Talk:Alternative medicine

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[edit] Electromagnetic Therapy

Hi. I've started the article Electromagnetic Therapy. I will be placing a link in this article on Thursday September 21st 2006 and would appreciate your feedback and opinion prior to commencing this action. I believe this should be in the "see also" section, nevertheless you may want to add a seperate section all by itself. Please forward your comments no later then Thursday 15h00 EST. Thank you. --CyclePat 16:09, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

It depends what the link is for. I've made some comments on the talk page. --apers0n 18:17, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Complementary and Alternative Medicine

I just spotted a new page Complementary and Alternative Medicine I guess it should be merged here or redirected. --Salix alba (talk) 23:05, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

It got done on Nov. 16. -- Fyslee 01:55, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
Alternative medicine describes practices used in place of conventional medical treatments. Complementary medicine describes alternative medicine used in conjunction with conventional medicine.
This seems to be contradictory - complementary medicine can't also be alternative medicine. I'd like to change it, if no one minds? something like Alternative medicine describes practices used in place of conventional medical treatments. Complementary medicine describes practices used in conjunction and cooperation with conventional medicine, to assist the existing process. Lottiotta 17:30, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Link removed - could someone check if it should be used or not?

[This link] was removed from the article by user Steth, with the justification "Rmv private link seeking donations of highly marginalizing, editorialized, subjective opinion "articles" by ex-psychiatrist not trained in any of the fields criticized". A brief overview on the page, however, shows that for example the Acupuncture article has plentiful references to well-renowned journals. It's tough for me to judge if the information is biased or lacking in any of the respects that Steth mentioned, though. Could anyone check, and re-add the link if justifiable? Narssarssuaq 16:51, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

The link above doesn't work. I was referring to this website. It looks rather scientific, and they're used in refs 30 and 34. Could someone investigate if we may use them as a source or not? To me it seems OK. Narssarssuaq 14:20, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
The link was immediately restored after it was deleted. It was a strictly POV deletion since it doesn't violate WP:EL. -- Fyslee 14:32, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
Great, that's finally settled then. There seems to be anti-scientific POV involved sometimes. That kind of attitude undermines the whole idea of Wikipedia in my opinion. For instance, Magnet therapy has recently been totally rewritten by someone with a poor knowledge of science. Narssarssuaq 14:41, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "Alternative" definition of alternative medicine - why?

Despite being bold in trying to make this page more accessable, my edit was reverted. Apparently, I have to achieve consensus before I can alter the page. Well, here's my point:

  1. The intro states that there are proponents of evidence-based medicine who don't distinguish between conventional and alternative medicine.
  2. There is then a rambling section called "Alternative definition" which is centered around Richard Dawkin's quote on alternative medicine, and is substantively the same as what the "proponents of evidence-based medicine" say.

I don't believe we need this "alternative definition" section, as it simply repeats what the lead section has to say. Furthermore, as there are plenty of medical doctors to reference for this position, we don't need a populist non-medical doctor such as Dawkins. Finally, I think such a contentious criticism of alternative medicine should be taken out of the lead section altogether.

So, may I put my edit back?

62.31.67.29 13:06, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Strange, that most of the information on definitions in this section is from opponents to alternative medicine. This section should have instead information about distinguishing alt med from mainstream or allopathic med, with several different takes on the matter.

There should be another section discussing the issues of validity and evidence, as it applies to both CAM and conventional med. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by V.B. (talk • contribs) Feb. 27, 2007.

Agree, the three quotes (Angell, Lundberg, Dawkins) essentially say the same thing and present a bit of an undue weight issue as presented. I'm contemplating retaining the references and trimming the quoted material. Thoughts from other editors? regards, Jim Butler(talk) 08:36, 28 February 2007 (UTC)
Most of the section is basically a critique (or more like, a dismissal) of alternative medicine as invalid. If that's what you want here, then I think it should be so labeled to alert the reader to its nature. But it seems to me, that in an entry on "alternative medicine", sypporters ought to have a right of rebuttal, to say the least. —V.B. 01:28, 3 March 2007 (UTC)V.B.

