Chiropractic Healthiness

Question:

: Again, I find myself in the odd position of agreeing with Rich.  I’ve : researched the basis of homeopathy because of my recent experiences, : and I can find NO SCIENTIFIC BASIS WHATSOEVER!!!  Just because some : guy (even a doctor) decides that likes cures likes doesn’t make it so. : : The whole theory behind homeopathy does strike me as cultish, and : many of the folks that post about it don’t seem to understand what is : meant by scientific proof. You seem to confuse ’scientific basis’ for ‘demonstrable basis’–as if if something can’t be demonstrated to be true by scientific study, it cannot occur. That seems like the height of scientistic folly. Many, many aspects of the world (and perhaps the world as a Whole) may very well remain recondite after centuries of further scientific endeavor. Just because you and Rich and Steve thing that science will unravel all things, or that science can be used to exclude perfectly rational therapies that have no scientific validation (perhaps because of lack of political will to perform those validative experiments), doesn’t make it so. Glad your kids got better. Join the ranks of the pleasantly surprised empiric adventurers. —

Response:

Weed, D.C.) writes: >word is commonly used to refer to the chiefly symptom-suppressing medicine >that is practiced by mainstream M.D.s. Its use in this respect is, by >convention, correct. And in my opinion, all the implications that the word >carries from its etymology are also correct (to the disdain of symptom >suppressors like Harris.)

    Let me see: I’m recommending that menopause be treated with the exact natural hormones that the body used to make, while YOU’RE recommending some plant stuff with different molecules in it, and vitamin E.  And you dare call me a "symptom suppressor"?  Tell us how menopause is an herb and vitamin E deficiency, "Dr." Weed.  This should be interesting.                                             Steve Harris, M.D.

Response:

>> It has since been proven in a 13 year federal > court battle–(Wilke et al., the AMA lost)–that their motives were > strickly self-interest; that is, the AMA perceived the growing > chiropractic profession as an economic threat to their pocketbooks and > so they tried to eliminate them and thus eliminate their competition. >Can someone out there shed some light (rather than ole Duane’s heat) on >this case.  The only reference I can find with my meager resources is to a >case of Cohn v. Bond (Wilkes Gen’l Hospital) that seemed to rule in FAVOR >of the hospital.  Looks like Dr. Cohn wanted hospital priviledges (AACK!) >at Wilkes Gen’l and the folks there said uhuh.  Seems like the courts >backed up the hospital. >Have I got the wrong case?

   Yes, indeed you have the wrong case. Maybe its because it’s "Wilk" and not "Wilkes."  Sorry if I misspelled the name in my first post. Wilk was the name of a chiropractor who sued the AMA, not the name of a hospital.    In 1976 Chester Wilk, DC, and four other chiropractors filed an antitrust suite in Chicago’s U.S. District Court against the American Medical Association and a host of other major medical groups. The case was sparked by the AMA’s decades-old blatant anti-chiropractic campaign. The chiropractors lost the first round.   In 1987, the chiropractors appealed the Wilk case decision and won. Judge Susan Getzendanner heard the evidence in the U.S. District Court and issued an opinion on August 27, 1987. It was ruled that the actions of the AMA and its co-conspirators over the last 25 years had resulted in serious damage to the cooperative process in health care, to the profession of chiropractic as a whole, to individual doctors of chiropractic, and to the patients they serve. The court issued an injunction forcing the AMA to stop its attack on chiropractic and to allow its members to refer patients to chiropractors. The judge stated in the decision, "The purpose of the [AMA's] boycott was to contain and elimminate the chiropractic profession. This conduct constituted a conspiracy among the AMA and its members…Under the Sherman Act, every combination or conspiracy in restraint of trade is illegal. The court has held that the conduct of the AMA and its members constituted a conspiracy in restraint of trade…" Susan Getzendanner, U.S. District Judge   In 1990 the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the decision against the AMA.   Chester A. Wilk, D.C., a plaintiff in the Wilk, et al. vs AMA case, has recently published a book, MEDICINE, MONOPOLIES AND MALICE, which chronicles the events leading up to and through the ultimate victory of the antitrust lawsuit. I highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the subject. It is must reading, not only for anyone interested in chiropractic, but for anyone interested in any alternative care. It shows you just what forces you are up against and what tactics they will use against you. Another book on the same subject that I highly recommend is RACKETEERING IN MEDICINE, THE SUPPRESSION OF ALTERNATIVES, by James P. Carter, M.D.     Dr. Duane Weed, DC  <*>  E-Mail request for my FREE Herb

