I used to work for people doing NIH-funded research on alternative treatments and integrating them into nursing practice. If researchers working on the study suggest to me that a naturopath might be able to help mitigate some of my chronic symptoms, I do give that weight. If actual bench scientists and people who do things to rats tell me that they think some alternative medicine treatment methods are efficacious, I give that weight.

So do I. With the caveat that the NIH has been congressionally mandated to promote alternative medicine.

Again, I am not saying that all alternative treatments are bunk. I am saying that very few have been subjected to rigorous examination and many that have show benefits that are difficult to discern from statistical noise. Unlike most FDA approved medications very few "altnerative treatments" show overwhelmingly positive results when subjected to objective study.

A doctor that says "some people say that herb X makes them feel better so you might try that is no different than the throwing pills at the problem and seeing what happens, an approach that was condemned earlier.

I'm sure many alternative treatments work, particularly "herbal medicines." I'm just arguing against excessive evidentiary claims. And double standards of evidence between so called alternative treatments and Western medicine. If Merck used the evidentiary standards and lax quality controls of the herbal supplement industry it would be driven bankrupt by lawsuits in a matter of weeks.

Hell, the current craze for hoodia (however that is spelled) seems to be based entirely on the scientific theory of "hey, I've never seen a fat bushman so it must work."

I think that there are some smaller studies going on in my own department, but I've been out of the loop now for long enough that I can't remember. They'd be actual, real-life studies. Oooh! I remember one now. One of the post-docs was doing something with orange oil and chemo nausea, I think. But I don't remember details.

I think part of what makes alternative medicine popular is that it often addresses that which conventional medicine won't - which is, I think, also why the nurses were getting into it. Obviously there are exceptions, but docs tend to be about fixing the big, immediate problem. Tumor, heart failure, gaping wounds - all attractive doctoring opportunities.

The less exciting stuff? Not so much interest. Get cramps so bad you miss work one day a month and going on the pill didn't help? Oh well - not life threatening. Chronic fatigue that leaves you nodding off when you should be watching baby and exciting causes ruled out? Oh well - drink some coffee. Mystery non-migraine yet debilitating headaches and nothing showed up on the MRI? Oh well - pull down the shades and wait it out. Rare non-lethal condition that causes chronic respiratory problems and giant purple skin lesions? Take some prednisone for the coughing and go away.

None of those people are actually seeing alternative medical providers, because insurance doesn't cover that sort of thing, but maybe they should.

Pharmaceutical companies don't fund research into the non-exciting stuff. Docs aren't interested in getting patients from "okay, but...." to "healthy." That leaves a choice of putting up with not being totally well or going alternative for some treatments.

Ok, but again, how do you decide, lacking any real evidence one way or the other, which alternative methods are simply too wacky to consider and which are worth spending money on despite no real evidence one way or the other. Because no matter who whacked out a proposed treatment, I will be able to find you a person in a position of apparent authority who endorses it (just as I can find you PhD geologists who believ the earth is only 6,000 years old).

And I want to be clear that I have absolutely zero problem with research being done on alternative methods. If orange oil helps with chemo nausea, I want to know. Orange oil helping nausea is no weirder than bread mold helping with infections.

Hahahahaha I got Alex riled up. [/singsong voice]

More later...

Pure coincidence but since I mentioned hoodia earlier one of the science blogs I read posted this. A FAQ about hoodia.

It shows the way reputable "alternative treatments" tend to work. A double blind study was done, safety tests are being done and dosage studies.

I also found it interesting that there is currently no legal source of the hoodia ingredient so all of those suppliers you're getting spam from (and Dateline investigations) must be using somehting else or illegally exported plants.

The efficacy of the plant is stronger than I figured it was since my only exposure has been through those spammers and infomercials.

Well geeze, you can always find a wacked out person to endorse anything. I don't think that condemns alternative medicine any more than it condemns geology.

