on Friday our favorite group of antivaccine activists...
“Postnatal depression blood test breakthrough” or Churnalism?
“Postnatal depression blood test breakthrough” proclaimed the headline. The UK Guardian article then declared: British doctors reveal ‘extremely important’ research that could help tens of thousands of women at risk. Here it comes. Readers were going to be fed a press release generated by the study’s authors and forwarded undigested by the media but disguised as writings of a journalist. If only...