Response:

– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text ->This is not a generally used definition of cult. but it is the one the >quack buster chose to use.  It is the position of the quack buster that >homeopathy has no scientific basis… > OK Judith here is your chance. Post the evidence that homeopathy > does have a scientific basis. I suspect that each of us may have > a VERY different idea of what the word "scientific" means. > In order for something to have a scientific basis it must be > demonstrated to be valid using the scientific method. Share > with us which scientific methodologic studies have given credence > to the idea that homeopathy is anything more than placebo. And > don’t get me wrong; placebo responses are very powerful indeed. > I just question whether homeopathy is nothing more than placebo. > so that when you spend all your time evaluating someone and > then figuring out which homeopathic remedy to use it may not > make any difference which one you choose. Anyone may be > as good as any other. But I am open to changing my mind. Let > us have a discussion of the scientific basis of homeopathy. > It is not enough to say that many people have benefitted from > homeopathy over the years. The same could be said for > people who received placebo treatments over the years. > They ALSO have benefitted. Is there any difference between > the two treatments? Is it important to see if there is a difference? > Or maybe it just does not matter to you. To me it is important > in order to understand the mechanism of action.

Again, I find myself in the odd position of agreeing with Rich.  I’ve researched the basis of homeopathy because of my recent experiences, and I can find NO SCIENTIFIC BASIS WHATSOEVER!!!  Just because some guy (even a doctor) decides that likes cures likes doesn’t make it so. The whole theory behind homeopathy does strike me as cultish, and many of the folks that post about it don’t seem to understand what is meant by scientific proof. It’s just a damn shame that I have to go home every day to two kids that were healed by homeopathy, and other similar cultish activities, when the medical community almost killed them.  I keep waiting for some of the symptoms that they had before being treated homeopathically to come back, but darn, it’s been close to 10 months now with no reoccurrence. I can’t explain why this stuff works, and it makes my skin crawl, as a scientist, to try to explain it to someone.  But I am now thoroughly convinced that SOMETHING that was done did work, and has continued to work. Therefore I have to come to this conclusion – there is some basis for the homeopathic process, which has been refined over 100 years, but we just don’t understand what it is yet.  This isn’t much different, really, from medicine men of years past giving herbal remedies with no concept of anatomy or biology.  Only time will tell.  Hopefully there are people out there that understand the scientific method that are researching why some of these alternative things really work. So, have fun with this, Rich.  I understand completely where you’re coming from, and would agree with you wholeheartedly (and you too, Dr. Harris), if I just hadn’t seen things that contradicted your world view.  If someone told me a story like I’ve related here before, I wouldn’t have believed them, either.  It was kinda eye-opening to realize that.

Response:

> It has since been proven in a 13 year federal > court battle–(Wilke et al., the AMA lost)–that their motives were > strickly self-interest; that is, the AMA perceived the growing chiropractic > profession as an economic threat to their pocketbooks and so they tried to > eliminate them and thus eliminate their competition.

