How can a Homeopathic product be dangerous?
August 14th, 2010
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Homeopathic products are often pointed to as scams for being a complete waste of money or damaging to health by displacing real medicine, but generally they are harmless because the active ingredients are so dilute that there’s less than a 50% chance that even a single molecule is present in the final product.
So how can this be?
Study Links Zinc Nose Sprays, Loss of Smell
Zicam Zinc Nasal Products Removed From Shelves Last Year
July 19, 2010 — Just over a year ago, the FDA warned that zinc-containing intranasal cold remedies might cause loss of sense of smell.Now a researcher who has long argued that the sprays were harmful says he has scientific evidence to back up the claim.
Last summer, the FDA warned consumers to stop using three zinc-containing Zicam products: Zicam Cold Remedy Nasal Gel, Zicam Cold Remedy Swabs, and Zicam Cold Remedy Swabs for kids. The federal regulators cited 130 reports of loss of sense of smell among users of the products.
Zicam manufacturer Matrixx Initiatives pulled the three products from the shelves, but the company maintains that there is no link between their use and loss of smell.
In the newly reported analysis, researchers applied a statistical method used to establish a cause-and-effect link between an environmental exposure and development of a disease in an effort to confirm that zinc-containing nasal products can cause loss of sense of smell, known medically as anosmia.
University of California, San Diego professor Terence M. Davidson, MD, says the analysis supports the hypothesis.
He adds that the effectiveness of zinc-containing products for preventing or shortening the duration of colds has never been proven.
“Given that they do absolutely no good for colds and given that there is potential for harm, I see no point in putting any zinc gluconate products in the nose,” Davidson tells WebMD.
But… Zicam is homeopathic, right? Well, no, not really. In this case, the product is being sold as “homeopathic” and in doing so managed to avoid all the scrutiny, testing and regulation that over-the-counter drugs normally would receive. However, the dilution of the zinc in Zicam is only x2, meaning about one part per 100 parts of solvent. This is generally not what you find in homeopathic remedies, which are diluted to 30x or more (one part per 10^30.)
So what happened here? Simply put, the makers claimed that since the active ingredient was dilute it qualified as being homeopathic and simply by calling it homeopathic they avoided all regulation. They just fudged the definition of how much “dilution” the zinc compound, zinc gluconate, need to be homeopathic, and since homeopathic groups are pretty dishonest to begin with, nobody raised any objection.
As it turns out, the concentration of zinc gluconate in the remedy – which may or may not have any effect on the cold virus – can most definitely have an effect on the scent receptors in the nose. Worst still, the damage may be permanent, making it impossible for a person to enjoy the smells of fresh cut grass, apple pie or perfume and also preventing them from being able to detect odors like the smell of smoke or leaking gas. And since taste relies heavily on smell, those with damaged senses of smell lose all but the most basic ability to taste food, being able to tell if the food is salty or sweet, but not being able to discern more complex flavors.
There is one bit of good news here, though. It seems that the company that makes Zicam is large enough and has enough asserts to make it worth going after in civil court. They’ve already settled quite a few lawsuits, but more are on the way. I hope they get taken to the cleaners, because it’s about time some of these fraud operations were made into examples. Perhaps if enough attention is given it could actually lead to regulatory changes, which are so sorely needed!
This entry was posted on Saturday, August 14th, 2010 at 1:35 am and is filed under Bad Science, Misc, Quackery. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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August 14th, 2010 at 5:00 am
Thanks, great little piece.
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August 14th, 2010 at 5:08 am
Odd that they didn’t go for a 30x homeopathic ’strength’ or more and save themselves the risk and the cost of raw materials.
Zinc supplements, as lozenges, were the rage some years ago as I recall, because there seemed to be some clinical proof of its effectiveness in reducing cold symptoms, but the fad seemed to have passed when more careful studies showed no value to this treatment.
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August 14th, 2010 at 8:02 am
Regulation of homeopathic products and products sold under the banner of being natural is lacking, it would seem everywhere. Clearly the United States is not regulating these like they should, but things are no better in Canada and the British are definitely not doing much to regulate it nor does it seem most of Europe. As I understand it, homeopathic meds get a pass in Australia as well and they’re the rage in India.
Are you aware of any examples of industrial nations that have managed to legislate reasonable regulations of these products? It seems to me that they’ve managed to get a very good multi-national scam going. Is no place sane these days?
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August 14th, 2010 at 11:12 am
Gordon said:
Actually in Canada The Natural Health Products Directorate has now been established for several years. It has published detailed guidelines for the manufacturing, labeling and marketing claims for the different categories of NHPs. Staff at the Directorate evaluate and approve new license applications. Approved products are licensed into two categories, and given unique identification numbers:
* DIN-HM (homeopathic remedy number) – all homeopathy
* NPN (natural health product number) – all other natural products, including vitamins, probiotics, etc.
On this basis, Health Canada’s granting of a DIN-HM means a review of safety and efficacy of a particular homeopathy remedy has been conducted, and a specific recommendation for use has been formally approved for the label.
Health Canada’s Evidence for Homeopathic Medicines: Guidance Document states that applications for licenses for homeopathic products must include evidence to support the “safety, and quality” of a homeopathic medication.
What this agency does not do, is certify these products as effective, only that they will not do direct harm. The NHPR is a regulatory compromise: Implementing manufacturing quality and safety standards, while avoiding setting standards for product efficacy claims. Unfortunately, I do not think this is right path ether, as a Heath Canada issued number gives these products a veneer of respectability they do not deserve.
It should be noted that these regulations include products such as nutritional supplements, probiotics, traditional Chinese medicine, vitamins, herbal products, as well as homeopathy. It’s less clear why homeopathy was included except for the presence of some practitioners in the House of Commons, sitting as MPs.
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August 16th, 2010 at 8:03 pm
blah blah blah… a few complaints & many are left deprived of their 2 favorite products used for yrs with no issues… yet, here we have the FDA who has never had any case of corruption, being the angel that it is for the good of consumers, … oh wait, could it be big pharma or politics playing a role in all of this… follow the money… greed always have a hand in everything… let me guess, I’m way off base & therefore don’t know what I’m saying…. blah blah blah
Always listen to big brother, take all your immunizations & swallow all them bills as prescribed… you’ll be as healthy as ever >D
Leave them natural/organic stuff (food, vitamins…) to the few of us uninformed who don’t know any better… thank you.
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August 16th, 2010 at 9:19 pm
Who Cares said:
Indeed you are terminally stupid, and frankly if idiots like you want to snort zinc salts, or drop Clorox tablets, or drink silver suspensions, I wish you would do so with abandon and take your DNA out of the gene-pool.
