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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Politics Popular culture Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Bill and Hillary Clinton embrace the quackery that is functional medicine

This might look somewhat familiar to people, but I have a good excuse. Yesterday was Easter, and, although by no stretch of the imagination can I be accused of being particularly religious, we still did have family to visit. Add to that the fact that I have a two talks to give today that as […]

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Biology Cancer Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Popular culture

Supplements: Flushing your money down the toilet in expensive urine

I remember during medical school that more than one of my faculty used to have a regularly repeated crack that the only thing that taking vitamin supplements could do for you was to produce expensive pee. My first year in medical school was nearly thirty years ago now; so it’s been a long time. During […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy Quackery

Naturopathy, functional medicine, and other quackademic medicine at the University of Kansas Medical Center

It’s been a while since I’ve done this, but somehow now seems to be the right time, particularly after doing such a long post yesterday on the intellectually dishonest promotion of “brave maverick” cancer doctor Stanislaw Burzynski. Unfortunately, dubious clinics like the Burzynski Clinic are not the only place where I find highly questionable medicine. […]

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Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Medicine Naturopathy Quackery

A quackfest at the University of Toronto

I always thought that the University of Toronto was a great school, but lately I’ve been starting to have my doubts. My doubts began three years ago, when I noticed that Autism One Canada, which is basically the Canadian version of the yearly antivaccine biomedical quackfest held every Memorial Day week in the Chicago area, […]

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Bioethics Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

“Patient-centered care” vs. CAM in the New England Journal of Medicine

“Patient-centered care.” It’s the new buzzword in patient care. Personally, I find the term mor ethan a little Orwellian in that it can mean so many things. Basically, it’s a lot like Humpty Dumpty when he says to Alice, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither […]