Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Throwing the baby out with the snake oil.
A few weeks ago, I vented my frustration about reports that budget-conscious patients where prioritizing supplements and vitamins over standard medical care. Apparently the news got the Associated Press even more fired up.
A new AP IMPACT report goes after alternative medicine like it's a potential terrorist network. And mainstream medicine is on the conspiracy! "Some medical schools are teaching future doctors about alternative medicine, sometimes with federal grants," the article warns. The author notes that most CAM (complementary and alternative medicine) education is designed to teach doctors about the products their patients may be using. "But some schools have ties to alternative medicine practitioners and advocates." Well, yes, in order to learn about alternative medicine you might actually have to have contact with those who provide it.
Absolutely, alternative medication is controversial and some treatments are total scams. But is demonizing the whole field--and anyone who tries to study it--going to help sort out what's helpful and what's harmful? When one of the top problems with CAM is that patients don't tell their doctors what alternative therapies they're using, maybe we should be calling for more research and more cooperation, not less.
Labels: alternative medicine
posted by Stacey Butterfield at
11:02 AM
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2 Comments:
I just happened by in the neighborhood and noted this blog.
First, Ms. Marchione's AP series was begun a year ago. I helped refer her to sources.
Second, it does not take Evidence Based Medicine in form of clinical trials (RCTs) to establish a level of plausibility for a sectarian medical ("CAM") claim. In fact RCT series are most often inconclusive until many - ten or more - are done. The cost and time are seldom worth the trouble at $50K to $1 million per trial.
Last, "alrnative" practitioners are the worst sources for valid information regarding "alternative" claims. They are ideologically motivated and misinformed. Start with chiropractors and proceed through acupuncturists and supplement pushers.
Having spent the last forty years investigating such claims, evaluating RCTs and reviews, and testifying for boards and in hearings and trials, I can safely state: Just look at the basic science. We have yet to see an unscientific claim verified by clinical trials.
Hmmm... observe, hypothesize, do something, observe again and then replicate / reproduce the process. Sounds like a scientific process to me. We do it as acupuncturists every day.
What were the Celebrex and Vioxx manufacturers doing several years ago? Surely not 'pushing' their products? 'Cause that was
really sound science and regualtion. Or was it corruption? Or some kind of ideologically motivated process?
Those who adhere so fixedly to the RCT as the most representative research tool, might also like to remember that there are several grades of evidence in the 'pyramid' which is EBM. At the base is the daily experience and observation of individual practitioners ie the individual case study. All forms of research are valid, and contribute to the whole.
The RCT is a flawed tool... and that's another whole discussion.
Good to see that assumptive thinking and generalization aren't evident in Wallace Sampson's comment here.
Margi Macdonald
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