"pharma/alternative medicine/superstitious nonsense"

[Barry Shnikov]

A new instance of the dangers of believing woo-woo claims (in this case, assuming some health claims are viable because they are venerable) has turned up in this weeks news.

This time it's ayurvedic medicine.

[Andy McGregor]

A new instance of the dangers of believing woo-woo claims (in this case, assuming some health claims are viable because they are venerable) has turned up in this weeks news.

This time it's ayurvedic medicine.

The thing to remember is that times change. Treatments and medicines need to change with the times. At one time the branch of medicine that is now conventional medicine was killing more people than it saved. That was until the mid-1800s. The people started looking at results of treatments, eventually conducting trials and studies to find out effectiveness and risk of treatments.

What has happened is that many traditional/alternative treatments have not undergone trials and have not been studied. Or they have been tested to sufficient depth to work out if they are worthy of further study.

However, there are still people who peddle these ineffectual and sometimes dangerous treatments. Even the treatments, like homeopathy, that do no harm in themselves are, in my opinion, dangerous. The danger is that you do not receive effective treatment, allowing your disease to progress. And, all the time you are receiving your "alternative" treatment you are not visiting a doctor who has been trained in proper diagnostics.

I believe that the time has come for all treatments to undergo the rigourous legislation that is applied to both conventional medicine and conventional pharmaceuticals.

[Astro]

At one time germ theory was "alternative". Who was going to believe that something too small to be seen could kill what were perfectly healthy human beings. It was a try anything, even the unproven, doctor who discovered that what was killing more of his patients was his enthusiasm, his more frequent examinations. All it took to change things was to wash his hands in something alleged to kill something he could not see. It is not one of the medical professions finer moments.

The advent of air conditoning brought a new threat to the health of patients.
Hospital windows were never opened.
Germs were trapped in the AC system and blown out through vents for the patients to breathe in.

However, there are still people who peddle these ineffectual and sometimes dangerous treatments. Even the treatments, like homeopathy, that do no harm in themselves are, in my opinion, dangerous. The danger is that you do not receive effective treatment, allowing your disease to progress. And, all the time you are receiving your "alternative" treatment you are not visiting a doctor who has been trained in proper diagnostics.

A friend of my who is a pensioner was taken in the ambulance to hospital, had loads of blood tests, was kept in overnight, then released the next day.
At no point did they tell her what was wrong with her.
She had been so worried throughout her ordeal at the hospital and all to no purpose.
She went to the local chemist and he prescribed her with Iron tablets.

I believe that the time has come for all treatments to undergo the rigourous legislation that is applied to both conventional medicine and conventional pharmaceuticals.

Who's going to pay for it though?
You can hardly expect the Homeopaths to fork out loadsamoney to have biased scientists prove what they already know, or disprove by using the wrong criteria.

[bigdjiver]

There is a big difference between discovery and blind faith. Eventually it was discovered that there were organisms that you can't see that were causing certain diseases. People already knew that the diseases existed, they just didn't know what was causing them. That is completely different from the situation with alternative medicines. We know they exist and have been around for years. In all that time it has not been possible to prove that they work. As I said, what little evidence there is proves that they do not work any better than placebo. I'm not going to do the google searches, do them for yourself and you might be more inclined to believe what you find.

Nowhere in my posts have I intended to convey belief in any alternative medicine. I am ignorant on such matters. I am just advocating an open mind. I believe in the scientific method, the power of negative thinking, i.e, "I believe this ... how do I prove I am wrong?" more usually practised as "He/she believes this, how do I prove him/her wrong?".

I have no evidence that Semmelweis believed in microbes. It appears that he was flailing around in desperation and prepared to try anything to cut down on the excessive number of tragic deaths in his ward. I have not seen if he tried sticking needles in his patients, or feeding the super dilute concotions. He tried washing his hands in a solution of phenol, and that worked.

For him it meant that he had to stand up and try to convince the nedical profession that he had been killing his young women patients by carrying the disease from one to another. If that was true of him, it was true of most, if not all, of the medical profession. It is not strange that such a caring and consientious man finished his days in an asylum. Thousands of patients died unecessarily just because they their carers would not just try washing their hands in an antiseptic.

It does not matter if alternative medicine makes people better by treating them with a placebo. It is proven that placebos sometimes work. What does matter is if people wrongly rely on these instead of exhausting conventional medicine first.