Can someone out there shed some light (rather than ole Duane’s heat) on this case.  The only reference I can find with my meager resources is to a case of Cohn v. Bond (Wilkes Gen’l Hospital) that seemed to rule in FAVOR of the hospital.  Looks like Dr. Cohn wanted hospital priviledges (AACK!) at Wilkes Gen’l and the folks there said uhuh.  Seems like the courts backed up the hospital. Have I got the wrong case? Respondents please provide references to some legal docs or something otehr than the ACA news. — nim

Response:

- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text ->I’ve been following the homeopathy debate with great interest, and while >doing some net-surfing, came across a document titled, "Homeopathy: A >Position Statement by the National Council Against Health Fraud." >(see:  http://user.itl.net/~brian/HOMEOP.HTML) >Question #1:  What is the National Council Against Health Fraud? >Question #2:  (I quote from the document)  "Homeopathy was devised by… >Hahnemann…as a reaction to practices based upon the ancient humoral >theory which he labeled "allopathy."  The term has been misapplied to >regular medicine ever since. (p.1)  And later:   >    "Hahnemann dubbed such practices "allopathy" (allos "opposite", >    pathos "suffering") and sought to replace it with his "Law of >    Similia" that treated "like with like."  Although medicine has >    never accepted the label of allopathy, homeopaths continue to >    misrepresent physicians as allopaths to make their differences >    appear based upon conflicting ideologies rather that scientific >    pragmatism.  Medical writers often refer to medical doctors as >    "allopaths" but their use of the term reflects an alternate >    definition of allopathy as "a system of medical practice making >    use of all measures proved of value in treatment of disease." >    This definition is inconsistent with its root words…its   >    duplicity aids those who wish to misrepresent medicine as >    ideologically allopathic (i.e., symptom suppression). >Now I’m confused.  Many of those proponents of homeopathy in this   >group frequently use the word "allopathy".  Is this an appropriate >word to use when referring to modern American medicine?  Or did >the word in fact originate as a descriptor for humoral theory, which >included attributing disease to blood, phlegm, and black & yellow bile? >Question #3:  The document includes the following statement: >    Homeopathy clearly fits Webster’s dictionary definitions of >    a CULT (emphasis mine)…and a SECT… >Is this an extreme statement, or do the proponents exhibit such >tendancies?

   I refer anyone who is interested in the truth about the National Council Against Health Fraud (NCAHF) to get a copy of the excellent book, RACKETEERING IN MEDICINE, THE SUPPRESSION OF ALTERNATIVES by James P. Carter, M.D., published by Hampton Roads Publishing Co. Inc., 1993, (ISBN 1-878901-32-X). A perusal of the index will indicate 12 places in the book where the NCAHF is mentioned.    The National Council Against Health Fraud is an outgrowth of the Coordinating Conference on Health Information (CCHI), which was formed by the AMA in 1964. The CCHI is actually an offshoot of the AMA’s Committee on Quackery that was originally established for the sole purpose of eliminating the chiropractic profession. It has since been proven in a 13 year federal court battle–(Wilke et al., the AMA lost)–that their motives were strickly self-interest; that is, the AMA perceived the growing chiropractic profession as an economic threat to their pocketbooks and so they tried to eliminate them and thus eliminate their competition. They disseminated lies about the profession in order to discredit the profession. As a result of this law suit, a federal judge issued an injunction against the AMA. The National Council Against Health Fraud, has turned their attention to other alternative "threats" to the medical establishment. Sometimes actual fraud is involved, but more often it is just a means of harassing and discrediting an alternative treatment in order to protect the medical status quo.    My advice is to ignore anything that you read that has been put out by the National Council Against Health Fraud. They are not a credible organization. I strongly recommend that you read the book I mentioned above.    I don’t think that the term "allopathy" has anything to do with the body "humors," although it’s origination coinciding with the birth of homeopathy is correct. With many words, the origination has little if anything to do with the word’s current use. Although there are many who object, today the word is commonly used to refer to the chiefly symptom-suppressing medicine that is practiced by mainstream M.D.s. Its use in this respect is, by convention, correct. And in my opinion, all the implications that the word carries from its etymology are also correct (to the disdain of symptom suppressors like Harris.)     Dr. Duane Weed, DC  <*>  E-Mail request for my FREE Herb

Response:

