Alternative (Medicine?)
In an age of acceptance and tolerance, it is not really politically correct to trash alternative medicine. Is it alternative? Yes. Is it medicine? Not in my definition. For the practitioners that cannot take a stand, this approach is often termed Complimentary Medicine. As a complimentary part of traditional medicine, alternative approaches may have promise, but as a stand-alone therapy, they routinely fail.
This message rang sadly and true for Microsoft evangelist and Blogger savant, Robert Scoble. Mr. Scoble's mother recently died. His mother was an alternative medicine disciple.
If you think the age of the Snake Oil salesman is gone, you better look around. True, they are no longer preaching from the back of a wagon claiming that the man with them is over 150 years old, thanks to this wonderful Elixir of Life.
The Snake Oil salesman now uses health food stores, television, and most of all, the Internet, to hock their wares to a wider and more gullible audience than ever before. The approach is absolutely the same: amazing discoveries that doctors do not want you to know, wild and wonderful claims of cure, credible-appearing testimonials, and all for this low, low price of whatever. Many back up their claims of miraculous results with quasi-scientific research taken out of context, huge studies that involve up to three people, and money-back guarantees.
How can you lose? Well, you can lose your life.
If I have to see that penis enlargement ad or that stuff to get rid of belly-fat one more time, I am going to scream. This is exactly what was going on more than 100 years ago and is still going on today. Sure, they don't call it Dr. Kilmer's Kidney, Liver, and Swamp Root, Kickapoo Indian Sagwa, or Dr. Pierce's Golden Medical Discovery anymore, but the message is the same. In the mid-19th century and early 20th century, patent medicines were BIG business. They are even a bigger business now, but the sales approach is a bit slicker.
My first colleague, a wonderful and kind physician, loved this type of voodoo medicine. At his insistence, I once attended an Orthomolecular (whatever the hell that is) Medicine conference in Los Angeles. In attendance, were hundreds of chiropractors, homeopaths, naturopaths, osteopaths, physicians, and one very confused PA.
He wanted to open my biased eyes to the world of holistic and alternative medicine. He was not just a physician, but a businessman, and this was the road to prosperity. "Patients eat this stuff up. They love it", he said.
I sat through lecture after lecture of some of the most bizarre subjects ever: Detoxifying patients using coffee enemas. Treating arterial plaque using celation therapy. Laetril for cancer management. Aura therapy. Manipulation. Aural (ear) acupuncture. The exhibit areas were filled with expensive devices that would impress any paying patient. Since most insurance companies will not pay for unproven treatments, a big machine would convince patients to open up their wallets.
He bought one of those machines called a Heidelberg Gastric Analysis. Patients would swallow a small radio transmitter ($75) that would record and transmit the pH (acid levels) of the stomach to a belt-like antenna worn around the waist. Since stomach acid is an important step for digestion, and essential nutrients may not be absorbed unless this acid is "balanced", this $8000 machine would tell us if the patient had enough gastric acid. Duh! By the way, the capsule can be retrieved and used again (by the same patient) if you attached a string to it and pulled it back out of your stomach.
This man was my mentor and trusted friend, but this stuff was pure, unadulterated baloney. He learned to accept that I would not be a convert to pseudo-medicine, and eventually, we parted professional ways. We remained close friends until his death. I helped clean out his house and dispose of THOUSANDS (Yes, thousands) of bottles of vitamins, minerals, trace elements, herbs, and unidentifiable nostrums. He even had thousands of dollars worth of human growth hormones that he injected several times daily in an effort to prolong his aging life.
We have some of the most advanced medical technology in the world and true medical miracles happen every day. So, why do people migrate to Charlatans and quacks?
Traditional medicine has created a void. It is in this vacuum that alternative medicine has found a firm niche. This void is the fine art of caring.
When a patient is diagnosed with a life-threatening cancer, they are frightened and lost. They are quickly referred from their primary care doctor to an oncologist where they are bombarded with radiation and filled with toxic chemotherapeutic agents that make them feel even sicker and more depressed. Their hair falls out. They lose weight. They look and feel terrible. There must be another way, so friends and relatives try to help.
"Go see my chiropractor. He cured my mother of cancer when all of the doctors just gave up on her." "You can still get laetrile in Mexico." "These drugs are doing more harm that good. You should try alternative medicine." Out of fear and frustrations, patient after patient will try just about anything to save their lives, even to the point of completely abandoning proven treatments.
Seriously-ill people are in need of CARE. Zapping them with radiation and pumping IVs full of drugs into them is NOT care. Without the human side, a void in care is created. They want someone to hold their hands, acknowledge their fears, and give them hope.
