What the Alternative Medicine Debate Is Really About
Last week, after my story on complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) went up on our website, I did a bit of keyboard out-loud thinking—can I call it blogmusing?—on the topic. The volume of comments has been unusually heavy, with the expected bright line separating those who castigate me for publishing nonsense from those receptive to CAM. It has been a useful discussion, but I'd like to clarify a couple of points.
I did not state in the story or argue in my blog post that CAM can cure—that it can address the underlying cause of an illness and treat it effectively. I did not write that the explanations put forward by CAM proponents and practitioners for the supposed mechanisms powering their techniques are logical. And I did not say that CAM studies have been well designed and executed or have produced noteworthy findings.
I did report in the story, and repeat on this blog, that CAM often makes people feel better by relieving their symptoms. I suggested that this is not necessarily a bad thing, if a therapy does not cause harm or if the risk is rare, small, and clearly stated.
A physician I know who is prominent in the movement to improve hospital quality E-mailed me after reading my post. He's not a big fan of CAM as a cure. As he wrote: "[E]very now and then, we see somebody who barked up the alternative tree, only to let their real disease go untreated or undiagnosed until it was too late. It doesn't happen often, but when it does, it's very sad and very memorable."
And then he added this: "For many of the things that CAM has attacked—stress, pain syndromes, stuff like that—western medicine doesn't have much to offer, so if it works for people (whatever the reason), God bless it, and them."
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Reader Comments
Alternative Medicine
I thought the article was well presented in terms of representing its facts. I understand that CAM is not a cure all thing, however I believe people should have access to alternative care when conventional care failed. I came from a long line of family in alternative care. Without it, I don't think I would be here today. I was very sick during my early childhood years. I had really bad coughs at night and was vomiting almost every night. By taking herbal medication it helped heal me physically and internally. In fact a lot of these CAM cares are well documented and proven it works. All we need is to take the time to look into it to understand how each of the techniques work.
Placebos and such
On the matter of the placebo effect, there is a Cochrane review that concluded that, except for a small category of self-assessed conditions, such a mild pain, there does not seem to be a placebo effect showing up in any trials.
What is called the placebo effect is likely to be the fact that most conditions go away or cure themselves. Possibly many of the claimed results from CAM are similar.
It does not seem (and is implausible, anyway) that the mind is able to cure physiological or biological conditions.
Of course, relief of pain or discomfort is valuable.
Not true
"It's important to note that standard medical approaches with
the possible exception of surgery(If it's properly conducted), does
not treat the underlying cause of any condition."
I'm sorry, but that's a load of B.S. Antibiotics treat the microbes that cause pneumonia, for example.
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U.S. News's Avery Comarow has been editor of the America's Best Hospitals annual rankings since they first appeared in 1990. His reporting on clinical medicine, from the latest cholesterol guidelines to robotic surgery, has been driven by the question: What does this mean to patients? And that is the perspective he brings to his observations and commentaries on the increasing number of programs by hospitals and other healthcare providers to improve care and patient safety.