Judith A. Linn tries to make the point that good studies of homeopathy are difficult because the treatments must be individualized. This, of course, is ridiculous.  As I pointed out here about a year ago the following study design would be excellent: 1) Patient comes into homeopath with complaint X 2) Homeopath says "yup, homeopathy can help you" (do they EVER say otherwise?) 3) Homeopath writes down perscription for DD600 of duck heart or whatever and sends the patient with Rx to the study pharmacy (which could be centralized). 4) Study pharmacist opens an envelope which says "Verum" or "Placebo" and fills as indicated (that’s the randomization step for those keeping track).  All pills will be identical little white globules, of course. 5) Neither patient nor homeopath know how patient was randomized (that’s double blinding). 6) Outcome is a simple one.  At 2 weeks (or whatever) – better, same, or worse. This is not a test of homeopathy in a specific disease and it cannot take into account the adequacy of the homeopaths (you’d want to pick a "good" one ).  If this study is negative, the homeopathic-industrial complex would have much to fall back on.  However, if an adequately blinded study (actually 2 or 3 would be nice) were positive, then standard medicine (as well as physics, chemistry, pharmacy, etc) would have a lot of explaining to do. Voila – pretty easy to do, too. Oh yes, I forgot to mention "step 0" informed consent something I’m sure ALL homeopaths do anyway before providing there, for the most part, "experimental" therapy. — nim when alternative medicine becomes experimental . . .                   . . . it will no longer be experimental

Response:

From   "Characteristics and Selected Results of Research on Homoeopathy" by M. Righetti … Research Results Research for its own purposes, i.e. Remedy Provings, is highly significant for homoeopathy, but not acknowledged very much by orthodox medicine… The following studies exemplify the effectiveness of homoeopathy in different older research models which, however, can be criticised with regard to the standard of methods or evaluation, but usually are acceptable with respect to scientific criteria… In vitro study:  In 1954, Boyd published his meticulous study on the effects of mercury chloride… D61… In a well-controlled and analyzed blind study with over 500 comparison examinations which lasted several years, Boyd significantly proved that HgCl2 D61 accelerates the splitting of starch by the enzyme malt diastasis. Plant studies: In this field, the untiring pioneer work of Lili Kolisko is to be mentioned, who, since 1923, has observed plants in connection with homoeopathic diltions. It has become increasingly obvious that the use of remedies enhanced the growth of plant seeds. Usisng the same principles, an effect was also shown by Pelikan and Unger 1965 (silver nitrate D8-D19 on the growth of wheat germs). Jones and Jenkins (1981) were able to reproduce these results with similar silver nitrate dilutions… The results of Kolisko’s  experiments with the potencies D24, D25, and D26 were recently reviewed by Pongratz and Endler… Animal studies: An often used ’standard model’ are poisoning studies (see Roth 1991)… The Basic principle is similar in all studies: laboratory animals are poisoned with a toxic substance and protected or rather detoxicated by homoeopathically prepared dilutions of the same substance. The homoeopathic diltion increases the secretion of the poison in the urine and stools. The most elaborate and best controlled work comes from Cazin 91986, 1987), who in blind studies has carried out arsenic intoxication studies on 696 rats. Twelve hours after oral arsenic poisoning, rats were injected with a homoeopathically prepared arsenic solution. All arsenic dilutions tested (C5-C15 and D10-D30) showed a statistically highly significant increase in arsenic secretion via stools and urine and a lowering of the arsenic level in blood. However, the absence of influence of a dilution of lead on the excretion cinetics of lead has been observed by Fisher et al. (1987). Furthermore, the model has also been tested in artificial animal illnesses. One example is Diabetes  mellitus induced by alloxane poisoning (toxic influence on the pancreas). The animals could be protected by potentised Alloxane (C7,C9) and did not or only rarely develop diabetes (see Righetti 1988). In view of these results, the question of their therapeutical application arises. Is it possible to protect an organism against poisonings by giving the corresponding homoeopathic dilution? According to Souza Margo et al, (1986) an application of different homoeopathically prepared dilutions of gentamycine will diminish the damage to the kidneys known to be caused by that antibiotic. In the study by Gardes (1989) nalidixic acid C7 led to a significantly quicker excretion ofthis antibiotic. Finally, Labonia et al. (1986) were able to protect mice against the poison of the Bothrops snake by administering potencies of the very same poison…

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From