Alternative and Complementary Therapies Blogs This is an RSS file. You can use it to subscribe to this data in your favourite RSS reader or to display this data on your own website or blog.

Make measles great again? Our Michigan legislature is doing its best to bring back epidemics of vaccine-preventable diseases.
The depths of stupidity to which the Michigan state legislature will stoop never cease to amaze me. This time, legislators are doing their damnedest to make measles great again. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - April 5, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Politics Popular culture Quackery HB 4425 HB 4426 nonmedical exemption Patrick Colbeck personal belief exemption SB 299 SB 300 Tom Barrett vaccines Source Type: blogs

Antivaxers marched on Washington last week. It was less than impressive.
A few dozen antivaccine activists descended upon Washington, DC to protest and lobby their legislators. The protest itself was not impressive, but pro-science advocates shouldn't let this pathetic march lead them to be complacent. Antivaxers are meeting with legislators, and President Trump is sympathetic to their aims. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - April 4, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Politics Popular culture Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Barbara Loe Fisher Brian Hooker Del Bigtree Donald Trump Jason Chaffetz Rebecca Robbins Revo Source Type: blogs

Did cannabis oil save Deryn Blackwell ’ s life?
In a forthcoming book The Boy in 7 Billion, Callie Blackwell claims that cannabis oil, which she had started giving her son Deryn to relieve his symptoms during a bone marrow transplant for two cancers, actually saved his life when the bone marrow transplant appeared to be failing. Unfortunately, her story appears to be another testimonial that confuses correlation with causation. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - April 3, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking bone marrow transplant Callie Blackwell cannabis cannabis oil Deryn Blackwell Karen Hockney Source Type: blogs

Is homeopathy the end of vaccines? Only quacks would think so …
Elissa Meininger argues that homeopathy is better than vaccines, going so far to ask the question, "Is this the end of vaccines?" Vaccines have nothing to worry about from homeopathy, although those of us who don't want to see the return of vaccine-preventable diseases have to worry about antivaccine cranks like Meininger. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 31, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Paranormal Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking epidemic Tim Bolen vaccines Source Type: blogs

Tomorrow, antivaxers march on Washington, and, boy, are they excited!
Antivaxers are marching on Washington tomorrow, as they did in 2008. The cast is different (other than Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and Barbara Loe Fisher), but the dangerous pseudoscientific is the same. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 30, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Politics Quackery Andrew Wakefield Donald Trump Gulf War syndrome Kent Heckenlively Revolution for Truth Robert F. Kennedy Jr. vaccines Vaxxed Source Type: blogs

The quackery that is “ battlefield acupuncture ” continues to metastasize
"Battlefield acupuncture," which is really a form of ear acupuncture based essentially on a homunculus on the ear, continues to invade and metastasize in the military. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 29, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking acupuncture battlefield acupuncture rapid acupuncture Richard Niemtzow Veterans Administration Source Type: blogs

“ Dr. Seuss monsters ” : The quackery that is “ battlefield acupuncture ” continues to metastasize
"Battlefield acupuncture," which is really a form of ear acupuncture based essentially on a homunculus on the ear, continues to invade and metastasize in the military, complete with Dr. Seuss monsters. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 29, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking acupuncture battlefield acupuncture Patricia Macsparran rapid acupuncture Richard Niemtzow Veterans Administration Source Type: blogs

Adventures in bad veterinary medicine reported by the local media (2017 edition)
Just because people think that sticking needles into their meridians will somehow unblock their qi and fix whatever ails them doesn't mean it's OK to inflict the same nonsense on our pets. Unfortunately, a local TV station disagrees. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 28, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking acupuncture dog Mike Petty Priya Mann Steve Garagiola veterinarian WDIV Source Type: blogs

The foremost defender of quacks is concerned that doctors won ’ t be able to get CME credit for studying quackery any more
The legal world's foremost defender of quacks issues a warning that the ACCME will stop accrediting continuing medical education courses that teach quackery credulously. Gee, he says that as though it would be a bad thing. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 27, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking ACCME medical education quackademic medicine Richard Jaffe Source Type: blogs

Out of tragedy, a campaign to increase vaccine uptake in Michigan
I’ve written before about how our vaccination rate here in Michigan are…suboptimal. Indeed, a couple of years ago, health officials were so alarmed at the increases in personal belief exemptions to school vaccine mandates that a new regulation was instituted that require parents seeking nonmedical exemptions to school vaccine mandates to travel to an office… (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 24, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Francesca McNally Franny Strong I Vaccinate Michigan pertussis vaccines Veronica McNally whooping cough Source Type: blogs

An as yet unidentified “ holistic ” practitioner negligently kills a young woman with IV turmeric (yes, intravenous)
Out of southern California, comes a lesson that something as seemingly benign as turmeric can kill when weaponized in the hands of a quack. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 23, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking curcumin eczema Jade Erick Leigh Erin Connealy Mark Stengler turmeric Source Type: blogs

Home remedies that may be worth a try
Harvard Medical School embraces evidence-based medicine — treatments that have been shown to be effective through high-quality studies called randomized controlled clinical trials. So it’s always a little surprising when a Harvard doctor proposes a home remedy, as Dr. James P. Ioli did in an interview about toenail fungus. Dr. Ioli, who is chief of the podiatry service at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital, suggested that daily applications of Vicks VapoRub might be at least as effective as most of the topical treatments for toenail fungus that are available by prescription or over the counter. Toenail f...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - March 22, 2017 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Beverly Merz Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Health Managing your health care Source Type: blogs

Naturopaths cynically use the murder of a quack to promote naturopathic licensure
The grieving widower killed the naturopath who treated his wife with cancer after telling her that "chemo is for losers." Where I see a tragedy, naturopaths see an opportunity to argue for naturopathic licensure. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 22, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy News of the Weird Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Fikreta Ibrisevic Juan Gonzalez Kentucky licensure Omer Ahmetovic Source Type: blogs

Massive measles outbreak in Romania: A warning to the US?
Beginning a little over a year ago, Romania has been enduring a massive measles outbreak. The cause is familiar: Low MMR uptake below what is needed for herd immunity. Is this a warning to the US? (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 21, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking Donald Trump measles MMR outbreak Romania Tom Price vaccines Source Type: blogs

The Galileo Gambit: Just because your quackery is rejected by the establishment does not make you Galileo or Semmelweis
Quacks love to invoke experts who made predictions that turned out to be wrong or point to Galileo or Semmelweis as examples of scientists whose findings were rejected by the scientific or medical establishment of the time, as though poor prediction or rejection by the establishment means there must be something to their science. Guess what? As Michael Shermer put it, heresy does not equal correctness. (Source: Respectful Insolence)
Source: Respectful Insolence - March 20, 2017 Category: Surgery Authors: Orac Tags: Biology Complementary and alternative medicine Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking Galileo Galileo Gambit Ignaz Semmelweis Michael Shermer predictions quackery Source Type: blogs