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August 16th, 2010 at 9:35 pm
Who Cares said:
I could not agree more that the FDA has some big issues. One of the biggest is that with products like this, they allow them to exist until they’ve harmed a signifficant number of people! Any product sold for human consumption and indicated to treat or prevent medical conditions or improve health should FIRST be subject to review for health and safety and then allowed to be sold after being proven safe. That is how it works with conventional drugs. Yet in these cases, they’re given a free pass until the public is harmed and only then does action occur.
Who Cares said:
And why exactly would “Big pharma” be so upset about this? It’s not like they have any products that compete with it directly. There’s no cure for the cold, so it’s not like that’s an issue and the contention that this reduces the severity and duration of a cold is, at best, questionable.
Who Cares said:
The food I eat is generally organic. I tried the ceramic and metallic type and found that didn’t agree with me. Then I tried the inert gas type and it turned out to be just very non-satisfying for my appetite. So I went back to organic..
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August 16th, 2010 at 11:19 pm
drbuzz0 said:
Do you know what I personally like to pour over my organic food? Some nice organic crude oil, topped with crunchy sprinkles of organic coal. Mmmmm- all natural organic goodness!
Who Cares said:
Well, you’re quite right about that!
And just for the record, did you know that when you press the [shift] key while pressing a letter, it becomes capitalized! And by doing it at the beginning of each sentence, you don’t look like an illiterate moron!
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August 17th, 2010 at 12:41 am
Mr. Blue said:
Actually, I do have to admit I like to sprinkle on some inorganic sodium chloride from time to time.
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August 17th, 2010 at 12:44 am
Dr. Buzzo, would you consider Boiron as an example of a “pretty dishonest group”? I also wonder what you’ve read about Dr. Samuel Hahnemann (see:http://altmed.creighton.edu/Homeopathy/history.htm) or if you knew about the debate between French microbiologists, Antoine Bechamp and Louis Pasteur, and scientist Claude Bernard, and how that debate impacted the course of allopathic medicine — following Pasteur’s ‘Germ Theory’ of monomorphism vs. Bechamp’s pleomorphism and biological terrain influences?
Allopathic medicine, where symptoms are treated primarily while causes are considered secondary, has its place, but there are limitations to its effectiveness. Dissatisfied patients will seek answers no matter what the FDA decrees.
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August 17th, 2010 at 12:49 am
Who Cares said:
You think all food should be organically grown, eh? The best guess I’ve seen for North America’s organic carrying capacity (based on the yield differential between modern industrial farming and the most productive truly organic farms at the time) is about 150,000,000 people. Given that North Americal has 450,000,000 people, are you volunteering to be among the 300,000,000 that starve to death? If so, you are a fool. If not, you are a sociopath. Take your pick.
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August 17th, 2010 at 1:50 am
drbuzz0 said:
And where would food be without a Dihydrous Monoxide based beverage? It’s inorganic, you know!
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August 17th, 2010 at 2:05 am
DocForesight said:
First it is utterly inaccurate to suggest that mainstream medicine, (‘allopathic’ being a meaningless term coined by Hahnemann) treats only symptoms and not causes – the very existence of antibiotics alone show this contention to be without logical foundation. Surgery to remove diseased tissue before it kills the patient, is another example of treating the cause, not the symptoms. Hahnemann’s contention may have had some currency in the 1780’s but it certainly has none now.
Medicine while practiced as an art, is founded on science. The human body is an exceptionally complex organism and its workings and failings are not as yet completely understood consequently it is unreasonable to expect physicians to achieve the same level of success as those that work on simpler systems, like a locksmith for example. This lack of guaranteed outcomes however does not mean science based medicine is failing. It simply means that it is still being developed. Treatments that are not effective, or have poor side effects, are dropped when something better is made available.
Homeopathy on the other hand, clings to a thoroughly disproven concept of pathology, and continues to practice treatments that can be shown to be ineffective, and founded on physical concepts that are in grave error. It is this failure to recognize, that there is no provable science behind these ideas, and that indeed they have been proven wrong that is the reason that homeopathy cannot be treated seriously.
Dissatisfied or frightened patients will seek answers when they cannot find them in mainstream medicine no matter what the FDA decrees, however that is no excuse for permitting quacks and other frauds from preying on them.
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August 17th, 2010 at 4:15 am
DV82XL said:
I really think we need to move away from referring to Medicine as an art – it’s an applied science just like Engineering. Or a skill, like flying a fighter jet. It requires immense amounts of knowledge but at a fundamental level there are still grey areas, sometimes doctors have to wing it to the best of their abilities and sometimes they lose.
It’s 90% science and logic, 9% experience and intuition and 1% luck (to quote my exotic-infectious-disease-geek brother).
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August 17th, 2010 at 6:04 am
I’mnotreallyhere said:
But that’s precisely what art means. Don’t confuse the broader definition of art with the more narrow domain of the fine arts.
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August 17th, 2010 at 8:29 am
BMS said:
By which you mean “don’t confuse the broader definition of art with the more narrow domain of art“?
Without wanting to get too far into somantic debate (because it tends to result in “I’ve got a bigger dictionary than you”), definition of “art” is always difficult. The best definition I’ve ever seen for “art” is “a field which is fundamentally of little to no productive value but which is intended to provoke an emotional response”. It perhaps leaves us with certain fields left on the fence but it is worth distinguishing them: civil engineering is not architecture, cookery is not cuisine (so the French keep reminding me).
Whilst one could refer to “the art of medicine” perhaps as easily as “the art of war”, it doesn’t quite work in reverse. If you came out with the statement “war is art” people would think you were either 1) so deep questions linger over the relative positions of your head and posterior; 2) a bit of a sociopath or 3) just a bit loopy.
Ironically, if you like the idea that art is about an unproductive, scientifically-inexplicable emotional response then it’s homeopathic rather that “allopathic” medicine which is an art.
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August 17th, 2010 at 9:21 am
There’s a subtle, but distinct, difference between “art” and “an art.” So, while “war is art” doesn’t make much sense, “war is an art” certainly does (and the phrase in question is “Medicine while practiced as an art …”).
Many English words have multiple meanings, and the one that applies often depends on the usage or context. I guess that my point is the following: why should we cripple the language and bend over backward for the sake of the functionally illiterate?
If someone is dull enough to confuse “medicine as an art” with painting, sculpture, or dance, then what makes you think that this person is going to understand any reasoned arguments that you could possibly put forward?
