Tag: reiki

Columbia University finally cuts ties with America’s Quack Dr. Oz

Decades after Dr. Oz pioneered "integrating" quackery into medicine and after many years of promoting diet scams and quackery on a nationally syndicated daily television show, Columbia University appears finally to have had enough and has quietly downgraded his status. What took so long?

/ May 2, 2022
Reiki

No, editors of The Atlantic, reiki does not work

Over the weekend, The Atlantic published an article by Jordan Kisner touting the benefits of reiki and arguing that you shouldn't listen to all those nasty skeptics calling it woo-woo. Unsurprisingly, the article is a credulous mess citing only token skepticism and relying on weak evidence. The Atlantic's embrace of quackery continues.

/ March 9, 2020

Damn the evidence and regulations: VA goes full speed ahead with medical pseudoscience

The VA recently mandated inclusion of acupuncture, reiki, reflexology and other CAM in veterans medical benefits and will require that they be offered at VA medical facilities, ignoring the lack of evidence and federal rules on what medical benefits can be covered.

/ December 7, 2017

Science-Based Satire: Alternative Medical Adverse Events on the Rise

Are patients being senselessly slaughtered by poorly trained Reiki practitioners? Probably not. Okay, they aren't...at least not directly. But Reiki is dumb and so is the belief that the power to manipulate human energy fields would be risk free. Here satire article is.

/ December 1, 2017
Definition

What is “integrative oncology”? Even the Society for Integrative Oncology doesn’t seem to know for sure

Last week, the Society for Integrative Oncology published an article attempting to define what "integrative oncology" is. The definition, when it isn't totally vague, ignores the pseudoscience at the heart of integrative oncology and medicine.

/ November 20, 2017

Hopelessly Devoted to Woo: TLC and Forbes Bring Us Yet Another Celebrity Healer

Endorsed by journalists and studied by academic medicine, bogus celebrity energy healer Charlie Goldsmith now has his own television program. In other words, it's just another day at Science-Based Medicine.

/ November 17, 2017

Reiki: Fraudulent Misrepresentation – Revisited

Factual misrepresentations about manipulating "energy" in a patient's body and its positive effects on health are integral to reiki. They can also be the basis of an action for fraudulent misrepresentation.

/ September 28, 2017

Johrei: The next energy healing craze?

Johrei appears to be a flavor of reiki. Is it supported by better evidence? Of course not.

/ July 21, 2017

Corrigendum. The Week in Review for 04/30/2017

Stroke from chiropractic. Measles in Minnesota. Fraudulent methodologies? How do your remove homeopathy from a product? Acuwhatever. And more.

/ April 30, 2017

Reiki and Therapeutic Touch. Compare and Contrast.

What? I’m not on vacation? I have to write a post? Crap. Remember those college essays? Compare and Contrast two topics and fill a Blue Book with your wisdom. Well, let's compare and contrast reiki and therapeutic touch, henceforth known as RATT.

/ December 9, 2016