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Cancer Medicine Politics

John McCain a “dead man walking”? Not so fast

Less than a month ago, I got a bit perturbed by some vile rhetoric written by a left-wing blogger named Matt Stoller, who referred to John McCain as a “crazy, cancer-ridden dishonest madman.” As you recall, I administered a bit of not-so-Respectful Insolence to him. It wasn’t so much because I like John McCain. Indeed, […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

Yawn. Yet another worthless acupuncture study for hot flashes in breast cancer patients

Here we go again. Tuesday night and yesterday, you probably saw it, plastered all over the media, in the newspapers, on ABC, on the radio, in press releases, and around the blogosphere. Yes, it was another bit of science by press release, with news outlets practically falling all over themselves to hype the results of […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Entertainment/culture Medicine Popular culture Skepticism/critical thinking

The Chicago Tribune’s cheerleader for woo is at it again

Oddly enough, I’m more tired this morning than I was on Friday. That’s the sort of thing that happens when I actually do as much work over the weekend as I often do on two typical weekdays. The reason is that I’ve suddenly found myself with an unexpected promotion, and–oh, by the way–there’s stuff that […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Can it be real? An FTC sweep goes after cancer quacks

As a cancer surgeon, I maintain a particularly intense contempt for peddlers of cancer quackery. Although I’ve been fortunate enough not to have had to see the end results of it more than a handful of times in my career, women with bleeding, stinking, fungating tumors with widespread metastases that could have been treated if […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Abraham Cherrix and the promotion of pseudoscience in medical school

One of the aspects of blogging that I’ve come to like is the ability to follow a story’s evolution over the long term and to comment on new developments as they come along. If you’re good at blogging, you can take that story and make it your own, adding it to your list of “signature” […]