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Complementary and alternative medicine Humor Medicine Quackery

Bringing a whole new meaning to the term chiroquacktic

Well, I’m here at TAM. I had a great time last night meeting up with old friends, although, thanks to the time difference between Eastern time and Las Vegas, combined with my having to give a talk today, I was forced to retire at an early 11 AM (which, of course, felt to me like […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Jenny McCarthy, antivaccine lunacy, and “The View”

Like Steve, I’m off to The Amazing Meeting today. I don’t know how much I’ll be posting, but, as Han Solo so famously said, “Hey, it’s me.” I’m sure I won’t be able to resist. In any case, I’ll be taking part in the Science-Based Medicine workshop tomorrow, and, for the first time ever, I’ll […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Get out the popcorn! This internecine war among antivaccinationists is getting interesting (part 6)

I don’t know why I’m interested in this, to the point where I’m on my sixth post about it since February. I sometimes even ask myself that very question, because taking an admittedly somewhat perverse interest in the internecine feuds among antivaccinationists. Maybe it’s a bit of schadenfreude. Maybe it’s just me. Whatever the reason, […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Quackery

Acupuncture: Small risks versus no benefit

Since I’ve been on a bit of a roll with respect to acupuncture over the last week or so, I thought I’d just round out the trilogy with one more post. One myth that acupuncture apologists like to promote relentlessly is that acupuncture is completely harmless, that it almost never causes complications or problems. While […]

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Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

More Tooth Fairy Science: Acupuncture does not improve in vitro fertilization success rates, no matter what acupuncturists say

Here we go again. Oh, well. These things come in waves, and sometimes I have theme weeks. Right now, this week appears to be developing into a week of quackademic medicine involving dubious acupuncture studies. Yesterday, it was acupuncture for lymphedema after breast cancer surgery, a study coming right about what is rapidly becoming the […]