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Re: Cure or cocoa?
Re: Cure or cocoa?
Cure or cocoa?
A point of medical semantics.
CAM practitioners offer what modern physicians do not
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George T Lewith, Professor of Health Research University of Southampton, Nicola Robinson
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gl3{at}soton.ac.uk George T Lewith, et al.
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I am astonished that Mr Ross is not aware of the therapeutic and research contributions made by various CAM disciples to conventional medicine. For instance, the use of herbal medicines within modern pharmacology has been well documented. In our articles we are simply arguing for a coherent research strategy that is properly representative of the public’s interest in CAM. This is an issue that many CAM researchers, including Edzard Ernst, have supported for some years1. We have to sort out the wheat from the chaff and without a properly funded strategic research programme, such as those in existence in the United States and Australia, we cannot do so. This is not an irrelevant sideline, but an important therapeutic, safety and public health issue for a substantial minority of the UK’s population. 1. Lewith GT, Ernst E, Mills S, et al. Complementary medicine must be research led and evidence based. Letter. British Medical Journal. 2000; 320: 188 |
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Peter A Fisher, Physician Royal London Homoeopathic Hospital
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peter.fisher{at}uclh.nhs.uk Peter A Fisher
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Mr Ross should have checked the evidence before making wild allegations of ‘shoddy research’. For homeopathy, even harsh critics agree that the quality of research is better than in conventional medicine: in a comparison of 110 clinical trials of conventional medicine matched with 110 of homeopathy, 50% more trials of homeopathy than conventional medicine were of high quality (21/110 v 14/110).1 It is also ironic that he raises conflicts of interest and the scale of the market: he is a trustee of Sense about Science, an organisation with an explicit anti-complementary medicine agenda and which has launched repeated attacks on it in the media. Sense about Science receives substantial funding from the pharmaceutical industry, whose scale enormously exceeds that of complementary medicine. Peter Fisher Clinical Director Royal London Homeopathic Hospital 1) Shang A, Huwiler-Muntener K, Nartey L, et al. (2005). Are the clinical effects of homoeopathy placebo effects? Comparative study of placebo-controlled trials of homoeopathy and allopathy. Lancet, 366:726- 32. |
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Nick Ross, Journalist President, HealthWatch
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nickross{at}lineone.net Nick Ross
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In their plea for more research into complementary therapies Lewith and Robinson contend that public enthusiasm for folk remedies, including we’re told among half all cancer patients, illustrates the need for a high quality research strategy (J R Soc Med 2009:102: 411-414). Interestingly both authors assert they have no vested interest in this argument, though both head Complementary and Integrative Health Research Units which, according to Robinson’s website, are “keen to further develop”. Nor do they acknowledge that while the complementary medicine market is worth a fortune it generally chooses to commission shoddy research or none at all. But more importantly their reasoning elides popularity with effectiveness. For centuries bloodletting was popular and widely thought to be effective, but all that goes to prove is that hope often triumphs over reason. Come to think of it cocoa is very comforting too but we don’t need to divert precious medical research budgets to wondering why. |
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J. Clifford Jones, Reader University of Aberdeen
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j.c.jones{at}eng.abdn.ac.uk J. Clifford Jones
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The appearance of an article on alternative treatments in the latest issue of JRSM made me think of a point which has arisen in my mind at intervals over the years. It sometimes happens that two words which have similar pronunciations and an obvious similarity in meaning are not in fact etymologically linked. The best known example, which features in at least one standard reference on word usage, is ‘census’ and ‘consensus’. Instinctively we expect that these are linked, but in fact ‘consensus’ is derived from ‘consent’ and has nothing at all to do with the process of carrying out a census. In one of the Sherlock Holmes stories Dr. Watson explains that a Turkish bath is an example of what in the medical profession of his day was termed alterative (no ‘n’). The ‘Free Online Dictionary’ which I have consulted defines an alterative as ‘a treatment or medication which restores health’. An online medical dictionary I have consulted gives a more focused definition. I don’t know to what extent doctors in this 21st Century use the term ‘alterative’. My question is whether it is in any sense a synonym for ‘alternative’ or whether ‘alterative’ and ‘alternative’ are analogous to ‘census’ and ‘consensus’. J.C. Jones DSc FIChemE FRSC MAIChE Fellow, RSM School of Engineering, University of Aberdeen. |
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Arun S. Nanivadekar, Physician None
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asnanivadekar{at}yahoo.co.in Arun S. Nanivadekar
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Although modern medicine has become technologically more efficient and powerful, it has gradually slipped away farther and farther from its anchorage to the physician-patient relationship which is so vital to the caring for sick people. Our focus is now on diseases, procedures, organs, tissues, cells, and subcellular systems, but not on illnesses and the suffering of sick persons. Practitioners of complementary and alternative systems of medicine (CAM) probably satisfy this human need far more than modern physicians do. This is likely to be the main reason for the growing popularity of CAM. Modern physician-scientists will benefit from studying this phenomenon, and borrowing what is good in CAM, so as to enrich modern medicine and make it more humane. |
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