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August 17th, 2010 at 12:07 pm
DocForesight said:
Boiron, for those who don’t know, is a producer of homeopathic products. They also wrap themselves in a lot of psuedo-science and try to make their products appear legitimate.
I would not say “pretty dishonest” but rather “completely dishonest” or “very dishonest.”
Any group that sells homeopathic products with the claim that they improve health or treat a condition is telling a bold faced lie.
DocForesight said:
You assume I know nothing of homeopathy, but I know much – you don’t participate in the skeptic community for as long as I do without learning a great deal about such things. Hahnemann was dead wrong. Some have credited him with being less harmful than other ideas of his day, but the fact stands that his beliefs regarding homeopathy are nonsense.
Perhaps he can be forgiven because he lived in what was truely the dark ages of medicine and many of those around him had equally false ideas they hung on to. Certainly today’s homeopaths can’t be forgiven since they live in an age of such greater knowledge.
DocForesight said:
Pasteur inadvertantly revolutionized medicine. Germ theory is about as proven as any scientific concept can get. Our understanding of it is the primary reason why infectious disease has been so greatly reduced. It changed the face of how we prevent diseases and the effectiveness is undeniable.
Claude Bernard was another big shot in revolutionizing medicine. He first proposed the importance of experimental blinding and helped establish science and evidence based medicine. Those two men helped take the blindfold off of humanity’s view of medicine.
As for Antoine Béchamp – sure he debated Pasture, but there’s no debate anymore. Béchamp’s belief that bacteria were the result of but not the cause of infection was wrong – dead dead wrong. The very notion is silly with what we know today. That’s not to say Béchamp was an idiot. Given the limited knowledge of the day his hypothesis was fairly reasonable. Of course, we now know spontaneous generation and the whole idea of bacteria arising from illness is untrue. This is clear every time you open a can that has not rotted because the inside was sterilized.
Oh, and Pasteur never said Béchamp was right on his deathbed. That’s a complete myth.
DocForesight said:
That’s not exactly an accurate description of mainstream medicine (allopathic has no real meaning)
Causes are always considered primary and if they can be addressed they are. If you go to a doctor with a bacterial infection, they’ll give you antibiotics to cure the underlying cause and eliminate the problem. When someone has cancer, if the cancer is localized and operable, the best way to treat it is to cut out the tumor. if it has not spread then the problem is solved and the cancer is cured.
If the cause can’t be fixed, many conditions can be managed by counteracting the problem. Hypothyroid, for example, is easily treated by adding some synthetic thyroid hormones to compensate for the lack of production. Allergies are treated with histamine blockers to inhibit the effects on the body.
Not all conditions can be cured outright, and some can’t be effectively counteracted. That’s just the way things are. When this is the case, the only thing left to do is address the symptoms.
Look, there are many people in the world who had a condition at one time and don’t anymore because it was eliminated by modern medicine. My friend had hyperthyroid and now does not because some of the excessively active thyroid tissue was ablated – problem solved. I had a bacterial infection of my lymphnodes. Antibiotics killed the bacteria – problem solved. My father had an ulcer caused by bacteria – antibiotic therapy brought the bacteria levels down and let it heal – problem solved. Another person I know had pollups on the colon which, if left, would have become full blown cancer and spread. They were removed with minimally-invasive techniques. Problem solved. Yet another person I know had skin cancer, which was removed by cryo-syrgury (basically frozen off) before it reached the stage where it would be likely to spread and cause greater problems – problem solved.
I don’t think we appreciate how many of us have medical problems that were 100% taken care of. Perhaps it’s because many of them are so easily treated these days that we can easily forget we ever even had them.
I mean, hell, we live in an age when most people who are in need of glasses can have 20/20 vision with a single inpatient appointment for lasic surgery and where many deaf people can hear with an implanted electronic device. Most bacterial infections are curable with cheap, readily available drugs. What would have been considered serious heart conditions a few decades ago can sometimes be taken care of with just a few days in the hospital using minimally invasive stent surgery. It’s easy to lose sight of just how amazing some of these developments.
Sure, not all conditions can be cured, but we’re working on it. It’s a tough nut to crack. It’s amazing we can do as much as we can!
DocForesight said:
Indeed. You can’t make a society truly “idiot proof” perhaps “idiot resistant” but todays weapons grade idiots can penetrate even the toughest idiot armor.
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August 17th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
Thank you for your responses. First, I did not assume you knew nothing of homeopathy but merely asked the question about what you knew. I can appreciate being skeptical, as opposed to being gullible, particularly when you are tasked with assessing a person’s health status and offering recommendations for its improvement. If Boiron is as you say it is, a “completely dishonest” business, then it should be taken to court and proven as such since its product poses a harm to the public.
Perhaps we should separate ‘chronic’ health problems from ‘acute’. The acute problems you cite are most certainly best dealt with by medicines or surgical procedures. I didn’t mean to assert that those techniques or regimens shouldn’t be used. Western medicine is unparalleled in its success rate when dealing with acute conditions, which is why so many foreigners travel here for treatment instead of relying on their own country’s health system.
The area in which I think there is room for debate (not condescension or flat-out dismissal) is in ‘chronic’ problems. Here is where the question: Why is this person suffering from this affliction? What is causing the deficiency that allows for this condition to continue or not respond to our pharmaceutical approach?
You have done enough research to know that the body restores its homeostasis through the supplying of the proper nutrients – food – that allows the body to heal itself. Medicines are not food. Determining what nutrients are deficient by way of an objective, quantitative, repeatable protocol rather than a subjective, qualitative “educated guess” would serve everyone’s best interest. The practitioner would have hard facts to consult and assess the protocol, while the client/patient would be able to hold the practitioner accountable for the recommendations.
Ultimately, the health of a person is determined by the movement of electrons that make up the atoms which form the molecules in every cell. No movement of electrons, no life. BTW, I am the grateful recipient of LASIK (monovision technique so I don’t require readers for most of my day) at the hands of a skilled ophthalmologist whom I knew and observed for 15 years prior to my surgery. Liberating!
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August 17th, 2010 at 4:59 pm
DocForesight said:
To start off with homeostasis refers to the body’s ability to physiologically regulate its inner environment to ensure its stability in response to fluctuations in the outside environment. It is not restored by intakes, as much as it is the process by which metabolic stability is maintained in response to change. Suggesting that there is some general need to ‘help’ this system through diet is just not accurate except in some very specific cases, where the issue is that an individual cannot tolerate or metabolise foodstuffs that most others can.
Human dietary requirements are well known for normal people, and short of some underlying problem as described above, there is little benefit from having some ‘nutritionist’ (an open term as the legitimate professional is referred to as a dietitian) adjust an individuals diet, that following basic dietary hygiene wouldn’t have.
I don’t need someone to tell me a diet of cheeseburgers and fries, washed down by cola is going to harm me, and that balanced meals, light on flesh and heavy on vegetables is better, and nether should anyone else. Particularly however, no one can legitimately claim that they can effect the course of pancreatic cancer by adjusting what someone eats.
Further to suggest that modern medicine is somehow ignorant of the role of diet, and when and under what conditions it needs adjusting is another false idea that has been extended by the ‘alternate care’ frauds without any proof whatsoever.
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August 17th, 2010 at 6:43 pm
DocForesight said:
Sometimes it’s something lifestyle-related, but often it’s nothing other than the fact that biology is imperfect. This becomes all the more apparent as we age. Some people have asthma, allergies, diabetes, hypothyroide and numerous other problems through no fault of their own. It may be just genetics.
Evolution does not produce perfect systems. Our bodies work pretty well, all things considered, but often one or more systems is just not going to work all that well as is. You can’t get rid of asthma by changing nutrition. Exercise can help, but ultimately you need medication for that. I have allergies to pollen. Short of moving to the desert, nothing really can be done except suffer with them or take anti-allergy medications, which work very well.
DocForesight said:
As Doctor Gorski said of this “Since when is nutrition ‘alternative’ medicine?”
Few people in the industrial world are badly deficient in any major nutrients. It’s not as simple as boosting one vitamin or giving them a bit more of this mineral or that.
However, it’s definitely true that diet and lifestyle play a very major role in many chronic conditions: Type two diabetes, heart disease, sleep aphnia, chronic indigestion, lymphatic retention issues, high cholesterol, blood pressure and so on. These conditions are related to being overweight or to having a bad diet.
Now here’s the crux of the problem: Ask any doctor and you’ll find out that it’s extremely difficult to actually get people to change this. Doctors recomend to their patients to cut down on fatty fast foods, lose some weight and take up regular exercise until their blue in the face and rarely does anyone really do it because of the advice of their doctor. The fact is, most people already know that a lot of what they eat is not the best thing for them or that they ought to go out and get more exercise.
For example, look at statin drugs – these are very popular and profitable cholesterol-lowering medications. They all say “for use if diet and exercise is not enough.” Lets be real here, though. How many people who take them really are doing so because they tried to lower their cholesterol by improving diet and exercise and only after completely exhausting those options, after cutting out all unhealthy food and beginning rigorous exercise, they still had too high a cholesterol level and thus turned to the drugs as a last resort.
I’ll bet you more than 90% of people on cholesterol drugs could lower their cholesterol level by just as much if they really stuck to a strict regemine of exercise and better diet. However, you’d just about have to put a gun to their heads to make them do so. Yes, some of them do have a gun to their head (metaphorically) in some cases, because their medical conditions are on the verge of killing them, but even that isn’t always enough.
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August 17th, 2010 at 8:58 pm
@DV82XL — I adamantly opposed the concept of a “Food Police” (as in NYC and trans fats). This is an example of the Nanny State run amok. I enjoy a good, juicy cheeseburger and fries as much as the next person and it’s no one’s business when, where or how often I choose to have one. Did I suggest that modern medicine is ignorant of the role of diet? No. Although the American Medical Association has been generally dismissive towards any supplementation until recently. They were known by the phrase “just wasting money and making expensive urine”. In my particular arena, carotenoids have shown some benefit to the macula that was not previously known or admitted. Similar experience is growing in regards to anti-oxidants.
@Dr. Buzzo — No doubt there are genetic redilections and environmental influences (some self-inflicted) that result in a person’s state of health. Does it cause you to question the protocol or rationale when the first option recommended for a chronic, non-life threatening condition is to be prescribed a medication? For example, someone complains of a headache and they are given Ibuprofen or Tylenol. Obviously, I am being simplistic in this example, but there are any number of other nagging, low-impact problems which are reflexively given a ‘pain med’. It seems the pharmaceutical route has taken over for a studied examination of the physiology underlying the affliction — the ’silver bullet’ is THE answer. Until it doesn’t work, then what? As to your high cholesterol or high blood pressure example, again, my question would be: why is the person not processing cholesterol properly or why are their vessels not supple enough to handle the blood flow?
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August 17th, 2010 at 9:27 pm
DocForesight said:
When debating with me, I strongly suggest you avoid attempting bate-and-switch techniques, I find these insulting to the extreme and intellectually dishonest. There was no talk of food police – only commonsence in diet selection.
Yes in fact you did imply that current medicine does not attend to the issues of diet, by suggesting that this was an area that there was room for debate, and then showing you know nothing about the subject by assuming a totally inaccurate definition of homoeostases and claiming that there is some benefit to having it ‘rebalanced’ by “supplying of the proper nutrients” (sic) This is categorically wrong, and any other claims you make about vitamin A and vision have in fact been known for over a century.
You are not going to get away with any attempt to give your ideas the veneer of legitimacy by pretending that there is room for discussion about them. You are just plain wrong. Your ideas are unsupported by references and they show a deep ignorance of the topic and the underlying theories never mind that you don’t seem to know what some of the terms you are using mean.
Traditional and alternative medicine is a sham if for no other reason than those techniques that work become mainstream and are then are ‘medicine.’ Those that fail, fail because they do not work, not because of any ideological issues. One of the things about practising medicine as an art, is that it is not bound by dogmas like science and other rule-based systems are, so the new ideas can be folded in fairly quickly.
Homoeopathy and other ‘alternatives’ to modern medicine, have had their chance to prove their worth and fallen short, simply because they do not work, no matter how much people like you want to believe, or how loudly you proclaim it does.
It is just that simple. And the gloves are off now, sport.
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August 18th, 2010 at 12:15 am
DocForesight said:
What would this alternative you propose be? I happen to be allergic to pollen and ragweed. I take a medication called Zyrtec every day during the allergy season. It works on the Histamine H1 receptor. Very effective stuff. I can’t make my allergies go away because my immune system has decide to respond to pollen in a way it shouldn’t and there’s no known way to effectively change this.
Anyway, I don’t *need* to take the medication. My allergies are not life threatening. They are quite miserable though.
DocForesight said:
It’s not that they’re not processing it properly. High cholesterol is what happens when you eat your lunch at a drive-thru every day and get the largest meal on the value menu and then go home and watch tv and eat Twinkies all night.
High blood pressure can also be related to being physically unfit, bad diet and high salt intake. It can lead to hardening of the arteries. It strains the heart and causes other problems.
The human body can’t be expected to always be in excellent health, especially when you throw a lot more calories at it than it was really evolved to deal with and then live an unhealthy lifestyle in numerous other ways.
If anything, I think it’s amazing our bodies have adapted as well as they have to the variety of living conditions that people have, including many which involve much different stressors than the species initially evolved to deal with.
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August 18th, 2010 at 10:56 am
@DV82XL — My reference to “Food Police” was not to insult you or engage in a “bait-and-switch” and I agreed with you on common sense food / diet selection. I don’t want Big Brother deciding what a private business can use for ingredients when conducting a lawful enterprise. If the public doesn’t want to consume those ingredients they can go elsewhere, same with smoking. That was the context, at least intended if not clearly stated, of my comment. I was siding with you, not against you.
I get the impression from you that there is no room for discussion when considering alternatives to western medicine and pharmaceuticals when dealing with chronic health afflictions. Am I wrong here? It is not my style to set up straw men arguments in order to score cheap “gotcha” points. Maybe that is due to my 25 years of experience with patients and trying to explain vague, nebulous terms that are often confused. Most of those patients appreciated my careful choice of words and the time I took to explain things to them.
As to “veneer of truth” or “loudly proclaim”, time will tell if certain approaches like specific supplementation of nutrients can be demonstrated to be effective or relegated to the dustbin of history. I don’t think I have engaged in a “loud” advocacy of alternative approaches — I’ve simply asked questions and offered some personal experience. Who would’ve thought radioactive isotopes would have medicinal value years ago?
I appreciate your posts and comments on nuclear blogs as they are informative and demonstrate a depth of knowledge that I, obviously due to my career choice, don’t have. Keep the gloves on, sport. Cheers.
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August 18th, 2010 at 11:09 am
@Dr. Buzzo — Let’s try ‘joint pain’. While a pain med may offer temporary relief of discomfort, it doesn’t address the underlying cause of the pain. Some people benefit from Hyaluronic acid and chondroitin supplements, some don’t. There is no harm in trying the supplement, right?
On cholesterol, there are people who don’t eat fatty foods and aren’t overweight who are afflicted with high cholesterol just as there are people who don’t smoke yet have contracted lung cancer – and there are those who smoke like a chimney for 60 years with no sign of cancer. Anecdotal? Yes, but there are enough of these people that make you scratch your head in wonderment.
The human body is, indeed, an amazingly complex aggregation of trillions of cells, each one dictated by its DNA. How the subcellular components work and maintain their balance, in spite of our best/worst efforts at upsetting that balance, is beyond my limited comprehension.
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August 18th, 2010 at 11:48 am
DocForesight said:
If you have patients, and you are not an MD, you are part of the ‘alternative medicine’ field, and therefore your motivations when posting to a sceptic’s blog are suspect.
Lest there be any doubt, there is no room for debate on the mater of ‘alternative medicine’ – treatments work, and can be proven to work in proper clinical studies, in which case they become part of mainstream medicine, or they cannot be proven and they are frauds. There is no room for discussion here. Patients with a medical problem cannot be expected to be responsible to research each and every treatment that any random individual suggests. They depend instead on a system that qualifies both the treatment and the people that determine which one is best. Alternative medicine practitioners, particularly those that adhere to thoroughly disproven and discredited ideas, such as those underpinning homophony, are NOT qualified to give medical advice, nor should they be permitted to treat anyone, for anything.
As for nutrient supplementation, I repeat that no minor additions to the diet have been shown to be effective at improving human health, that are not swamped by bad eating/lifestyle habits. Ten or twelve years ago I started to have problems with my knees. My wife suggested that I start taking a mix of glucosamine, chondroitin, and MSM, as this was all the rage in her circle of acquaintances. It did nothing after months of taking it. My doctor sent me to a physiotherapist who got me to loose weight, and showed me a regimen of exercises that I needed to do as long as my job kept me sitting behind a desk eight hours a day. This worked.
Since then the dietary supplements I had been taking have been shown to be worthless in clinical double-blind testing. The only thing I was relived of was the several hundred dollars that I paid for them.
Pretending that there is an on going discussion is a trick used by many in those fields threatened by hard science to create the illusion in the public mind that there is some room for doubt. This dialectic has exploited the generous nature of those in science to engage with the intent to explain, and the generally collegial tones we chose to communicate in, but this is then twisted to claim that there is doubt in the scientific community, and that these questions are still open.
I have dropped this façade of treating crank ideas as if they are simple errors on the part of those extending them, and I now assume that there is some underlying agenda. In your case, an attempt to legitimize whatever nonsense you inflict on your patients. And if your explanations include categorically wrong definitions of homoeostases I have no doubts they are often confused.
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August 18th, 2010 at 2:03 pm
DV82XL said:
Gee … I didn’t know that dentists, podiatrists, etc., are all part of the “alternative medicine” crowd.
I guess I now need to go tell my nurse practitioner that she’s a crank.
If I were to guess based on his moniker, I’d venture that DocForesight’s patients come to see him for help with something to do with their eyes.
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August 18th, 2010 at 4:16 pm
@DV82XL — Pardon me, but I didn’t know that this blog was restricted to ’skeptics’ or that the opinions of ’skeptics’ were more equal than others’. I posted my questions under no pretense or motivation, other than to gain insight into the thinking of others. Have I in any way been condescending to you? No. In fact, I have praised you for your expertise in a vitally important area in which I am not an expert – nuclear energy – merely an interested observer. Nor have I suggested that western medicine is a failure and to avoid being seen by a physician or other qualified health care practitioner, when one is needed.
For all the rigorous double-blind, case-controlled, randomized studies that pharmaceuticals go through, there are still thousands who die annually from properly prescribed medicines. That is a tragedy that ought not happen but also shows how even under the best attempts at safety there will be negative outcomes.
Certainly you don’t mean that berberi, scurvy, ricketts and other nutritional deficiencies are not treatable via either an enhanced diet or supplements? It’s unfortunate that your joints didn’t respond to those supplements. I suspect your knee problems took more than a few months to develop, and why you have knee problems while sitting behind a desk is puzzling. If you were standing all day on concrete, that might explain why. So, besides spending a few hundred dollars over a few months to fix a problem that took years, possibly, to develop is frustrating, but not life-threatening.
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August 18th, 2010 at 4:18 pm
BMS said:
Alright now we’re getting into hyper-technicalities. I’m sure DV82XL would agree that dentists, orthodontists, nurse-practitioners, physical therapists and other such thins are legitimate practitioners of medicine. In all these cases, of course, they’re licensed by the government and board certified for their specialty or at least have some kind of formal accreditation to it.
