What alternative medicine represent the greatest threat to human life?
5 months ago
33 Comments
Here is what I mean by alternative therapy, thusly drug treatments and surgery don't fall into this category
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine
let's stay on task people
Chiropractic related strokes?
Acupuncture related infections?
Probiotic related chronic inflammation coronary heart disease?
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Any alternative therapy that purports to cure cancer without the need for surgery, radiotherapy or appropriate cytotoxic drugs. People who take money from sufferers on this basis should be hanged and left for the vultures to pick clean.
I couldn't say it better myself. Although I do worry that the excess colloidal silver in their bodies may harm the poor vultures :(
Very true - sorry vultures.
Blue vultures would be totally sweet.
win!
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2008/09/boguscures.shtm
About damned time the FTC actually did their job...
^ I'm sayin' son. No fucking shit, marked as such.
I was going to say prayer - but it doesn't fit your requirements.
well, I say add it anywhoo
okay!
I think preventive medicine is the most important kind. You definitely can control many health issues with alternative medicine, but nothing is 100% safe. Hospitals seem to be very dangerous lately. Believing only God can help is the greatest threat to human life.
While I agree completely that a preventative approach is best, I don't think "many" (if any) alternative therapies can control health issues. However, it is most helpful to follow such a statement with an example.
Understanding the risks and the benefits are more important then dismissing it all. Western medicine does support some alternatives. I have used many alternatives for female related issues. I use natural alternatives to steroids for my sons eczema. My sisters son has a rare form of M.D. and without research of natural alternatives my nephew would be very uncomfortable. My aunt has kidney problems from sugar diabetes and only uses natural medicine from Mexico . She feels great. I can go on and on. I met a women at the mall who had breast Cancer and cured herself through alternatives. I think it is possible, but not everyone has the same chance. That is why i said nothing is 100%. My brother works with cancer patients and almost everyone comes back with cancer. It would not hurt to try alternatives along with your doctor's prescription.
the plural of anecdotes is not evidence, that is to say your stories prove nothing
http://www.quackwatc...ltbelief.html
by example I meant proper controlled studies, please link to real data, not stories, if you feel you can prove your point, alternative therapies are harmful, they give false hope and use up people's money that could be spent towards real treatment
The plural of anecdote is not 'evidence'? That's hilarious. I want that on a bumper sticker, or possibly a t-shirt.
Ok. Well..How rude of me. Next time a will give a full report of exactly what you ask. Where is your evidence? What do you believe works? All the answers above are stories. Alternative Medicine is constantly changing, because conventional doctors start to use them after they prove to be effective. These studies take place because people are looking elsewhere for help when conventional medicine does not work. I do not support false hope.
"What do you believe works?"
Nothing is 100% successful, but I can say without a doubt that conventional medicine is vastly more effective than the majority of alternative treatments, with objectively measured results 100% better. As you cannot provide proof of your assertion, you just decide to ask me a question and dodge. If you would like to know the basis of my statement, please read an intro biology text, Campbell and Reece is halfway decent
http://www.amazon.co...dp/080537146X
although I prefer Alberts et al http://www.amazon.co...dp/0815316194
then explain to me how the proposed mechanisms of homeopathy, acupuncture, chiropractic, iridology, magnet therapy, etc. could possibly work given the constraints of reality and human physiology. You do know the stated mechanistic basis of these therapies right? Good doctors do not recommend these things, quacks and the uninformed do. You have yet to give an example of "after they prove to be effective." Gee, maybe its because this has not been proven. A good website to research alternative medicines is
http://www.quackwatch.com/
here you will find the science that the above answers are based upon
an excellent podcast on the issue (more technical) is http://www.quackcast...rch-2008.html
I never said conventional medicine does not work. I did not say all alternative therapies work.
http://nccam.nih.gov/clinicaltrials/
Great actual studies (well a portal to research)
So I take it you have read the findings of these research avenues, yet still support people paying for alternative therapies with limited to zero efficacy? Fueling false hope. Which one in particular? They are not all equal.
Don't some alternative therapies become conventional ones? I am thinking of the ones science looks at and confirms there is evidence to support efficacy. Doesn't acupuncture come under this sort of heading? I am old enough to remember when everyone (in the West) laughed at the idea that needles stuck into the body could do anything useful. Now it is has been demonstrated that surgery may be performed using acupuncture as the sole anaesthetic. So sometimes science comes out in support of alternative therapies that are then lifted from the realms of quackery to respectability. In the same way ayurvedic medicine is sometimes laughed at in the West by average people. However, I think that is quite mistaken. Science does not laugh at it. For example, turmeric is used in Ayurvedic medicine and science has confirmed that it has some anti-carcinogenic qualities.
I think we should definitely distinguish between alternative medicines that have some basis in scientific fact and ones that have none. For example, I am quite prepared to accept that a decoction of willow bark would help with a headache (salycylic acid) but I am quite unprepared to accept the claims of psychic surgery from some crone who presses her withered claw into someone's fat belly and "pulls out" a chicken liver and says to fat belly - "Your tumour is removed - you are cured - that will be 10,000 dollars - cash no cheques".
thoraby
"Doesn't acupuncture come under this sort of heading?"
no, what is the basis of acupuncture, qi, a fictional energy, here is an excellent summary of the best (ha) acupuncture studies
http://www.quackcast...odcast_26.mp3