Categories
Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Medicine Naturopathy Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Surgery

On the "integration" of quackery into the medical school curriculum

Ever since the $200 million gift by Susan and Henry Samueli to UC-Irvine, I’ve been thinking about the “integration” of quackery into medicine through integrative medicine. The way advocates of quackademic medicine are going to make this “integration” really happen is to start with the medical schools.

Categories
Complementary and alternative medicine Integrative medicine Medicine Pseudoscience Quackery

Thomas Jefferson University goes full quack with a department of “integrative medicine”

Quackademic medicine takes a big leap forward at Thomas Jefferson University with its new Department of Integrative Medicine and Nutritional Sciences.

Categories
Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Naturopathy Quackery

Quackademic medicine now reigns supreme at UC-Irvine

Yesterday, the University of California, Irvine announced that Susan and Henry Samueli had donated $200 million to establish integrative medicine quackery there. Is this the shape of medicine to come?

Categories
Complementary and alternative medicine Integrative medicine Medicine Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking

Is the infiltration of “integrative medicine” into medicine as relentless as we thought? Maybe not…

When it comes to expansion and infiltrating medicine, “integrative medicine” has frequently seemed like the Terminator: utterly relentless. Recent setbacks at major integrative medicine “Crown Jewels” resulting in their closure cast that narrative in doubt. However, I never forget that after its seeming destruction, the Terminator always comes back.

Categories
Biology Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Integrative medicine Medicine Science

The “interstitium”: Interesting science versus PR spin and pseudoscience

Last week, the media were awash with reports of the “interstitium,” which was dramatically described as a hitherto undiscovered “organ,” a narrative that was definitely a triumph of PR over science that went beyond what even the investigators claimed in their paper. Worse, the investigators themselves even speculated that their discovery could “explain” acupuncture and other kinds of alternative medicine, thus providing an opening for quacks to run wild with their discovery, something I expect to see very soon.