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August 18th, 2010 at 4:32 pm
BMS said:
That would be correct, sir. I take myself 1/3rd less seriously than most of my colleagues – thus the moniker. I also found that Conventional Wisdom in eye & vision care left too many of my patients dissatisfied with their results, so I had to look to expand my ‘toolbox’ beyond a hammer, if I were to be successful in meeting their needs. A clinician doesn’t have the luxury of waiting for double-blind, case-controlled studies before deciding on a regimen to meet the need of the person in the chair NOW. So you go with what your education and experience tell you based on the facts at hand. That’s part of the Art of health care.
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August 18th, 2010 at 6:18 pm
DocForesight said:
I told you before you picked the wrong person to try and pull this on. I did not write anything of the sort. I wrote specifically that there is no grounds for debate with you on this issue because you are categorically wrong. I do not care if you post, however expect that if you continue to assert nonsensical ideas without reference to hard science you will get the same treatment any other crank gets here, which is to have your notions dismissed outright as rubbish.
DocForesight said:
So you say, but given that you should know, as you are a regular, that nonsense of the sort you are presenting, gets jumped on hard in these pages routinely, I find it hard to believe that you have not tailored your approach with the intention of introducing a wedge-argument. As to your opinion of me, I am indifferent, as I claim no expertise in nuclear matters beyond what any motivated autodidact can.
DocForesight said:
Oh please! That is the flimsiest argument for TAM that anyone has offered to date, and at any rate does not in any way logically suggest that ‘alternative medications’ should get a free pass.
DocForesight said:
Those are specific problems cause by a dietary lack yes, but they are not present in those that eat a balanced diet, and are anyway well documented diseases. And again as I stated before, those things that have been proven have found their way into mainstream medical practice, thus in these cases large doses of the missing vitamin are not by any stretch of the imagination, alternate treatments. Nor did I suggest at any point that there were not real medical conditions caused by poor diet, or that there were not cases where some people could not eat certain things due to a specific condition. These are not what this about: it is about prescribing dietary supplements to effect cures in conditions NOT recognized as being due to deficiencies in that area without proper scientific proof that this is an effective treatment.
DocForesight said:
I did not ask you, nor do I give your opinion in this matter any weight. If indeed you are involved with vision care, why would I seek a diagnosis anyway from you on a mater better answered by a rheumatologist. Anyway I doubt that you are a licensed ophthalmologist or an optometrist.
DocForesight said:
Well that statement by itself says volumes about who we are dealing with here, now doesn’t it?
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August 18th, 2010 at 7:51 pm
@DV82XL — As you have noted, I post comments on several blogs and websites of interest to me. If you read them, you will recognize that I am characterized by being fair-minded and genuinely inquisitive. I try to refrain from ad hominem or snarky responses as it doesn’t wear well, it contributes to the coarsening of the civic discussion and is just tiresome.
I have not suggested that ‘alternative medicine’ get a “pass”. In fact, I’d like to see more rigorous requirements for supplements – that their ingredients actually contain what is claimed on the label; that the active component be clearly defined and that there be a uniform unit of measurement for each component – so the consuming public can compare apples-to-apples. Their health deserves nothing less and it would weed out the poseurs from the certified laboratories who employ the strictest of standards.
I actually earned my state license in September, 1985 and have been interested in nutrition since my undergrad days at the U of North Dakota. Being in the health care field gives me the reason to learn about the health of the whole body – as systemic conditions commonly have site-specific manifestation (e.g. Diabetic Retinopathy). My last comment is exactly what every practicing MD does on a daily basis – unless they are just marking time and can’t get fired no matter the lack of success of their patient protocols. The Ivory Tower professor gets to “wait and see”.
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August 18th, 2010 at 8:41 pm
drbuzz0 said:
No, we are having a little fun at DV8’s expense. Perhaps you missed the wink icon?
More importantly, however, this illustrates that DV8 is definitely not at his best when he has fallen into a campaign of personal attacks, which is an occasional weakness of his.
Frankly, it cheapens much of the fine commentary that he usually provides when he is not being so obnoxious. Pettiness and vindictiveness do not make for an effective writing style.
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August 18th, 2010 at 9:13 pm
DocForesight said:
Ya, well I draw a line in the sand when I know I am dealing with a nitwit. My patience wears thin at the point where I am not getting solid proof, and where an ignoramus is holding forth on a subject they obviously know nothing about, and where there is prevarication and mendacity.
You have failed to offer one single scrap of anything approaching proof of your contentions. You have attempted to drag red herrings through the discussion by attributing statements to me that I did not make, and you have carefully avoided stating your profession by name. You have not made one solid argument that has not been disposed outright by ether DrBuzz0 or me, and have demonstrated an appalling lack of understanding of the fundamentals.
When someone pulls this sort of thing on me and I call them out for it, it is not an ad hominem argument I am making – it is a direct criticism of what is being done, and if there is no change in attitude forthcoming, I get annoyed, and state my feelings in direct terms. I dislike being played for a fool, and I openly hate those that think that all they need to be taken seriously is to state their ideas in the style of a rationalist. Wrong remains wrong no matter how well it is presented.
Most people are attracted to some intuitive (and wrong) notion of epistemic fairness: you are making one claim, the other guy is making another claim, the two of you are therefore on equal footing. I do not suffer from this handicap.
DocForesight said:
However, YOU deem yourself above such conventions as waiting for the efficacy of a treatment to be proven, or declared safe by the agency that does the certification
DocForesight said:
Yet I still don’t see you stating clearly what part of heath care you were licensed in.
I challenge you to prove that MDs behave in the manner you described – you claiming it is so out of nowhere is just more noise
@BMS – I did not answer your petty little criticism because you took the statement out of context, but you know what? Maybe I stop commenting here all together and leave dealing with ass(w)holes to the peanut gallery. I’m sure you can handle this discussion on your own from this point forward.
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August 19th, 2010 at 1:49 am
@DV8 — I didn’t know I was required to offer proof and it is pretty clear that no amount of citation of studies or proof would satisfy your requirements. This whole exercise began over a simple question about homeopathy remedies – which I don’t recommend nor denigrate outright. There are some things we just don’t know yet and, while I am naturally cautious about making recommendations outside what my judgement and experience would inform, I don’t, as a rule, suggest people jump on the latest fad treatment. Medical isotopes for radiation therapy would have been considered madness years ago but now form an important treatment regimen for certain conditions. We didn’t know how it worked because we couldn’t measure its effect.
