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Cancer Clinical trials Medicine Politics Quackery Science Skepticism/critical thinking

Cancer quackery, Republican presidential candidates, and political influence

Yesterday, I wrote about how pediatric neurosurgeon turned presidential candidate Ben Carson is an excellent example demonstrating how the vast majority of physicians and surgeons, even highly accomplished ones admired as being at the top of their professions, are not scientists and how many of them are disturbingly prone to buying into pseudoscience. In Dr. […]

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Bioethics Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

Odds and ends left over after the Panorama Burzynski Clinic report: Burzynski versus his own SEC filing

I realize that I’ve been focusing on Stanislaw Burzynski the last couple of days, but it’s just been one of those weeks. Between the release of Eric Merola’s latest paean to the Brave Maverick Doctor and BBC Panorama’s report on Burzynski and his activities, it’s been an eventful week. My review of the second Burzynski […]

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Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Movies

Five things I learned (second hand) from the recent screening of Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business, Part 2

Film producer Eric Merola seems to think that there is a conspiracy of skeptics (whom he calls The Skeptics) hell bent on harassing his hero, Brave Maverick Doctor Stanislaw Burzynski. According to his latest film Burzynski: Cancer Is A Serious Business, Part 2 (henceforth referred to as Burzynski II, to distinguish it from Merola’s first […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

R.I.P., Billie Bainbridge

A very sad bit of news has come to my attention, courtesy of a reader. Billie Bainbridge has died of her brainstem cancer. Regular readers might remember this unfortunate young girl, who was diagnosed with a diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma of the brainstem last year. The tumor was inoperable, and, unfortunately, Billie’s parents turned, as […]