I think a great deal of common sense applies, as with anything else. Who do I trust? Well, Bastyr manages to have a whole little University that affiliates with reputable conventional medical and nursing schools, so that would be a start. Bastyr's website links to this recent article describing a current UW/Bastyr study on providing care to the dying. Sounds to me like an example of working on that "real evidence". Maybe it's because I worked in a health care school for so long, but I saw lots of "real" studies that involved alternative therapies. Whether light therapy calmed elderly demented patients. (If I recall correctly, it didn't.) Various ways to treat and manage fibromyalgia. I think my former boss lady is involved with some CAM research being done in Korea that might actually involve acupuncture. (Maybe with Seoul National University? I can't remember.)

I think you proceed the same way you proceed when checking out any specialist. Are they affiliated with reputable institutions? What does their CV look like? Are they currently involved in research? Same questions I asked myself when I checked out the bio of the specialist recommended for my brother's conventional treatment.

Then we're arguing the same side of the coin here.

Again, I am not saying there is no value in alternative medicine. Of course, once those values have been objectively determined they're not really "altnernative" any more. I'm not a big fan of the Bastyr University curriculum because while parts of naturopathy reek of common sense the core is still extremely quacky and the modern practitioners haven't done much to cleanse that taint (naturopathy grew out of Sebastian Kneipp's belief, back in the 1890s that soaking the Danube River cured tuberculosis and other original thinkers of the time, such as John Tilden who believed that the core of all illness was excrement spending too much time in the intestines. But I'll also admit to a personal bias against the school because of a woman I knew once who attended and also taught a UW extension course on how to talk to dolphins. A greater dingbat I've never known and yes it isn't fair to taint the whole institution because of her.)

But to the extent that they are engaging in valid research, that is great and I hope it helps them slowly scrape the silliness out of the field of naturopathy as, slowly, allopathy has mostly done.

Again, I don't mean this with any derogatory intent but in this thread tracilicious claimed more scientific support for acupuncture than exists and that homeopathy works for her but it turns out she didn't know what homeopathy is. When you look into alternative medicine it is great that you look into the ongoing research, CVs, and reputable sources. But in my experience (and yes, that is anecdotal) very few people I know who use them do so, instead relying on the reports of someone they know how says "it worked for me!"

Unless you're saying, and I don't think you are, that merely the fact that someone is studying it scientifically is reason to use an alternative treatment. That would be the equivelant of Pfizer putting the new heart drug on the market while they're still doing the clinical studies and seeking FDA approval.

On the original topic is worth noting that this kid and his family aren't saying that the alternative treatment in Mexico will help with chemo ralated nausea or pain management. They are claiming (presumably because the clinic told them that they have strong evidence of it) that the treatment will cure the cancer. I am willing to go out on a limb and guess that the Mexico clinic is not affiliated with a reputable institution, that the head of the clinic has probably been denied license to practice in the United States (if s/he'd even qualify), and that there is no clinical evidence of efficacy other than what the doctors tell the patients.

On this one, my point wasn't that it condemns it, just that calls to authority don't necessarily endorse it. One of the tools of pseudoscientists is reliance on pedigree put to misuse.

The guy responsible for the whole face on Mars lunacy was also one of the most brilliant planetary scientists of the '60s. His claims (Richard Hoagland, by the way) are obviously beyond stupid but a lot of people buy into them simply because he has an impressive resume.

Having a wacko proponent is certainly not dispositive evidence. But neither is a string of letters after your name positive evidence.

My impression is that Bastyr is making deliberate efforts to be more "legit". They've been actively pursuing research relationships with both the school of nursing and the school of medicine here. So it's likely changed somewhat since you left the area.

(Oh - and extension will hire just about anyone to teach just about anything. They're self-sustaining, so anything that brings in dollars is fine by them.)

I think most of the stuff I'd consider is on the boundary of alternative/conventional. It's been proven to have some success, but not embraced broadly as routine treatment.

For example: I don't buy into the theory that chiropractors can cure anything that ails you. But I've had a diagnosed curvature of the spine since I was in about the fourth grade. Not severe enough to merit "conventional" treatment, so nothing was done. Except prescribe some bizarre and painful exercises my mom was supposed to make me do. Stuff like trying to force my back flat against the wall. Even if it did work, doing it without supervision from even a physical therapist made it useless. And that was the conventional doc! Can chiropractors fix scoliosis? Probably not. But damn I'd want to see if they could improve anything.

Although come to think of it, that's about when they added ballet to my dance schedule. Ballet as alternative treatment? Who knows?