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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Science Skepticism/critical thinking

How not to choose a keynote speaker for a "scientific assembly"

One of the consistent themes I’ve maintained on this blog over the years is to combat in my own small way in my own small corner of the Internet, the influx into medical academia of medicine based not on science, but on prescientific notions of disease, vitalism, and magic, such as homeopathy (which is sympathetic […]

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Blogging Complementary and alternative medicine Evolution Medicine Science

On teaching the controversy in medicine

Dr. Kevin Pho responded to a recent post by Orac criticizing a post on KevinMD that was overly credulous about alternative medicine. His response was…disappointing. Since he seems to want to teach the controversy, I thought: If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em. And then I came up with some ideas for other controversies to “teach.”

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Naturopathy Quackery

Cancer Treatment Centers of America, naturopathy, and “naturopathic oncology”

Note: Parts of this post have appeared elsewhere, but not in this form. If there’s one aspect of so-called “alternative medicine” and “complementary and alternative medicine” (CAM) is that its practitioners tout as being a huge advantage over what they often refer to sneeringly as “conventional” or “scientific” medicine is that — or so its […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Differences between CAM practice and primary care practice

If there is one aspect of “complementary and alternative” medicine (CAM) that can puzzle advocates of science-based medicine, it’s why, given how nonsensical much of it is given that some of it actually goes against the laws of physics (think homeopathy or distance healing), CAM is so popular. Obviously one reason is that there are […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery Surgery

Does alternative medicine use result in worse outcomes in breast cancer?

Has it really been that long? More than two years ago, I wrote a post entitled Death by Alternative Medicine: Who’s to Blame? The topic of the post was a case report that I had heard while visiting the tumor board of an affiliate of my former cancer center describing a young woman who had […]