The really interesting question is why do placebos sometimes work? What feel good substances does the body produce that does the trick? Does administering those work?

And, more relevant to this forum, does dancing produce those substances?

And the motive for all these posts is revealed - BigDJiver wants dancing on the NHS - unproven? - alternative? - bah!

[Chicklet]

A friend of my who is a pensioner was taken in the ambulance to hospital, had loads of blood tests, was kept in overnight, then released the next day.
At no point did they tell her what was wrong with her.

I hear Mulder's back, he'll find out for her, might take ~2 hrs 20 mins but.

[Andy McGregor]

You can hardly expect the Homeopaths to fork out loadsamoney to have biased scientists prove what they already know, or disprove by using the wrong criteria.

The same people who always pay. The patients - that's us! In this case it should be the people we've elected to spend our taxes wisely.

And who says scientists are biased? IMHO biased scientists wouldn't last very long in the job. Is there any evidence, any at all to support Astro's claim that there are biased scientists currently working in medicine? Having worked as a scientist in medicine I can tell you that it is a voyage of discovery. You are trying to uncover the unknown or verify the "known". And you want your results to be reproduced by other scientists - therefore you must tell the truth or be found out very quickly indeed.

And how do homeopaths "know" their treatments are more effective than placebo? We know that placebo is effective, we've all agreed that. So, a homeopath is correct when he or she "knows" that their treatment is effective - they've probably seen the treatments work just like those in conventional medicine have seen placebo work. But are homeopathic treatments more effective than placebo? Still no evidence as far as I can see. Worse than that, there is some evidence that they are no more effective than placebo. If there is any profession that you can accuse of bias it's those that don't compare their treatments with placebo - now that is bias!

[martingold]

And who says scientists are biased? IMHO biased scientists wouldn't last very long in the job. Is there any evidence, any at all to support Astro's claim that there are biased scientists currently working in medicine?

Drug companies are well known to employ biased scientists to prove a medicine they have on patent works

I know it is about 15 years ago but as i recollect Zantac a well known ant acid tablet was under the ten year patent as a cure for stomach ulcers when a scientist from Australia found a bacteria in a large portion of patients called helicobacter pylori (Wiki) was causing the ulcers he was atacked by the medical profession as a nutter until the patent ran out on zantac then glaxo suddenly found out that H Pylori was the culpret and triple therapy ( a two week course of very strong antibacteria) was hailed as the new cure for peptic ulcers

Thats medical science for you its all about money

[Andy McGregor]

Drug companies are well known to employ biased scientists to prove a medicine they have on patent works

Drug companies will only test the products they manufacture or have developed. They have to publish all results, good or bad.

I have worked for many companies and have not come across a biased scientist. I do not believe it is "well known" that drug companies emply biased scientists. I believe that some people think that drug companies are crooked. This is simply not the case.

Thats medical science for you its all about money

Medical science is all about the patient. Banking, insurance, etc, they are all about the money. Medicine is about saving lives, improving the quality of life, etc.

Of course people need to get paid and investors need to see a return. That's the same in any business. We live in a capitalist society and medicine is part of that society. That there is a financial incentive to saving more lives or curing more diseases is a worthy and very effective goal. Those companies who save more lives or develop more effective medicines make more money for their investors. The alternative is far worse, look at the communist era of the USSR, medical progress was nothing like as rapid as it was in the USA.

Also, there is a great deal of work done by charities and Universities in the medical field. A huge amount of medical research is grant-aided. When I worked in the field of parasitic tropical diseases at The London School of Hygiend & Tropical Medicine we were funded by grant aid from Avon Cosmetics in the USA. They had no interest in any vaccine we developed. I'm not even sure what their motive was in giving grant aid, but they gave it freely and unconditionally once we'd convinced them that our work was worthy

[bigdjiver]

... And who says scientists are biased? IMHO biased scientists wouldn't last very long in the job. Is there any evidence, any at all to support Astro's claim that there are biased scientists currently working in medicine? Having worked as a scientist in medicine I can tell you that it is a voyage of discovery. You are trying to uncover the unknown or verify the "known". And you want your results to be reproduced by other scientists - therefore you must tell the truth or be found out very quickly indeed...

