complementary and alternative medicine
oracknows | May 21, 2013Actions have consequences. No matter how much the person might want to try to hide from the consequences of one's actions, they frequently have a way of coming back, grabbing you by the neck, and letting you know they're there. We see it happening now in the U.K.
Fifteen years ago, British doctor Andrew Wakefield published a case series in The Lancet in which he described gastrointestinal symptoms in 12 autistic children who were treated at the Royal Free Hospital. His conclusion was that he had identified associated gastrointestinal disease and developmental regression in a group of…
oracknows | May 19, 2013That naturopathy is a veritable cornucopia of quackery mixed with the odd sensible, science-based suggestion here and there is not in doubt, at least not to supporters of science-based medicine (SBM). However, what naturopaths are very good at doing is representing their pseudoscience as somehow being scientific and thus on par with actual SBM. So how do they accomplish this? Certainly, it's not through the validation of any of the cornucopia of pseudoscience and quackery that naturopaths apply to their patients as though picking "one from column A and one from column B" from a proverbial…
oracknows | May 17, 2013Manufactroversy.
It's wonderful, made-up word that describes a phenomenon so aptly, so brilliantly, that I like to use it all the time. Basically the word describes a manufactured controversy that is motivated by either extreme ideology (virtually always crank ideology) and/or profit that is intentionally stoked to create public confusion about a scientific issue that is not in dispute. Such efforts are often accompanied by conspiracy theories involving deception and polemic rhetoric (and sometimes fraud). There's also another term that is related to the word "manufactroversy," and that's "…
oracknows | May 15, 2013After yesterday, I really hadn't planned on writing about Angelina Jolie and her decision to undergo bilateral mastectomies again, except perhaps as a more serious piece next week on my not-so-super-secret other blog where The Name of the Doctor is revealed on a weekly basis. As I mentioned yesterday, there are a number of issues about the decision that could use my professional attention, from the process, to the evidence, to the issue of how the surgery was handled. Oh, and if I do decide to do that I'm sure I won't be able to resist a mention of some of the quackery that oozed out from…
oracknows | May 15, 2013I should have known it. I should have known that the reaction wouldn't take very long. I should have known it based on prior history. The news story to which I am referring is, of course, the revelation yesterday in the New York Times editorial page by Angelina Jolie that she had decided to undergo prophylactic bilateral mastectomies (removal of both breasts) because she had learned that she was a BRCA gene mutation carrier, and the particular mutation that she apparently carried portended an 85% lifetime risk of breast cancer. The reaction to which I am referring is, of course, the same sort…
oracknows | May 13, 2013I'm not alone in pointing this out, but if there's one thing about research and clinical trials into "complementary and alternative medicine" (CAM) that has become very apparent to me over the years, it's that the more rigorous the study the less likely it is to show an effect. In normal research, the usual progression in clinical research goes from small pilot and observational studies to small to medium-sized randomized studies, ultimately culminating in large randomized, double-blind studies that are tightly controlled to eliminate as many potential biases and confounders as possible, as…
oracknows | May 12, 2013Sometimes blogging topics arise from the strangest places. It's true. For instance, although references to how tobacco causes cancer and the decades long denialist campaign by tobacco companies are not infrequently referenced in my blogging (particularly from supporters of highly dubious studies alleging a link between cell phone radiation and cancer and the ham-handed misuse of the analogy by antivaccinationists, who seem to think that vaccine companies engage in deceit on a scale similar to the deceptive practices of tobacco companies in "denying" that vaccines cause autism and all the…
oracknows | May 10, 2013I hate to end the week on a bit of a downer, but sometimes I just have to. At least, it's depressing to anyone who is a proponent of science-based cancer care as the strategy most likely to decrease the death rate from cancer and improve quality of life for cancer patients. Unfortunately, in enough ways to disturb me, oncology is actually going in the exact opposite direction. I'm referring, of course, to the phenomenon of "integrative oncology," a form of quackademic medicine that is proliferating and insinuating itself in academic medical programs like so much kudzu. The concept behind "…
oracknows | May 8, 2013A key pillar of the Stanislaw Burzynski antineoplaston marketing machine, a component of the marketing strategy without which his clinic would not be able to attract nearly as many desperate cancer patients to Houston for either his antineoplaston therapy (now under a temporary shutdown by the FDA that, if science were to reign, will become permanent) or his "personalized gene-targeted cancer therapy," which Burzynski represents as a discovery of his that large NCI-designated comprehensive cancer centers like M.D. Anderson or Memorial Sloan-Kettering are only now starting to copy, is the…
oracknows | May 8, 2013I've been very, very critical of a self-proclaimed cancer doctor named Stanislaw Burzynski, who is not an oncologist but somehow has managed over the last 36 years to treat patients with unapproved cancer drugs, list dozens of phase 2 clinical trials in ClinicalTrials.gov but never publish a completed one (at least to this date), and have his patients pay up up to several hundred thousand dollars for the privilege of being treated on one of his clinical trials. Meanwhile, the Burzynski Clinic and Burzynski Research Institute flout the regulations protecting human subjects in research. Even…
oracknows | May 6, 2013As hard as it might be to believe, one time over 20 years ago I actually took the Dale Carnegie course and, as part of that course, read his famous book How To Win Friends and Influence People. I know, I know. It's probably not obvious from my style of writing on this particular blog, but I did, and i tried to take the lessons to heart. The main reason I took the course, however, was because back then my public speaking truly sucked. I was nervous, hesitant, and tended to mumble a lot. That course was the first time I realized that I could be a halfway decent public speaker. Now, over 20…
oracknows | May 2, 2013In the United States, the federal government has long had a prominent role in funding science research. Be it the $30 billion a year or so that funds the National Institutes of Health or the $5 or $6 billion a year allotted to the National Science Foundation, the government funds a lot of basic and applied research, and this is in general a good thing. The number of discoveries and advances that have come out of this funding have well repaid the investment and much more. There is, however, a downside to this funding that's a pretty obvious consequence any time the government funds anything,…
oracknows | April 30, 2013Well, April is over, which means that Autism Awareness Month is almost over. While antivaccinationists are saying goodbye to April and whining about the very concept of "autism awareness," I can't help but realize that the autism quackfest known as AutismOne is less than a month away. Yes, every year around Memorial Day weekend, the glitterati of the autism quackery and antivaccine world descend upon an airport near Chicago's O'Hare airport (what a drag, given that it can take an hour to get to downtown from there at rush hour) in order to spin conspiracy theories about big pharma and the…
oracknows | April 29, 2013So now we know.