It seems like you don’t read my entire post before you launch into your ’slice-and-dice’ fusillade. Can you cite where I have employed the ‘red herring’ technique with your statements? I have fastidiously avoided playing you for a fool. For one thing, I recognize your expertise based on other articles and postings on the sites I frequent – and I have voiced that in appreciative terms.
My license is as a Doctor of Optometry. As I mentioned, I found early-on in my career the Conventional Wisdom of medical eye care was entirely too limiting and didn’t explain or offer choices to satisfy patients that didn’t fit or respond “by the book”. I learned that eyesight (acuity) and vision (gaining meaning and directing action from what is seen) were different and that vision was a learned process. I learned that only 20% of the retinal nerve fibers are employed for eyesight (coming from the macular area) while 80% of the peripheral fibers follow a different nerve pathway to affect balance, coordination and posture. Try standing on one foot with your eyes open then eyes closed to see this at work. There are other fibers that go to the hypothalamus, the pineal and pituitary glands – the retino-hypo-thalamic tract (see: “The Influence of Ocular Light Perception on Metabolism in Man and in Animals” Hollwich, Fritz -Springer Verlag) which is involved in cases of SAD – Seasonal Affective Disorder – and why full spectrum light has such a profound effect on mood. The higher the Color Rendering Index of a light , the better it is for visual performance due to less inherent glare. Sunlight has no inherent glare, as it is perfectly balanced.
Now, I offered some observations to Dr. Buzzo relating to thin, underweight people with high cholesterol and people who don’t smoke who contract lung cancer while others who smoke like chimneys for 60 years have no obvious complication from that habit. Conventional wisdom doesn’t offer an explanation for these inconsistencies. MDs, indeed, utilize their education and experience at making clinical decisions on a daily basis. Part of that experience comes from seeing similar complaints among a population, some from pharmaceutical studies that demonstrate an efficacy for a treatment regimen, some of it is a “hunch”.
By the way, what is your background? I assume it is engineering and I believe you have had some involvement with the CANDU reactors but would appreciate your clarifying my understanding. Thanks.
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August 19th, 2010 at 5:20 am
DocForesight said:
One of the touch-stones of a crank, caught out, is the assertion that they won’t offer proof because it won’t be accepted. You apparently think I am stupid enough to buy such an excuse, and since you are a regular here, I also find it hard to believe that you are surprised that proof is asked for.
That you do not reject homeopathy outright given that it is based on the ludicrous belief that solutions are made stronger by dilution, among other equally ridiculous theories, should make anyone question your competence to practice in any health care capacity regardless of your professional qualifications, and current standing.
BTW radioactive isotopes for radiation therapy were being used long before anyone knew how they worked, or the dangers they represented. As a consequence many died from these treatments. Spend a bit of time researching a subject before holding forth on it.
Any rate I am getting bored with this exchange and BMS is going to take over and demonstrate how to deal with you since apparently I am not doing a good enough job.
DocForesight said:
Click on my name and you will be sent to a page with my profile.
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August 19th, 2010 at 12:08 pm
@DV8 — I have never asserted that you are “stupid enough” nor implied that in any way. In fact, I have been entirely circumspect in my address to you. Yes, I have not offered “proof” of the efficacy, or lack thereof, of homeopathy regimens as that was not my original question to Dr. Buzzo, whom I thought was the lone “owner” of this blog. If you operate as a “tag-team” (like The Crusher and The Bruiser, of All Star Wrestling fame – remember those guys?), then I stand corrected.
While I regularly check in on topics here, I only occasionally post a comment. Regarding “the ludicrous belief that solutions are made stronger by dilution”, is it possible that we don’t yet know how all dilutions work, particularly when it comes to human response? Edward Jenner (smallpox vaccination) was rejected by his contemporaries and may’ve been considered a crank. Turns out he was right about immune system response.
If homeopathic remedies are too dilute to cause any effect then there is no harm in taking them, other than the small cost (compared to pharmaceuticals) and the possible delay in seeking other treatment. I don’t know about mortality figures from relying solely on homeopathic remedies but I suspect it is quite low.
In optics, to a low hyperope or an emmetrope a (+) lens elicits a certain response of relaxation up to a point. After that point, the response is negative – so a stronger lens is rejected. If I followed Conventional Wisdom, I would find a way to force the patient to accept the stronger lens because “they need it” – never mind that they’ll never wear it.
Based on BMS’ observation, I might find that interaction entertaining. Either way, I wish you a good day and thank you for your advocacy of civilian nuclear power. Cheers!
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August 19th, 2010 at 4:28 pm
For the record, Dr. Buzz0 is the sole owner of this blog, and I have no more status here as a commenter than anyone else.
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August 20th, 2010 at 6:41 am
DocForesight said:
Conventional wisdom does offer an explanation for these inconsistencies. Smoking doesn’t always cause cancer it just increases the probability. It is like throwing basketballs at the net with your eyes closed. Occasionally you will hit the net and the more times you throw a basketball the higher the probability that you will get a hit. But even with hundreds of tries you may never hit the net.
So someone who smokes like a chimney may get very lucky and never ‘hit the net’ while someone who never smokes has their net ‘hit’ by some other factor that can cause lung cancer.
And cholesterol is affected by more than diet. There is a genetic component and individuals differing metabolisms also cause wide variations.
But even when conventional wisdom doesn’t (yet) have an answer it doesn’t mean that some alternative medicine approach is the answer.
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August 20th, 2010 at 6:55 am
Now if conventional wisdom could just remind me to use “Preview Comment” before clicking on Submit.
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August 20th, 2010 at 7:43 am
ddp said:
I fixed your closing tag.
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August 20th, 2010 at 8:34 am
BMS said:
Sorry, I’ve been meaning to reply to this for a while, but life has a habit of getting in the way, in my case in the form of friends, alcohol and sleep deprivation. Where were we? Oh yes…
Sure, you can certainly refer to war as “an art” if you like, although personally I’d contest you only sound slightly less loopy than if you were to simply say “war is art” – although you’d probably qualify as being more grammatically correct at least and it’s more fun to have eloquent nutters.
Why should we cripple our language? Well we do all the time in order to be both correct and specific and up to date. Conventional understanding of words, the first definitions people think of if you will, evolve just as the whole language does. I could give a dozen examples from a dozen fields, but we’ll just go with the historical meaning of “gay” versus the current and leave it at that.
Taking a look around at various definitions of “art” again, they tend to break down into two categories:
1) Art in the classical sense, fine arts, dance, poetry, painting etc.
2) Art in the artisanal sense, a skill or talent outside the realms of academic learning usually involving either A) a substantial physical (usually dextrous) aspect, e.g. the art of tailoring or B) an intuitive or communicational aspect, e.g. the art of persuasion.