My first experience of a PhD "scientist" was a guy "proving" his circuit could measure temperature to 1/100th of a degree. He was using an appartus that consisted of a carbord box and a 100 watt bulb, and was measuring his results with a glass thermometer which measured to 1/10th of a degree. The second "scientist" tried to improve vacuum tube production by changing three variables at once. The third ignored me telling him that the consignment of valves that started the quest for improvement had been contanimated by smog. The fourth designed a testing machine that relied on the trigger tubes being tested working perfectly. That, and the fact that the firm was stealing other peoples ideas, were the reason I did not stay to complete my apprenticeship. I later came across geologists. One, a PhD, drew a 200 ft water depth contour on a map, right through an island. Another drew a straight line through a 2,000 ft fault.

Everyone has their biases. Science is about trying to eliminate them from the results, trying to prove yourself wrong. One of my saddest moments was when I discovered Millikan, who designed one of the classic great experiments of all time, had skewed the results. It is probable that his internal bias was that he believed a very few results that did not fit were due to mistaken readings on his part. He may have delayed the discovery that the electron was not the smallest unit of mass and of charge.

Scientists are first and foremost human, and have all of the faults of the rest of us. The best ones know this, and try to rise above them.

For an example of the humaness of scientists take a glimpse of:


For an insight into a great mind at work follow the links to his interviews and lectures.

[Andy McGregor]

Is there any evidence, any at all to support Astro's claim that there are biased scientists currently working in medicine?

My first experience of a PhD "scientist" was a guy "proving" his circuit could measure temperature to 1/100th of a degree. He was using an appartus that consisted of a carbord box and a 100 watt bulb, and was measuring his results with a glass thermometer which measured to 1/10th of a degree. The second "scientist" tried to improve vacuum tube production by changing three variables at once. The third ignored me telling him that the consignment of valves that started the quest for improvement had been contanimated by smog. The fourth designed a testing machine that relied on the trigger tubes being tested working perfectly. That, and the fact that the firm was stealing other peoples ideas, were the reason I did not stay to complete my apprenticeship. I later came across geologists. One, a PhD, drew a 200 ft water depth contour on a map, right through an island. Another drew a straight line through a 2,000 ft fault.

It seems to me that these scientists were not working in medicine. Good thing too, by the sound of it. Your life in their hands and all that.

[bigdjiver]

It seems to me that these scientists were not working in medicine. Good thing too, by the sound of it. Your life in their hands and all that.

You are right. They did not work in medicine, they worked in electronics, fortunately long ago. Even then they used electronics in medicine.

[Astro]

You are right. They did not work in medicine, they worked in electronics, fortunately long ago. Even then they used electronics in medicine.

The medical proffesion still use those EEG machines today don't they on people whom they have diagnosed as "mentally unfit"?

The ones that fry the brain as in "One flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"

[Andy McGregor]

The medical profession still use those EEG machines today don't they on people whom they have diagnosed as "mentally unfit"?

The ones that fry the brain as in "One flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"

I do not believe people are given a diagnosis of "mentally unfit". At least not by doctors (it might, however, have been used on my 6th form report ). EEG machines are used to measure brain activity. They are simply a measurement tool. They are not used as a treatment at all.

And "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" was a work of fiction. Not a documentary. Nobody ever "fries" brains. And I don't think they ever did.

[bigdjiver]

The medical proffesion still use those EEG machines today don't they on people whom they have diagnosed as "mentally unfit"?

The ones that fry the brain as in "One flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest"

I think you are thinking of ECT machines, electro-convulsive therapy. Like Andy I do not think they quite "fried brains" either.

They may have had quite a high reported success rate.

"Are you cured, or do you need another dose?"

[Tessalicious]

I think Astro might be referring to ECT: Electroconvulsive therapy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

The way you phrased it, though, is like saying 'those horrible doctors still force these completely healthy people to have their brains burnt out'. In reality: a) this is quite a rarely used treatment, b) it is used, like any other therapy, strictly on an informed consent basis unless needed to treat a life-threatening condition where consent is not possible and c) it does not have the effect you're talking about in the majority of cases.

There seems to be a lot of antagonism towards those sceptic of complementary medicines on this thread. Why do you perceive that it is acceptable to demonise rigorously trained and hard-working conventional medicine professionals and their support networks but that those practising unproven alternative therapies are beyond reproach and investigation?