[edit] A redirect is not a merge

You have removed a merge tag [1], deleted a whole article (without merging the contents here), and left only a redirect. Being bold is one thing, but what you have done can be considered vandalism. Be very careful. Significant edits or large edits, especially deletions, should be discussed first. Please undo what you have done´. -- Fyslee 13:19, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I reviewed every statement in the article under consideration and came to the conclusion that nothing was worth including - either because it was already in this article, or because the material did not meet Wikipedia's WP:NPOV, WP:V and/or WP:NOR policies. For your edification, here is my reasoning:
The term is very debated within the scientific arena, since it has been mainly used in public health discourse (mostly among physicians and sociologists) only in US and UK during the last decades.
Other continental European scientific communities -- with even a much longer history in traditional medicine or herbal medicine (such us Germany or France)-- do not know this term, neither do they use it.
I agree that "alternative medicine", "complementary medicine" and CAM are recent neologisms to describe a wide range of techniques, many of which are several centuries old and come from around the world. A reference to a dictionary which has tried to find the earliest printed reference would be a good thing. However, the above text is not acceptable for providing such a history section. It doesn't give verifiable facts, nor references. It's just a rant. I've tried to find references to the first usages of the terms, but I've come up blank. I will check with an OED subscriber later today. But until someone can find a verifiable source of the history of the terms, it's not a good idea to put it into the article.
The National Institute of Health in the US defines "Complemntary and Alternative Medicine" (CAM) as "a group of diverse medical and health care systems, practices, and products that are not presently considered to be part of conventional medicine".
Already in the article. It's also wrongly attributed - the NIH themselves don't define CAM like that, their NCCAM division do.
The main problem that most scientists have with this terminology is that the CAM definition is not sufficiently culturally senstive, since what is "alternative" and/or "complementary" towards a pre-existing medical tradition/school can be very different in different cultures of the world. Paradoxically, industrial "pharmaceuticals" could also be seen as CAMs within the context of traditional medicine/traditional healers in Africa or even among Traditional Chinese Medicine.
"Most scientists" is an unattributed claim, or "some argue" by any other name. This paragraph is simply an attack on the definition, not grounded in verifiable references. It reads to me like original research.
Moreover, the list of what is considered to be CAM can change continually, as those therapies that are proven to be safe and effective become adopted into conventional health care and as new approaches to health care emerge.
Already in the article.
According to the NIH (National Institutes of Health): 1. complementary medicine is used together with conventional medicine. An example of a complementary therapy is using aromatherapy to help lessen a patient's discomfort following surgery; 2. alternative medicine is used in place of conventional medicine. An example of an alternative therapy is using a special diet to treat cancer instead of undergoing surgery, radiation, or chemotherapy that has been recommended by a conventional doctor. A less extreme example would be choosing an echinacea medicine from a naturopath, for hayfever, rather than an NSAID pharmaceutical or conventional doctor recommendation/prescription.
Not already in the article, but I don't think it needs to be. We could certainly recycle the reference to NCCAM's definition (already in the article) as a citation for our introductory sentences.
NCCAM classifies CAM therapies into five categories, or domains:
It does, and that's what the prominent "NCCAM classifications" link and list in the introductory boxout shows. I don't like the "Terms and concepts" article, as it's not really in the Wikipedia style, but fixing that is a job for another day - unless you'd like to do it. I propose a "NCCAM classifications of alternative medicines" article, with the five classifications and lists of what CAM techniques fall under that. Nethertheless, I don't think the NCCAM classications need to be brought into this article any more than the boxout already provides.
CAM is often erroneously confused in Western countries with traditional medicine.
This is another unattributed claim. I also think it's incorrect. CAM is an umbrella term for anything outside Western medical orthodoxy (or rather, anything which doesn't currently have proven efficacy). "Traditional medicine" is more vaguely defined than CAM. Traditional medicine overlaps with CAM, in that some traditional medicines (by which I'm defining as "invented before the 20th century") are still used today, marketed as CAM because of unproven efficacy - such as acupuncture, herbal remedies - and some traditional medicines are not still used today - such as bloodletting. There are also traditional medicines that are part of medical orthodoxy. Draw yourself a Venn diagram as an exercise. So there is a subset of traditional medicine that is CAM, not an "erroneous confusion".
So, in my opinion, everything of worth has been merged from the article. 62.31.67.29 10:58, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for the excellent explanation. I agree. -- Fyslee 08:19, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Osteopathic medicine?

Osteopathic medicine, in my opinion, does not belong on this page. OM is actually referred to as not an alternative medicine, but an "evidence based medicine" according to the osteopathic medicine page itself. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.61.200.253 (talk • contribs) 01:29, 3 December 2006 (UTC).