Back when it was announced that the second Burzynski movie by Eric Merola would be screened at the Newport Beach Film Festival on April 27, Merola announced that there would be a "special celebrity guest." Those of us who have been following Burzynski for a while scratched our heads, not knowing who it could likely be. We considered and rejected multiple possibilities: Suzanne Somers, Ralph Moss, and many others. Well, now we know who would be giving the celebrity endorsement for the Burzynski Clinic, and, no, it's not Josh Duhamel.
It's Fabio Lanzoni:
Yes, that Fabio. The…
oracknows | April 28, 2013Every so often, our "friends" on the other side of the science aisle (i.e., the supporters of "complementary and alternative medicine"—otherwise known as CAM or "integrative medicine") give me a present when I'm looking for a topic for my weekly bit of brain droppings about medicine, science, and/or why CAM is neither. It's also been a while since I've written about this particular subject; so it's a win-win for all sides! I get a topic. A certain CAM journal gets extra traffic. And you get the benefit of my usually brilliant deconstruction of dubious science. What could go wrong?
In any case…
oracknows | April 26, 2013A long, long time ago in a ScienceBlogs far, far away (well, it seems that way anyway, given the halcyon times back then before Pepsigate), Mark Hoofnagle coined the term "crank magnetism." It was a fantastic term used to describe how susceptibility to one form of quackery, pseudoscience, or just plain crankery tended to be associated with other forms of quackery, pseudoscience, or crankery. It explains why so many creationists tend to be into quackery and/or antivaccinationism, why so many 9/11 Truthers also tend to flirt with Holocaust denial or anthropogenic global warming denialists go…
oracknows | April 24, 2013I've written about naturopathy many times before. The reasons that it interests me are several. First, it amazes me how anyone "discipline" (if you want to call it that) can encompass so many forms of quackery, some of which are mutually contradictory. (For instance, how can homeopathy and traditional Chinese medicine both be true?) Also, it's amazing how deeply steeped in prescientific vitalism naturopathy is. Then, of course, there's its tight embrace of The One Quackery To Rule Them All, homeopathy. There are times when I feel as though it's just too easy, as homeopathy is nothing more…
oracknows | April 24, 2013I had a long day in the operating room yesterday; so I was tired last night. As a consequence, I thought that today might end up being one of those rare weekdays free of new Insolence. Then, in the morning as I was doing my usual brief perusal of e-mail and blogs before heading to work, I noticed a post on that wretched hive of antivaccine scum and quackery, Age of Autism, that was such a perfect distillation of the reason why antivaccinationists refuse to accept all the evidence that autism has its roots largely in genetics that I couldn't help but whip off a quickie post. The post revealed…
oracknows | April 17, 2013I want to thank Dan Olmsted, the editor of Age of Autism. I think.
Why do I say this? After all, Olmsted is the managing editor of perhaps the most wretched hive of antivaccine scum and quackery that I am aware of. However, he's actually done me a favor. You see, the other day, the instigator of the U.K. anti-MMR wing of the antivaccine movement, Andrew Wakefield, posted a video to YouTube because he's really feeling some serious butthurt right now:
Basically, it's Andrew Wakefield complaining about being blamed for an ongoing measles outbreak in South Wales. Of course, given that, if there…
oracknows | April 16, 2013I've been writing about the antivaccine movement for a long time. The reasons are many, but they boil down to a handful. First of all, it interests me. It interests me as an example of pseudoscience and quackery, how it spreads, and how antiscience cranks attack science. More importantly, it's dangerous. The antivaccine movement is a threat to public health, which is why it's important to study its origins, the methods its members use to attack vaccines, the misinformation it spreads, and how it spreads that misinformation. As a result, I've been consistently vilified and attacked by…