This is where alternative practitioners often have the upper hand over traditional medicine. They DO care about their clients. They hold their hands...touch them...massage them...CARE for them. It is this profound and powerful element of human kindness that draws patients to alternative approaches. The only gap here is that many alternative treatments are scientifically unproven and/or downright worthless. Time and time again, people choose Alternative Medicine, only to return when it is too late.
Medical providers must be better salesmen. Unless you can convince a person to embrace your therapy or treatment, they will not remain under your care.
We need to bring CARE back into patient care, hold more hands, offer more hugs, and spend more time. When your patient's clock is ticking downward, it behooves all practitioners to spend the time to find out what makes them tick.
We are all going to die someday, and patients do have the right to chose how they do it. Medical providers have the ongoing responsibility and obligation to honestly and realistically reveal our path. Unless we involve our patients in this most-important journey, they are likely to take a road unproven.
Resources: National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine
Related Topics: Be Smart About Integrative Medicine, The Heart Speaks: Are You Listening?
This message rang sadly and true for Microsoft evangelist and Blogger savant, Robert Scoble. Mr. Scoble's mother recently died. His mother was an alternative medicine disciple.
If you think the age of the Snake Oil salesman is gone, you better look around. True, they are no longer preaching from the back of a wagon claiming that the man with them is over 150 years old, thanks to this wonderful Elixir of Life.
The Snake Oil salesman now uses health food stores, television, and most of all, the Internet, to hock their wares to a wider and more gullible audience than ever before. The approach is absolutely the same: amazing discoveries that doctors do not want you to know, wild and wonderful claims of cure, credible-appearing testimonials, and all for this low, low price of whatever. Many back up their claims of miraculous results with quasi-scientific research taken out of context, huge studies that involve up to three people, and money-back guarantees.
How can you lose? Well, you can lose your life.
If I have to see that penis enlargement ad or that stuff to get rid of belly-fat one more time, I am going to scream. This is exactly what was going on more than 100 years ago and is still going on today. Sure, they don't call it Dr. Kilmer's Kidney, Liver, and Swamp Root, Kickapoo Indian Sagwa, or Dr. Pierce's Golden Medical Discovery anymore, but the message is the same. In the mid-19th century and early 20th century, patent medicines were BIG business. They are even a bigger business now, but the sales approach is a bit slicker.
My first colleague, a wonderful and kind physician, loved this type of voodoo medicine. At his insistence, I once attended an Orthomolecular (whatever the hell that is) Medicine conference in Los Angeles. In attendance, were hundreds of chiropractors, homeopaths, naturopaths, osteopaths, physicians, and one very confused PA.
He wanted to open my biased eyes to the world of holistic and alternative medicine. He was not just a physician, but a businessman, and this was the road to prosperity. "Patients eat this stuff up. They love it", he said.
I sat through lecture after lecture of some of the most bizarre subjects ever: Detoxifying patients using coffee enemas. Treating arterial plaque using celation therapy. Laetril for cancer management. Aura therapy. Manipulation. Aural (ear) acupuncture. The exhibit areas were filled with expensive devices that would impress any paying patient. Since most insurance companies will not pay for unproven treatments, a big machine would convince patients to open up their wallets.
He bought one of those machines called a Heidelberg Gastric Analysis. Patients would swallow a small radio transmitter ($75) that would record and transmit the pH (acid levels) of the stomach to a belt-like antenna worn around the waist. Since stomach acid is an important step for digestion, and essential nutrients may not be absorbed unless this acid is "balanced", this $8000 machine would tell us if the patient had enough gastric acid. Duh! By the way, the capsule can be retrieved and used again (by the same patient) if you attached a string to it and pulled it back out of your stomach.
This man was my mentor and trusted friend, but this stuff was pure, unadulterated baloney. He learned to accept that I would not be a convert to pseudo-medicine, and eventually, we parted professional ways. We remained close friends until his death. I helped clean out his house and dispose of THOUSANDS (Yes, thousands) of bottles of vitamins, minerals, trace elements, herbs, and unidentifiable nostrums. He even had thousands of dollars worth of human growth hormones that he injected several times daily in an effort to prolong his aging life.
We have some of the most advanced medical technology in the world and true medical miracles happen every day. So, why do people migrate to Charlatans and quacks?
Traditional medicine has created a void. It is in this vacuum that alternative medicine has found a firm niche. This void is the fine art of caring.
When a patient is diagnosed with a life-threatening cancer, they are frightened and lost. They are quickly referred from their primary care doctor to an oncologist where they are bombarded with radiation and filled with toxic chemotherapeutic agents that make them feel even sicker and more depressed. Their hair falls out. They lose weight. They look and feel terrible. There must be another way, so friends and relatives try to help.
