alternative medicine
Today, I had a great day: two wonderful book reviews, one in THE TIMES HIGHER EDUCATION and one in THE SPECTATOR. But then I did something that I shouldn’t have done – I looked whether someone had already written a review on the Amazon site. There were three reviews; the first was nice the last was very stupid and the third one almost made me angry. Here it is:
I was at Exeter when Ernst took over what was already a successful Chair in CAM. I am afraid this part of it appears to be fiction. It was embarrassing for those of us CAM scientists trying to work there, but the university nevertheless supported his right to freedom of speech through all the one-sided attacks he made on CAM. Sadly, it became impossible to do genuine CAM research at Exeter, as one had to either agree with him that CAM is rubbish, or go elsewhere. He was eventually asked to leave the university, having spent the £2.M charity pot set up by Maurice Laing to help others benefit from osteopathy. CAM research funding is so tiny (in fact it is pretty much non-existent) and the remedies so cheap to make, that there is not the kind of corruption you find in multi-billion dollar drug companies (such as that recently in China) or the intrigue described. Subsequently it is not possible to become a big name in CAM in the UK (which may explain the ‘about face’ from the author when he found that out?). The book bears no resemblance to what I myself know about the field of CAM research, which is clearly considerably more than the author, and I would recommend anyone not to waste time and money on this particular account.
I know, I should just ignore it, but outright lies have always made me cross!
Here are just some of the ‘errors’ in the above text:
- There was no chair when I came.
- All the CAM scientists – not sure what that is supposed to mean.
- I was never asked to leave.
- The endowment was not £ 2 million.
- It was not set up to help others benefit from osteopathy.
It is a pity that this ‘CAM-expert’ hides behind a pseudonym. Perhaps he/she will tell us on this blog who he/she is. And then we might find out how well-informed he/she truly is and how he/she was able to insert so many lies into such a short text.
A recent article in the BMJ about my new book seems to have upset fellow researchers of alternative medicine. I am told that the offending passage is the following:
“Too much research on complementary therapies is done by people who have already made up their minds,” the first UK professor of complementary medicine has said. Edzard Ernst, who left his chair at Exeter University early after clashing with the Prince of Wales, told journalists at the Science Media Centre in London that, although more research into alternative medicines was now taking place, “none of the centres is anywhere near critical enough.”
Following this publication, I received indignant inquiries from colleagues asking whether I meant to say that their work lacks critical thinking. As this is a valid question, I will try to answer it the best I presently can.
Any critical evaluation of alternative medicine has to yield its fair share of negative conclusions about the value of alternative medicine. If it fails to do that, one would need to assume that most or all alternative therapies generate more good than harm – and very few experts (who are not proponents of alternative medicine) would assume that this can possibly be the case.
Put differently, this means that a researcher or a research group that does not generate its fair share of negative conclusions is suspect of lacking a critical attitude. In a previous post, I have addressed this issue in more detail by creating an ‘index’: THE TRUSTWORTHINESS INDEX. I have also provided a concrete example of a researcher who seems to be associated with a remarkably high index (the higher the index, the more suspicion of critical attitude).
Instead of unnecessarily upsetting my fellow researchers of alternative medicine any further, I will just issue this challenge: if any research group can demonstrate to have an index below 0.5 (which would mean the team has published twice as many negative conclusions as positive ones), I will gladly and publicly retract my suspicion that this group is “anywhere near critical enough”.
Much has been written on this blog about progress in the area of chiropractic practice and research. But where is the evidence for progress? I did a little search and one of the first sites I stumbled across was this one which is full to bursting with bogus claims. This cannot be what chiropractors call ‘progress’, I thought.
Determined to find real progress, I continued searching and found THE FOUNDATION FOR CHIROPRACTIC PROGRESS. Great, I thought, an organisation and a website entirely devoted to the very subject I was looking for. Consequently, I studied the information provided here in some detail. What follows are excerpts from the site:
Chiropractic care is a health option that has proven beneficial for a multitude of health conditions, along with in the practice of achieving optimal wellness. It is essential for those unaware of chiropractic care to be adequately informed, so they too can experience the benefits that over 60,000 practicing doctors of chiropractic in the U.S. provide to their patients daily. Established in 2003, the not-for-profit Foundation for Chiropractic Progress (F4CP) aims to educate the public about the many benefits associated with chiropractic care.On behalf of the F4CP, I invite you to tour this site and learn more about this effective form of treatment.
Kind regards,
Kent Greenawalt
Chairman | Foundation for Chiropractic Progress
THIS WAS A STRANGE INTRODUCTION, I THOUGHT; BUT UNDETERRED I READ ON:
Parents of Colicky Infants Turn to Chiropractic Care
For those parents who never imagined their ailing babies and toddlers could be helped by chiropractic care, it may be time for some rethinking.New mom Jean, a 31-year-old speech therapist from New Jersey, became an advocate after enlisting the help of her own chiropractor to treat her colicky infant girl, Emma. After having had what she says was “no luck” with the usual ways of alleviating colic symptoms – including giving Emma children’s probiotics daily – one appointment with board-certified in chiropractic pediatrics Dr. Lora Tanis produced an immediate difference.
Concussions Among Athletes
A concussion is a type of traumatic brain injury caused by a bump, blow or jolt to the head that can change the way the brain functions. Symptoms include dizziness, instability and confusion.
