I followed your link and read the article about chiropractice. The article seemed very reasonable to me, and does not exclude possible beneficial effects.

If you don’t mind, I’m not an ‘anecdore’ but a real person who has been relieved of pain – and so have may other people I know

The author of the article talks of the costs of chiropractic treatment. Well, they are on the capitalist market like many others. What one doesn’t have to pay for psychoanalysis – and is this a sufficiently proven treatment? I only had to peek through the door of a specialist to be told he was busy and I could come on another day. This peek cost me 90 euros, considerably more than my ch. treatment for a week.

I was treated gratis for my chiropractic manipulations, because they were funded by the National Health Service. Later Berlusconi took away this funding, not because he was against Chiropractice but because he was generally cutting funds. MY chiropracter takes me now for a special fee which is manageable for people who are not well-off.

But I think it is at present more than one’s life is worth to defend a chiropracter on HP. The – partly psychological and unscientifically generated – hatred is almost as great as other hatreds we know of. People are absolutely not prepared to listen to anyone who says the have benefitted from the unmentionable treatment.

And who wouldn’t sympathise with Mr. Singh? I certainly hope he will not be successfully sued for damages, and would be willing to militate against such an outcome.

This thread has been superceded by others on the same subject, so my comment will probably fall by the wayside. I can’t say that I really care.

“Fuck the scientific and medical value. More interesting is postive results. They are the evidence. And you have ignored the scientific evidence I have illustrated above.”

Felix, there is an old aphorism: the plural of anecdote is not data.

Nor, in that vein, are ill-remembered sources evidence.

Say what you want about Singh (& Ernst), but at least he uses solid numbers etc. rather “a wikipedia article” or a programme on German TV. For scientific evidence something approaching a link like this would be more appropriate:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18280103
ie. a link to an abstract from a peer-reviewed journal indexed in MEDLINE.

I’ll leave it at that.

field:

“Lots of people have nearly died or suffered psychotic reactions to anti-malarial drugs. Surely you know that?

Personally speaking I adopt the cowards of not going to malarial regions. But if you do go, surely it’s a matter of choice about how you protect yourself.”

Field, I’m going to assume you are being truthful here, and not lying/exagerating/naively passing on misinformation.

Yes, lots(/most) of interventions have side effects. However, there is a difference between possible side effects of drugs that have been proven to work and taking water/sugar pills that offer no protection at all and have no side effects.

Given that the side effects of drugs being that drastic are really quite small and the chances of catching malaria in a high malarial region with no protection* are quite high. I think I know which I would choose. But I agree, discretion may be the better part of valour in such cases ;).

FWIW, the BHA agrees with all the skeptics here when it comes to homeopathy:
http://www.trusthomeopathy.org/export/sites/bha_site/hh_article_bank/in_practice/general_practice/autumn_08_general_practice.pdf
“Members of the Faculty of Homeopathy operate within very clear policy guidelines which advocate medical immunisation and condemn
homeopathic malaria vaccination.”

*remind me again how “like cures like” can protect against malaria.

Lots of people have nearly died or suffered psychotic reactions to anti-malarial drugs. Surely you know that?

Personally speaking I adopt the cowards of not going to malarial regions. But if you do go, surely it’s a matter of choice about how you protect yourself.

Are you prepared to take full personal responsibility for any ill effects suffered by people who take anti-malarial drugs? Of course not. That’s the question you should always ask your doctor – and have the tape recorder running.

I think that’s a bit unfair. IIRC McKenna had got his qualification from some sort of postal or internet college. But you did have to meet some minimal criteria to get your qualification. But you might surprised what qualifies for a degree in bona fide UK universities these days.

Pity that you haven’t grasped at all what we are talking about.

Some interesting issues – however, it was just a preliminary hearing to ascertain whether there was a prima facie case that could be tried or whether it should be thrown out. The judge obviously decided there was something to argue (he did not decide the outcome – that is for the trial). Poor reporting.

“Felix
You story is interesting and I believe you, but it has no medical or scientific value.”

Fuck the scientific and medical value. More interesting is postive results. They are the evidence. And you have ignored the scientific evidence I have illustrated above.

You got a point. it’s not always easy to perform double-blind tests. For instance, it is posible to test the effect of acupuncture with fake needles (that retract once they touch the skin), but this would be only single-blind (only the patient does not know whether the treatment is real).
In the case of chiropractics and physiotherapy, I don’t really know if a double-blind test is feasible.
Mind you, physiotherapy is not controvertible and it does not claim treating diseases other than muscle and bone injuries.

To get to the conclusion that some drug or treatment really works, extensive double-blind tests involving hundreds or thousands of people should be conducted and published.

How do they do double-blind tests of something like physiotherapy?

With pills, sure, it’s clear. Pills are taken. Neither patient nor therapist knows which ones are real.

But how can they ‘fake’ giving someone an exercise to perform?