"Go see my chiropractor. He cured my mother of cancer when all of the doctors just gave up on her." "You can still get laetrile in Mexico." "These drugs are doing more harm that good. You should try alternative medicine." Out of fear and frustrations, patient after patient will try just about anything to save their lives, even to the point of completely abandoning proven treatments.
Seriously-ill people are in need of CARE. Zapping them with radiation and pumping IVs full of drugs into them is NOT care. Without the human side, a void in care is created. They want someone to hold their hands, acknowledge their fears, and give them hope.
This is where alternative practitioners often have the upper hand over traditional medicine. They DO care about their clients. They hold their hands...touch them...massage them...CARE for them. It is this profound and powerful element of human kindness that draws patients to alternative approaches. The only gap here is that many alternative treatments are scientifically unproven and/or downright worthless. Time and time again, people choose Alternative Medicine, only to return when it is too late.
Medical providers must be better salesmen. Unless you can convince a person to embrace your therapy or treatment, they will not remain under your care.
We need to bring CARE back into patient care, hold more hands, offer more hugs, and spend more time. When your patient's clock is ticking downward, it behooves all practitioners to spend the time to find out what makes them tick.
We are all going to die someday, and patients do have the right to chose how they do it. Medical providers have the ongoing responsibility and obligation to honestly and realistically reveal our path. Unless we involve our patients in this most-important journey, they are likely to take a road unproven.
Resources: National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine
Related Topics: Be Smart About Integrative Medicine, The Heart Speaks: Are You Listening?
14 Comments:
It´s very important to listen to the patient.Often he himself knows best-
Actually (from reading the questions posted to WebMD), most patients haven't a clue as to what is happening to them.
They need to carefully and concisely list their symptoms for an accurate diagnosis.
I love gathering nutrition quackery information; been doing it all the almost 30 years I've been a dietitian. Amazing what people will believe.
Gail
I went to a chiropractor once and I will never again go to one. I had torn my lower back muscles when I was in a car accident and my friends swore to death that their chiropractor could help after i was not getting a relief 3 months after the accident. I was unable to take perscription pain killers because I had given myself a stomach ulcer from Naproxan. I never should have believed them. I went three times a week for a month and had no relief and I quit going. Even though the doctor said he could help me I really don't believe he could. Muslces will heal by themselves over time and you just have to be patient. Three years later I am completly healed and I have no pain. It took about a year and a half to make it through a day without any pain, but I lived.
Granted, traditional medicine is important, no arguement there. But natural health is a good preventative and it has been proven that some nutrients do help some conditions. I had TMJ some years back and still get bouts of neck pain & symptoms. I was in a car accident where I broke my jaw and all my teeth were knocked loose, I had to have braces on my gums so they could heal in a straight position.
I tried physical therapy, muscle relaxers etc and nothing really worked. Next was surgery, that I decided not to go through with. I found that meditation and yoga actually worked better than anything prescribed. After that I became very interested in stress reduction and natural therapy, since it did work better for me. To say all "alternative" therapies is quackery is very black and white, which to me is very dangerous and extremist. No matter what business you are in-there are quacks and salesman. I have had just as many negative experiences with doctors, as apparently some have had with natural medicine. Both medicines can work together to help relieve symptoms and pain. Natures gifts shouldn't be pushed aside and considered to be worthless, because of a doctor's ego.
Believe it or not... SWAMP ROOT was NOT snake-oil... it was a real tonic of 15 herbs, is approved by the FDA and is still a valid medicine sold in drug stores today! For more info see www.swamp-root.com
There are so many validated experiences of healing illnesses with natural/"alternative" medicine. Yes, some of it is money-making quackery, but I'd have to say that they real money hungry people are the pharmaceutical companies... and those in natural medicine don't make anywhere as close to what that industry rakes in. Some of it is life-saving and essential, and some of it is symptom-masking quackery, in my book.
