Alternative medicine: Deadly for cancer patients
By definition, alternative medicine has not been shown to be effective or has been shown to be ineffective. Thus, alternative medicine is ineffective against cancer and can best be represented as either no treatment at all or potentially harmful treatment. It is thus not surprising that cancer patients who choose alternative medicine have a higher risk of dying from their cancer. A new study confirms this conclusion yet again. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 21, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Naturopathy Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking chemotherapy epidemiology mortality Source Type: blogs
Medical exemptions to school vaccine mandates soar in California as SB 277 makes personal belief exemptions unavailable
California's new law that eliminates personal belief exemptions has been a success, increasing vaccine uptake after just one year. That isn't to say that there aren't problems. One potential problem is the increasing number of medical exemptions, likely fueled by doctors willing to write letters of support for them based on reasons that are not science-based. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 18, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Politics Quackery Bob Sears medical exemption personal belief exemption SB 277 vaccines Source Type: blogs
More Gardasil fear mongering: A “ critical review ” of HPV vaccination that lacks critical thinking
Antivaxers fear and detest vaccines, but one of the types of vaccines they fear and detest the most is the HPV vaccine, such as Gardasil and Cervarix, which have been blamed for everything from sudden death to premature ovarian failure to autoimmune diseases. A couple of Mexican "researchers" from a cardiology institute try again with a "critical review" of HPV vaccine safety that lacks anything resembling critical thinking. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 16, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Clinical trials Medicine ASIA Cervarix Christopher Shaw Gardasil hpv Lucija Tomljenovic Luis Amezcua-Guerra Manuel Martínez-Lavin premature ovarian failure syncope Yehuda Shoenfeld Source Type: blogs
Naturopathy: When fake doctors cosplay real doctors
Naturopaths are fake doctors who fancy themselves to be real doctors, so much so that they call themselves "physicians" even when explicitly barred from doing so by law. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 15, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Naturopathy Politics Quackery colorado Source Type: blogs
The death of Jade Erick from intravenous curcumin: Mystery solved
In March, it was widely reported that a young woman named Jade Erick had died suddenly of a hypersensitivity reaction while undergoing an infusion of intravenous curcumin ordered by a naturopath named Kim Kelly to treat her eczema. The FDA investigated and found egregious problems with the injectable curcumin used. This tragic incident serves to demonstrate how dangerous a combination naturopaths and dubious compounding pharmacies can be. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 14, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy Quackery curcumin eczema Jade Erick Kim Kelly Source Type: blogs
How is it that antivaccine pediatricians keep their medical licenses?
There's one phenomenon I've never been able to figure out, namely antivaccine pediatricians. For a pediatrician, to be antivaccine is a profound betrayal of everything learned in medicine and a betrayal of patients. Here's another antivaccine pediatrician, one I have never encountered before. Special bonus quack points: She's a homeopath, too. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 11, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Medicine Source Type: blogs
Contamination requiring ritual purification: Superstitious concepts at the heart of antivaccine beliefs
Much of the belief system that undergirds antivaccine views is rooted in superstition. That's why it's not a coincidence that antivaxers frequently speak in terms of contamination due to vaccines as a cause of autism and all the other conditions for which antivaxers blame vaccines and ritual purification in the form of "detoxification" as the treatment. These beliefs very much resemble religious beliefs, and antivaxers project them onto pro-science advocates. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 10, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Religion Skepticism/critical thinking contamination John Rappaport Megan Heimer Mike Adams Natural News quackery ritual purification vaccines Source Type: blogs
Another study shows just how hard it is to change beliefs in antivaccine misinformation
Correcting antivaccine misinformation is hard. Real hard. Another study shows us just how hard. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 9, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine misinformation quackery vaccines Source Type: blogs
Dumb and dumber: Kent Heckenlively and Mike Adams team up to support an antivaccine WhiteHouse.gov petition
On July 3, an antivaxer named Kent Heckenlively posted a WhiteHouse.gov petition demanding a five year moratorium on childhood vaccines. It failed. Did that stop Mr. Heckenlively? Of course not, and this time he has help from über-crank Mike Adams, who is whining about being "censored" by Facebook over it. The hilarity continues to ensue (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 8, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Politics Popular culture Donald Trump Kent Heckenlively Mike Adams petition vaccines WhiteHouse.gov Source Type: blogs
Following up on a very old case: Abraham Cherrix is alive and well because he finally rejected alternative medicine
Although I haven’t discussed it here in depth, the case of Abraham Cherrix is an instructive example. Eleven years ago, he and his parents chose quackery over science-based medicine to treat his cancer. He’s alive now because he finally realized the error of his decision and underwent chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 7, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Quackery Abraham Cherrix chemotherapy Hodgkin's lymphoma Hoxsey therapy Source Type: blogs
The cruel sham that is “ right-to-try ” is one big step closer to being federal law
So-called "right-to-try" is a cruel sham that holds out the mostly false hope of survival to terminally ill patients and their families. In return, all they have to give up is patient protections and agree to pay to be guinea pigs to test a drug company's product. The product of an ideology that uses the terminally ill as shields to hide the ideological motives behind the law, which are to hobble the FDA, right-to-try is a terrible idea. It's bad for patients, but it just passed the Senate and could well become the law of the land when the House reconvenes in September if it isn't stopped. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 4, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Clinical trials Medicine Politics Goldwater Institute right to try Ron Johnson S.204 Stanislaw Burzynski Trickett Wendler Right to Try Act of 2017 Source Type: blogs
Carissa Gleason: Embracing real medicine after fake medicine failed her
I wasn’t sure if I should do this post, mainly because I could find so little information to elaborate on a bit of information that I discovered. Then I thought about it a bit more. Perhaps my not being able to find out will illustrate my point better than a detailed progress report on a… (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 3, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy Popular culture Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Carissa Gleeson sarcoma Tijuana Ty Bollinger Source Type: blogs
No alternative medicine ever disappears when shown to be ineffective: The case of laetrile
I recently took a review course in general surgery to prepare for my board recertification examination in December and realized just how much the standard of care had changed in the decade since I last recertified. Then I learned that laetrile is still a thing. If there's one thing that demonstrates the difference between alternative medicine and real medicine, it's how no alternative medicine treatment ever goes away, no matter how often it's shown not to work. Ever. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - August 1, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking amygdalin laetrile vitamin B17 Source Type: blogs
Dr. Aviva Romm: Distancing herself from Goop after defending it
Dr. Aviva Romm, one of Goop's doctors, tried to distance herself from Goop's pseudoscience. It didn't go well. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - July 28, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Naturopathy Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Aviva Romm Goop Gwyneth Paltrow Jen Gunter Source Type: blogs
Surprise! Relatively small decreases in vaccine uptake can lead to big increases in vaccine-preventable disease!
Whenever vaccine uptake falls to a level below that needed to maintain herd immunity, the risk of outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases climbs. It doesn't take that dramatic of a decline. Here's a study that shows how a small decrease in vaccine uptake can lead to a large increase in disease. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - July 26, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Medicine Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking community immunity herd immunity Peter Hotez Texas vaccines Source Type: blogs