Whilst there are certainly elements of (2) in medicine, those aspects mostly only apply to hospital level care where physical actions get involved and/or treatment decisions sometimes have to be made based on less-than-perfect information.
But that claim can equally be applied to any industry. Ask a civil engineer for a choice of beam for a specific technical specification and he’ll go away with a calculator and a bookcase of industrial standards and supplier catalogues and come back with a precise answer. Give him ten minutes and he’ll sketch a diagram on the back of a napkin scratch his head a bit and then give you an answer erring suitably on the side of caution – the degree of caution and confidence in the choice depending on the experience of the engineer generally. Does that make civil engineering an art? Or perhaps just the practice of beam selection?
Medicine, like Engineering, may once have been based on experience and intuition, but in the modern world is based on scientific research and mathematical analysis. Describing it as an art simply makes it easier to conflate with holistic “treatment” and alternative “therapy”.
But what’s worrying is that, certainly frequenting the kind of blogs we seem to, we’re reaching the stage of seeing people feel the need to specify this. This daft little phrase “science-based medicine” has come up – which I hope to never use without quotation marks around to allow me to soothe my distaste for it. Once you stray outside the bounds of science you’re beyond medicine and into charlatans, frauds and tricksters.
If that sounds too harsh or narrow-minded to you, I invite you to return to the civil engineering analogy. If you want to have your house built by the guy divining the materials and dimensions by use of crystals, herbs and the phases of the moon then you go ahead. I’ll be living next door in a house designed by the geeky-looking guy with the calculator.
We’ll see who survives when the Big Bad Wolf strolls by.
P.S. Sorry, this turned into rather more of an essay than I meant. And by the looks of it I’ve got rather stronger opinions on the issue than I’d previously thought. Phew.
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August 20th, 2010 at 12:11 pm
I’mnotreallyhere said:
To start off with I don’t think you can arrogate to yourself the power to limit the meaning of a word you did not coin. Also, English has no equivalent to the Académie française to fix the definition of a word officially.
The other thing is that there is a very large index of occupations published by the UN, ( I’m still looking for a link, but most public libraries have hard copies) that uses the term ‘art’ to describe those occupations that depend of craft techniques, rather than skill alone, or procedure to execute. Medicine in that list is called an art.
Also you may notice that in many cities there are buildings still named ‘Medical Arts’, although this usage in no longer as popular as it used to be.
So while I am sympathetic to your argument, I am afraid there is not much support for limiting the word’s meaning to activities driven by aesthetic principles only.
BTW: Is no one going to challenge this?
DocForesight said:
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August 21st, 2010 at 5:30 am
DV82XL said:
Erm, a bit part of me wants to be ridiculously catty, but I probably shouldn’t for a dozen reasons so I’ll simply point out that I trawled through as many dictionaries as I could reasonably lay my eyes on and took an overview of the definitions available.
Because you have every right to ask for an example (no this wasn’t the only place I checked) try http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/art
Of the sixteen definitions available, it would be logical to assign medicine to the 16th and perhaps reasonable to link it to 8, 10 and 12. This is rather typical of the results I’ve had from other print and internet dictionaries.
You’re right of course, there is no English equivalent of the Académie française (the merits of which are a whole new debate) so the best we can reasonable do is keep track of the usage of words, something which dictionaries are essentially designed to provide a meta-analysis of.
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August 21st, 2010 at 10:20 am
DocForesight said:
Lung cancer – yeah, smoking increases the probability but does not guarantee you’ll get it. Just like driving drunk increases the chances of an accident, but just the same, some drunk drivers make it home just fine. Also, some sober drivers are killed in accidents.
As far as cholesterol – I think his point is the vast majority of lipitor/crestor/zocor users don’t turn to the drugs as a last resort after completely exhausting all margin for improvement in diet and exercise. There might be some. How many people with high cholesterol live highly athletic lives and eat very restricted diets with the intent of maintaining optimal nutrition? I’m thinking probably not many. Maybe a few percent if that.
In a normal person less than half of cholesterol is produced in the liver and that’s where these drugs act. If someone has high cholesterol and yet has a great diet and lifestyle then it must be coming from their liver producing too much. So then you suggest that doctors address the root problem??? Seems to me like they are doing just that. Something is WRONG with the liver making too much cholesterol. You seem to have trouble with the concept that sometimes the body does the wrong thing even though there’s no external cause. So what do we do when the liver is making too much? These drugs work right there and basically regulate it when the body won’t do it on its own.
There’s a bigger point here though. It’s not just cholesterol but there are many conditions where a person could get relief if they really really worked at it. Look at all the obese people and their various health problems. Most manage the symptoms, but they could do better by losing weight. That’s not what people want to hear though. Sure some of them may have metabolic problems so they can’t lose weight, but most can.
I’m not being judgmental though, because I’m far from being in tip top shape. I’m just saying I’m not going to pretend that this is all the drug companies or doctor’s faults. I could probably eat better, but boy do I love a big bacon cheeseburger with seasoned curly fries and a thick milkshake!
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August 21st, 2010 at 3:20 pm
I’mnotreallyhere said:
Yes, I’d say so.
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November 30th, 2010 at 5:06 am
Great blog. I have been wearing glasses for since I was 5 years old and have just recently discovered the eye exercise program by dr. Bates. The results are great!
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January 7th, 2011 at 1:34 am
Your malicious propaganda against homeopathy is set to die soon.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/IIT-B-team-shows-how-homeopathy-works/articleshow/7108579.cms
with technology becoming better, soon even idiots like you will be able to understand How Homeopathy Works.
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January 7th, 2011 at 6:39 am
Nisha Singh said:
You have been saying the same thing for quite awhile.
“Soon all those talking loud against homeopathy will be seen running for cover. Or may be in homeopathy clinic looking for ultradiluted medicines to correct their mental imbalance.
Posted by: Nisha Singh | July 13, 2010 2:45 AM”
So just when is this going to happen?
And the article you link to doesn’t back up a single homeopathic claim. What it says is;
“”Certain highly diluted homeopathic remedies made from metals still contain measurable amounts of the starting material, even at extreme dilutions of 1 part in 10 raised to 400 parts (200C),” said Dr Jayesh Bellare from the scientific team. “
I don’t see anything there about effectiveness. All it says is that after a large dilution some of the original component still exists. I have never seen anybody deny that. If I put a drop of oil into a swimming pool of water, the oil will still exist and a sample of the water will have a few molecules of oil. But the water won’t work to lubricate my cars engine just like the few atoms of the components in a homeopathic ‘medicine’ will not treat any disease.
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