There is a difference, and here's what the disambiguation page says:Osteopathy may refer to:
* Osteopathy: alternative medicine, as practiced by osteopaths outside the United States
* Osteopathic medicine: as applied by osteopathic physicians in the United States
The European version is not a medical profession on a par with MDs, and is very much alternative, with many different pseudoscientific practices. They have never officially distanced themselves from A.T. Still's weird ideas, while the American osteopaths have done so a long time ago. (Unfortunately there are still American DOs who are no different than European DOs. Joseph Mercola is one notable example of a DO who advocates pseudoscientific ideas, quackery, and anti-medical sentiments. The FDA always has to watch him and has warned him several times for his illegal and unethical marketing practices.) -- Fyslee 01:42, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Neutrality box

I linked to this article from "essential oils" and was unfortunately only slightly surprised to come to the end of a long page and realize that it said very little about alternative medicine but a lot about its critics. The only unique information in this article is found in the first three paragraphs. Everything after the Table of Contents is just repeat after repeat of the same tired vituperative claptrap that old Dawkins bore has been bleating about for years. Come on, now. One good paragraph would have been plenty about doubts concerning the efficacy of alternative therapies, and to have actually described one or two of these therapies would not have gone amiss, either. Either this article needs drastic revision (i.e., starting from scratch), or it needs to be retitled "Criticisms of Alternative Medicine" or something like that. By the way, I took a look through a few of these talk pages, and while it is true that "allopathic medicine" is often used to describe somewhat deprecatorily what I will delicately call "mainstream medicine as practiced in the majority of healthcare facilities in the United States of America and as featured on such popular television programs as E.R., St. Elsewhere, and Grey's Anatomy, excepting certain episodes" by many practitioners and advocates of alternative therapies, by the same token "alternative medicine" is used in this article as a pejorative description of anything else. I bet when most people come here looking for information on "alternative medicine" they want information on traditional, complementary (or yes, possibly actually alternative) therapies because what is scientifically tested is not always enough - and it would be nice is they found it. Yes, the scientific method is a fantastic tool for discerning the safety and efficacy of a technique/substance/whatever, but using this tool is often costly, beyond the capabilities of most, and most importantly, time-consuming. Not everyone has time to wait.

What all these high-falootin' words are trying to say is: Chill, freaks. We don't all need nurse-maiding.

James P McLanahan

P.S. I NEVER write this kind of thing anywhere to anyone on any sort of board-type thing, ever, and I'm very angry at all of you for making me do it. And I'll never come back to read the replies, so don't bother insulting my mother, 'cause I won't know. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 4.245.66.69 (talk) 10:31, 10 December 2006 (UTC).

