Categories
Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Integrative medicine Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Aromatase inhibitors and acupuncture in breast cancer: Spinning a negative study

Aromatase inhibitors are antiestrogen drugs frequently used to treat breast cancer. Unfortunately, they can cause significant joint pain. A recent study of acupuncture for joint pain caused by these drugs was basically negative, but the authors did their best to spin it as positive. Same as it ever was for acupuncture studies.

Categories
Antivaccine nonsense Clinical trials Medicine Science Skepticism/critical thinking

One more time: HPV vaccination is not associated with primary ovarian insufficiency

Antivaxers claim that HPV vaccination causes primary ovarian insufficiency, also known as premature ovarian failure. A large epidemiological study has just shown them to be wrong. As usual.

Categories
Bad science Cancer Clinical trials Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery

Clínica 0-19 and IDOI: Not making DIPG history in Monterrey (part 3 of 4)

This is the conclusion of my series on Clínica 0-19, the cancer clinic where Drs. Alberto Siller and Alberto Garcia see patients with DIPG, a deadly brain tumor, whom they treat at Hospital Angeles in Monterrey Mexico with an unproven combination of intra-arterial chemotherapy with up to 11 drugs and a poorly defined dendritic cell immunotherapy. Some people have asked me: What’s the harm? In this concluding post, I attempt to answer that question.

Categories
Bad science Bioethics Cancer Clinical trials Quackery

Clínica 0-19 and IDOI: Not making DIPG history in Monterrey (part 2 of 4)

Earlier this week, I discussed Clínica 0-19, a clinic “making DIPG history in Monterrey” whose doctors claim to be able to successfully treat the deadly brainstem cancer DIPG using intra-arterial chemotherapy and immunotherapy. This week, I discuss what I’ve learned since last week, specifically a lot more about just what it is that these doctors do, why it is scientifically dubious and unproven, and why I am becoming even more harsh in my assessment of this clinic, which shows every indication of being a predatory clinic selling an unproven treatment for a very high price.

Categories
Bioethics Clinical trials Medicine Politics

As I predicted, the exploitation of desperate patients using right-to-try begins

I warned you. I’ve been warning you for four years. Now that a federal right-to-try law has passed, the profiteering has begun. Let patients beware!