I believe that many bad habits could be hindering the prevention of many diseases that pharma drugs try to keep under control or mask. But those pharma drugs are there for those who really do need them for events out of their control. They are also there for those who refuse to let go of their poor habits in life. It's hard to know who to trust in the holistic environment. I have seen more of the medical community incorporating natural ideas into their practice, such as the use of Red Yeast Rice to lower cholesterol, rather than pharma drugs (at patient request to stay away from Pharma drugs when possible), and also listening to the patient and understanding their desire to avoid Pharma drugs when reasonable, when there may be a longer-term therapy instead (such as physical therapy for a "bad" back, instead of Naproxin, etc.) Patients are making doctors more aware of their desires to do things more naturally, and doctors are starting to respond to it, slowly, cautiously, and certain. You can learn a lot from both the medical and the holistic community. The patient needs to learn as much as possible in order to make a decision that suits their unique being. I hope to see the medical community progress towards more natural remedies, but only if they are scientifically proven. It's easy to get sucked into a website promising their cure for you, and it's scary wondering if their product will actually hurt you in the long run. I like to do things natural when possible, avoiding pharma drugs, but sometimes it's unavoidable. You have to be careful when taking a natural remedy that's only being touted by the maker who's trying everything to get a sale. He's smaller than the pharma companies, so he needs every single sale and will say anything. It's hard to know who's truthful or a quack. I believe many MD's are trustworthy. They wouldn't want to ruin their credibility by pushing questionable herbal remedies without proven scientific testing. Hopefully some day, these remedies will be tested so we know or not what works and what is safe.
i have a question, why is it when someone gets sick with a disease or condition Dr.s automatically prescribe about 4 drugs which in turn do no good...then the patient has to come back with even more problems due to the side effects of the 4 drugs prescribed...and the original problem is forgotton about...I agree some people are out to make money ...this is what drugs and healthcare has turned into...General Practitioners are pill pushers and no one can get good help until they actually get to an expert and by the time you get there your condition is so much worse...its a big joke..my dad has gone through this for 5 years...he was poisoned by carbon dioxide over an 8 month period and now 5 yrs. later he is on 13 meds and worse than ever...he cant even have natural bowel movements without taking meds for that..its ridiculous....He finally has cut some of his meds himself and starting eating natuarl organic food and is having bowel movements...so it can help.
watch dr richard &cindy becker from 1-2pm on ch 321 on direct tv
he is a cancer surivor for 9 years!he has been GOD SENT!4 alot of people.im also a cancer surivor
i've had moderate to severe bouts with depression for 8 years now and have just recently discovered orthomollecular medicine. my mood has dramatically improved / stabilized and i am currently removing lexapro (ssri) from my treatment regiment. does the writer of the above article work for a pharmaceutical company or what? :-)
Instead of arguing and research money spent on researching a disease, why not reseach ways to strenthen the immune system, the organs that many drugs damage to keep someone living while destroying the very quality of that life? Are not the researcher looking at things backwards? Do not attack what is damaging the body "do not repay evil with evil", but instead make the body strong and it will heal the rest. Wake up people, God in his wisdom did not give us the tools to destroy, but to heal. Now do you get it?
If doctors held more hands while patients were telling them their needs, maybe the doctors would listen with their hearts more. I am empethetic for the over worked physician, but not for the lack of humanity I witness or hear of in this Preferred Medical Care system. I have been in 3 hospitals with my mom and I told her what was causing her distress, 2 weeks before doctors and technology provided her with no answers. Then the final conclusion came in her last emergency visit, which strangely agree with mine. I am a practicing Massage Therapist for 18 years, doctor, and I needed no machines or technology to determin my mother's cause for her distress. Why did it take 5 doctors, 2 emergency visits, 2 nights of additional poor care in the hospital to determine the same conclusions? She went through a horrible time so they could send her home with a tranquilizer. She only went to the hospital because she thought the doctors were more knowledgable than her daughter the massage therapist. They have more education you see. Now who do you think she is listening to?
I am a family physician and have been practicing both alternative and traditional medicine for 19 years. I agree that there are practitioners of alternative medicine that make unrealistic claims and have poor judgment in choosing the safest and most effective treatment. There are also time after time, treatments that are considered alternative that are safer than, and perhaps the only safe approach. We were recommending folate for early conception over 25 years ago. The data was good then and the safety was clear, yet the medical community at large took another 15 years to catch on. The same holds true for telling people to drop the trans-fatty acids from there diet. My stomach acid tested low on the Heidelberg machine and the benefit of hydrochloride supplementation is clear for me. The medical community has a bias against nutritional treatments evidenced by unquestioned acceptance of any reports of possible toxicity,and skepticism of any reports of possible therapeutic benefit. Contact me for the journal references. C. Kertay M.D. ckertay@yahoo.com
apparently the author of this article has never even researched such things as orthomolecular medicine. I certainly do not believe that all alternative treatments are safe or that they all work. It is supprising to me, however, that treatments like orthomolecular medicine are not researched further. How about when traditional medicine does fail a patient? Then what? And then there are all of the dangerous side affects that come from traditonal prescription drugs that somehow are considered okay to take when treatments such as orthomolecular medicine, which have had no know side affects, are quickly dismissed. I guess until the drug companies no longer run healthcare and healthcare practitioners wallets we will never see "real" research involving alternative medicine. Other countries research it with great success. Why don't we?
Post a Comment