Stop complaining about Wikipedia contributors - they're doing the best they can. It's clear that the article needs improvement, do contribute if you have something of encyclopedic value to add. Narssarssuaq 11:53, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Good intentions do not just brush away bad results. The whole page stinks of supporting Alternative Medicine. The part regarding "support" for it is laughable. Conventional Medicine also recommends having a healthy lifestyle, but it won't go into religion/spirituality. We have yet to prove spirits, souls, gods, etc. exist. That's why Conventional Medicine doesn't embrace unproven thought. Honestly, the track record of Alt med is quite shakey at best. It is nothing but second fiddle to real medicine that does tests, verifies its findings amongst itself, and strives for tight tolerances regarding safety and effectiveness. That has yet to be said of Alt-Med. --Big Mac 21:17, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
Well if the article falls somewhere between McLanahan and Big Mac, it must be about right. I have to say, though, Mac, as someone who has little or no interest in Alt Med, your claim that "Conventional Medicine doesn't embrace unproven thought" is a bit of a stretch! There are countless examples of treatments that were embraced by the Conv Med establishment for years, only to be reversed later. I remember hearing MDs trashing flavinoids, anti-oxidants etc. back in the 60s and 70s. And conventional medicine's embrace of acetominaphen over aspirin tells you all you need to know to understand what drives conventional medicine, er, medi$ine. -- Mwanner | Talk 21:38, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
It is just a matter of knowing where to look. You might as well forget Alternative medicine and check out the following.
Glossary of alternative medicine
Category:Alternative medicine stubs
John Gohde 03:35, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
Ghode, you got banned here for a year from April 05 to April 06, in part for this kind of self-promotion. Please go read WP:NOT, and repent, okay? SBHarris 09:14, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
Exactly who is this Ghode?
I was just helping out McLanahan, a person in need of help. If I was self-promoting than I would have pointed out that my site is in the top 10 for my keyword in Google. Or, that my Dictionary of Alternative Medicine has gotten the job done unlike this Alternative medicine article. But clearly, I did no such thing.
Clearly, I just pointed out how the Glossary of alternative medicine and Category:Alternative medicine stubs articles enables people, like McLanahan, to totally ignore the totally useless Alternative medicine article.
Surely, you are NOT the same SB Harris who authored that research paper on Popsicles? -- John Gohde 18:54, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't care if your site is #1 on Google for discount dentures and anal pain cremes, Wikipedia is not the place for YOU to link to it. Get some others to explain this to you if you don't believe me. Popsicles? Cryopreserved embryos and tissues are already a part of medicine and whole organs preserved that way have been demonstated to work in animals. You can call them popsicles if you want to get in touch with your inner-child, I suppose, but it's not very scientific. SBHarris 19:00, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
First of all, I was minding my own business when you rudely butted in my private conversation. Second, I find it funny how a so-called research MD who claims to be interested in nutrition seriously suggests cryogenics as the longevity method of choice. Popsicles [2] just about sums it up.
I have put a lot of work into this joint. A very large number of THE WikiProject on Alternative Medicine InfoBoxes are in fact still on their respective articles. THE WikiProject's Alternative Medicine InfoBox is in fact still on the Alternative medicine article. And, there now is an even bigger Blue Box on the article, designed and implemented by one of your MD Buddies. But, THE WikiProject on Alternative Medicine still has a lot of work to do. And, you have just given me a reason to give Wikipedia a second look since smn is now just a Fat Farm. I have been here longer than you have. And, I have two different user pages. The last time that I was here, I wrote just one article that successfully competed with the Health article. I am planning on writing a NEW proper successful article on STRESS. Quality counts!
Who cares about Alternative medicine when the WikiProject's Glossary of alternative medicine is constantly being edited? -- John Gohde 20:04, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
You've been here longer than me? Does the year you were banned count in the time? None of these conversations are "private." Have your read the article on cryonics you reference? No, quite obviously not. The idea that I suggest cryonics as the "longevity method of choice" is of course misrepresentation. I'm by no means confident that cryonics will work for anybody, let alone everybody who tries it. Even among cryonicists, dying and being cryopreserved is viewed as the second-worst thing that can possibly happen to you (guess what the worst thing is?). Every other longevity method is preferable to being cryopreserved, and cryonics is an option to consider only after every other method has failed, and you have been pronounced dead and your society is now planning to burn you up, or stick you in a hole in the ground to decay. Which is your privilege if that floats your boat, but in that situation it's hardly your place to crow about your success, and suggest that I'm silly to try something else. All you're really doing is giving up, making a virtue of necessity, and playing at sour grapes. Big deal. SBHarris 20:42, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
This happens to be my 3rd Tour of Duty, here. Surely, that counts for something? Speaking of self-promotion, you don't see me with a fancy multi-color signature, now do you? Just remember this, I found this place in November of 2003. What took you so long? -- John Gohde 23:30, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

<cluestick> Whack! </cluestick> Steve Harris - what are you doing? You don't need to justify yourself to John Gohde! Ignore him. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 20:47, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I should, but Gohde raises these issues in public and they need answers for the curious. Of course he's not interested in cryonics, but rather in deflecting attention from his own self-promotion, which is against the rules on Wikipedia. People shouldn't be writing articles which link to their own promotional websites. I don't. Ghode shouldn't. If he continues, I'm doing to do more than give him a verbal smacking-- I'm going to take his butt to ArbCom. Remove those links to your own sites, Gohde, or I will. SBHarris 20:56, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't need any such self-promotion nonsense. I was helping out a person in need, when SBH started attacking me for absoluetly no reason other than jealousy on his part. My web site is too popular to fool with such nonsense. Can you please fix my signature indention that you messed up above? -- John Gohde 23:30, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't see where it's messed up. Feel free to fix it yourself, Mr. Experience. Colors in names aren't illegal here (so feel free). Spam links, however, are. SBHarris 23:41, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
I have NEVER posted a spam link, anywhere. Not ever, ... except perhaps your Popsicle article? -- John Gohde 00:14, 3 January 2007 (UTC)


[edit] "Bad medicine"

From the lead, this could be clearer:

"Bad medicine" is any treatment where the efficacy and safety of which has not been verified through peer-reviewed, double blind placebo controlled studies, regarded as the "gold standard" for determining the efficacy of a compound. ".

