Posts Tagged ‘cam’
A hilarious and scathing examination of the regulatory system for “complementary” medicine in Australia.
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Tags: cam, skepticism
One of the key concepts essential to science-based medicine is the placebo: What it is, what it isn’t, and how it complicates our evaluation of the scientific evidence. One my earliest lessons after I started following the Science-Based Medicine blog was that I didn’t understand placebos well enough to even describe them correctly. Importantly, there […]
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Tags: cam, clinical trials, placebo, placebo effects
CAM for cancer is no alternative
One of the themes I’ve emphasized in many posts on this blog is that every treatment decision requires an evaluation of risks and benefits. No treatment is without some sort of risk: Even a decision to decline treatment has its own risks. And when a treatment has no demonstrable benefits, the risks factor more significantly […]
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Tags: breast cancer, cam, cancer, supplements
Is it ever ethical to provide a placebo treatment? What about when that placebo is homeopathy? Last month at Science-Based Medicine I blogged about the frequency of placebo prescribing by physicians. I admitted my personal discomfort, stating I’d refuse to dispense any prescription that would require me to deceive the patient. The discussion continued in […]
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Tags: cam, ethics, homeopathy, pharmacist ethics, placebo effects, placebo medicine, placebos, standards of practice
Working in pharmacies where supplements are sold alongside traditional (over-the-counter) medications, I’m regularly astonished at the different perceptions consumers can have about the relative efficacy and safety of different types of products. Once, speaking with a customer about a medical condition she wanted to treat, I indicated that there were no effective non-prescription therapies — […]
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Tags: adverse events, cam, drug safety, natural health products directorate