[Andy McGregor]

There seems to be a lot of antagonism towards those sceptic of complementary medicines on this thread. Why do you perceive that it is acceptable to demonise rigorously trained and hard-working conventional medicine professionals and their support networks but that those practising unproven alternative therapies are beyond reproach and investigation?

I have been wondering about this. I think that one reason is that, in denfending the indefensible, there is no other defence but attack. The use of unproven treatments is completely indefensible - therefore the practitioner and those supporting them must attack those who do no more than ask for proof.

[bigdjiver]

... The use of unproven treatments is completely indefensible ...

Treatments are "proven" by statistical analysis. If the results are less than 100% then there is a chance that, for the next patient, they may fail. The treatment is unproven for the next patient. There is always the small chance of an allergic reaction which may make the patient worse.

The treatment Semmelweis adopted was unproven for childbirth fever. The results of that experiment proved that that disease had something to do with the doctor, it was not something that was due to some defect in the patient, as some theories of the time had it.. In the last resort, when there is very little to lose, you might as well try an unproven treatment, if there is any reason to believe that it might work.

The "dose too small" argument is also dubious. Very small amounts of substances cause severe allergic reactions. Our minds should be open to the possibility that extremely small doses of substances can cause major reactions in a positive direction, if only in a very small percentage of the population. We are still a long way from knowing it all.

As Andy says, we need the proper clinical trials.

One major clinical trial big pharma could conduct, with government direction and support, is to collect all the customer shopping habit data from the big supermarkets and correlate diet to medical conditions. We really should know which foods are really bad for us, and which might have unknown benefits.

[Andy McGregor]

One major clinical trial big pharma could conduct, with government direction and support, is to collect all the customer shopping habit data from the big supermarkets and correlate diet to medical conditions. We really should know which foods are really bad for us, and which might have unknown benefits.

This type of study is called epidemiology. For dietary matters a great deal of work has already been conducted. I'm not an expert in this field. However, I have done some work with the world famous epidemiologist, Denis Burkitt. I remember his talks from 20 years ago saying that we know populations with high fat and low fibre diets have a higher incidence of diabeties and other diseases. His own work showed that many diseases common in developed world are almost unheard of in people living on a basic, hunter gatherer, diet.

I always remember a series of slides Denis used to show at his talks. One was of a sink with a tap running and water overflowing on to the floor to be mopped up by men in sugical gowns. He used to say that the water running from the tap was patients with disease. He said that the guys mopping up were the surgeons. He said that the early part of his career he'd been a very good mopper upper. But that had made no difference to the amount of water puring from the tap. He said that his work as an epidemiologist had shown him how to turn off the tap. He then had a slide of a car park. One side had loads of flash looking and shiny cars and the other had one, old, beat up car with a flat tyre. He said that the side with all the cars was where the mopper uppers parked their cars - the other side was for the tap-turner-offers. There's no money in turning off taps

[JiveLad]

There is a growing body of well-researched writing which explores the inner workings of Big Pharma.

Amazon.co.uk: Big Pharma: Jacky Law: Books

Amazon.co.uk: The Truth about the Drug Companies: How They Deceive Us and What to Do about It: Marcia Angell: Books

Amazon.co.uk: On the Take: How Medicine's Complicity with Big Business Can Endanger Your Health: Jerome P. Kassirer: Books

Amazon.co.uk: The $800 Million Pill: The Truth Behind the Cost of New Drugs: M Goozner: Books

Amazon.co.uk: The Whistleblower: Confessions of a Healthcare Hitman: Peter Rost: Books

Amazon.co.uk: Powerful Medicines: The Benefits, Risks, and Costs of Prescription Drugs (Vintage): Jerry Avorn: Books (this one does take into account 'alternatives' - eg ginseng)


In summary, the Big Pharma industry has:
- excessive profits (Big Pharma is more proftable than banks - that take some doing!
- poor quality products (what other industry would withdraw hundreds of products each year because they were harming or even killing customers)

As for alternative medicine - I don't know so much about it. The little I know about homeopathy (from this thread and Wikipedia) makes me very sceptical.

[Andy McGregor]

As for alternative medicine - I don't know so much about it. The little I know about homeopathy (from this thread and Wikipedia) makes me very sceptical.

JiveLad is a born sceptic. There is a great career for sceptics. It's called scientist. They don't believe anything until it's proven and even then they set confidence limits to their proof.