I don't think that most EBM proponents regard surgical procedures (most of which are impossible to double-blind) as "bad medicine".... thx, Jim Butler(talk) 03:20, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Reworded.[3] --Jim Butler(talk) 22:59, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
What does "EBM" mean?
"good medicine" and "bad medicine" is obviously POV. Also, just because something hasn't (yet) been proven doesn't necessarily mean it doesn't work, and doesn't necessarily mean it's harmful. Lack of proof doesn't objectively make something into "bad medicine". I would like these terms either deleted, or presented as quotes by some particular relevant expert, not as something Wikipedia is saying. --Coppertwig 01:17, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
EBM is an acronym for evidence-based medicine.
I'm moving the para in question here for now, so we can hammer out appropriate wording. The para is misleading in that clearly not all scientists regard the distinction between CAM and conventional medicine as moot (per ref's in the article, e.g. Ernst, Cochrane, whose statures as EBM proponents are beyond question).
Proponents of evidence-based medicine regard the distinction between conventional and alternative medicine as moot, preferring "good medicine" (with provable efficacy) and "bad medicine" (without it). "Bad medicine" is any treatment where the efficacy and safety of which has not been verified through peer-reviewed, randomized controlled trials. It is thus possible for a method to change categories in either direction, based on increased knowledge of its effectiveness or lack thereof.<ref name="Angell">[http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/extract/339/12/839 Alternative medicine--the risks of untested and unregulated remedies.] Angell M, Kassirer JP. ''N Engl J Med'' 1998;339:839.</ref>
thx, Jim Butler(talk) 01:52, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
OK -- how about this, taken from Glossary of alternative medicine?
The list of therapies included under CAM changes gradually. If and when CAM therapies that are proven to be safe and effective become adopted into conventional health care, they gradually cease to be considered CAM, since adoption and acceptance often takes time.
thx, Jim Butler(talk) 01:58, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
Are proponents of Evidence-Based Medicine against surgery? --Coppertwig 02:13, 17 February 2007 (UTC)
No, definitely not, although some articles about EBM often confuse the issue. The "gold standard" for a compound (multiple randomized, double-blinded placebo-controlled studies) obviously isn't an appropriate standard for surgery. The article Evidence-Based Medicine has some good material about levels of evidence. cheers, Jim Butler(talk) 03:15, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Information from OED

Note to self: This article is approaching a train-wreck and I must find the time to re-write it. Note to others: I intend to re-write this article into something a bit more coherent. I haven't time at present. However, here's a useful tidbit that I was going to use in my rewrite:

The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd edition) cites the earliest print reference to "alternative medicine" as this:

1983 Brit. Med. Jrnl. 30 July 307/1 One of the few growth industries in contemporary Britain is alternative medicine.
The use of alternative meaning "purporting to represent a preferable or equally acceptable alternative to that in general use or sanctioned by the establishment, as alternative (i.e. non-nuclear) energy, medicine, radio, etc." from 1970 at the earliest.

The OED 2nd ed. doesn't have any citation for "complementary medicine". 81.178.213.18 15:41, 24 February 2007 (UTC)

Sounds great - I look forward to seeing the new version. I would have done it myself, but I don't feel that I know the subject well enough! Lottie 12:17, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup tag

I added a cleanup tag, and removed the following from the article:

Medicina Alternativa The Alma-Alta declaration defines its strategy as "Health for All by 2000 A.D." through primary health care. This is in pursuance of the aims declared at the WHO/UNICEF sponsored conference at Alma-Alta, USSR[citation needed]. Primary health care has been described as "essential health care based on practical, scientifically sound and socially accepted methods and technology made universally accessible to individuals and the families in the community through their full participation and at a cost that a community and country can afford to maintain at every stage of their development in the spirit of self reliance and self determination". Subsequently, the Alma-Alta declaration outlined that primary health care is based on training and scientific orientation provided to health care workers including physicians, nurses, midwives, auxiliary and community workers and traditional medical practitioners. Therefore, Medicina Alternativa has established guidelines and regulations outlining the code of ethics that healers are expected to follow consequent to their training, certification and membership of Medicina Alternativa.

http://cbs5.com/health/health_story_052150403.html http://cbs5.com/health/health_story_052150403.html http://cbs5.com/health/health_story_052150403.html http://cbs5.com/health/health_story_052150403.html AND http://allafrica.com/stories/200702211138.html http://allafrica.com/stories/200702211138.html http://allafrica.com/stories/200702211138.html http://allafrica.com/stories/200702211138.html Narssarssuaq 09:22, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

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