Using methods that rely on brain-based, non-invasive, drugfree approaches — like chiropractic
care and physical rehab — can help re-establish balance and maximal brain and nervous system functionality.
News of Health – Improving Military Health Care
Retired U.S. Army Brigadier General Becky Halstead—the first woman in U.S. history to command in combat at the strategic level—is speaking out on the value of chiropractic care for the nation’s military men and women.
Good Health
With the epidemic now estimated to be costing the nation $147 billion annually, it’s a question that’s very much on the minds of health experts. And many, including lifestyle guru Shea Vaughn, are citing chiropractic care as a crucial part of overall wellness programs.
FEELING A LITTLE DISAPPOINTED, I STOPPED READING AND THOUGHT
PROGRESS INDEED !!!
Homeopathy has many critics who claim that there is no good evidence for this type of therapy. Homeopaths invariably find this most unfair and point to a plethora of studies that show an effect. They are, of course, correct! There are plenty of trials that suggest that homeopathic remedies do work. The question, however, is HOW RELIABLE ARE THESE STUDIES?
Here is a brand new one which might stand for dozens of others.
In this study, homeopaths treated 50 multimorbid patients with homeopathic remedies identifies by a method called ‘polarity analysis’ (PA) and prospectively followed them over one year (PA enables homeopaths to calculate a relative healing probability, based on Boenninghausen’s grading of polar symptoms).
The 43 patients (86%) who completed the observation period experienced an average improvement of 91% in their initial symptoms. Six patients dropped out, and one did not achieve an improvement of 80%, and was therefore also counted as a treatment failure. The cost of homeopathic treatment was 41% of projected equivalent conventional treatment.
Good news then for enthusiasts of homeopathy? 91% improvement!
Yet, I am afraid that critics might not be bowled over. They might smell a whiff of selection bias, lament the lack of a control group or regret the absence of objective outcome measures. But I was prepared to go as far as stating that such results might be quite interesting… until I read the authors’ conclusions that is:
Polarity Analysis is an effective method for treating multimorbidity. The multitude of symptoms does not prevent the method from achieving good results. Homeopathy may be capable of taking over a considerable proportion of the treatment of multimorbid patients, at lower costs than conventional medicine.
Virtually nothing in these conclusions is based on the data provided. They are pure extrapolation and wild assumptions. Two questions seem to emerge from this:
- How on earth can we take this and so many other articles on homeopathy seriously?
- When does this sort of article cross the line between wishful thinking and scientific misconduct?
Yesterday, The Hinckley Times published a report on Parliament’s foremost medical expert which I take the liberty of reproducing below in a slightly shortened version.
Alternative therapy proponent David Tredinnick has pitched in with the possibility of complementary practitioners being the solution to the current A&E crisis. The Tory MP for Bosworth raised the issue with the Department of Health saying: “To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what assessment he has made of the potential contribution of regulated complementary and alternative medical practitioners to reducing demands on the NHS.” The question came against the backdrop of the nation’s casualty departments being swamped with new cases since Christmas.
Despite Mr Tredinnick’s pleas his faith in less mainstream medical care was not supported by Government health chiefs. In a written answer to the former Grenadier Guardsman, the Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for Health, Daniel Poulter, said: “Practitioners of complementary and alternative medicines are not subject to statutory regulation. A working group has been established to consider a number of matters relating to the use of herbal and traditional medicines by practitioners. I know my hon. Friend is a member of this working group. “The findings of the working group will be published in due course, once it has finished its work. Until that working group has reported, no assessment can be made of the contribution of such practitioners to reducing demands on the National Health Service.”
Just days before in the House of Commons, Mr Tredinnick was apparently slapped down by a fellow Conservative MP and GP Sarah Wollaston when he called for a homeopathic flu vaccine to be given to people at risk this winter. Making the suggestion in his role as a member of the Health Select Committee he was rebuked by Mrs Wollaston, the chairman of the group, who distanced herself and said she would “personally be horrified” if his view was taken up.
Mr Tredinnick’s Liberal Democrat opponent councillor Michael Mullaney, said: “Dr Sarah Wollaston is a highly respected GP and Conservative MP whose background in the health service makes her someone who should be listened to on health issues. Unlike Mr Tredinnick, who has no formal medical training, yet constantly tries to tell doctors how to do their job. “If even Dr Wollaston, a fellow Conservative MP, is saying David Tredinnick is wrong and should be ignored, it is time he listened and stopped opening his mouth on things he knows nothing about. Mr Tredinnick has told doctors not to operate on a full moon and told GPs to use patients’ horoscopes when they come for consultations. With his way out views, Mr Tredinnick is increasingly becoming a joke even to his fellow Conservative MPs. How can he represent the people of Hinckley and Bosworth when even his own fellow Conservative MPs are condemning his views?”
Cllr Mullaney’s remarks relate to an episode in the Commons in October 2009 when Mr Tredinnick said blood didn’t clot when there was a full moon and more recently when the MP advocated the integration of astrology into the NHS.
I am deeply saddened by this unfair opposition to my friend Tredinnick. Finally, we have someone in Parliament who shows us a way out of the crisis and all we can do is to slap him down! Just think how much we could gain from his innovations:
- crystal healers and Reiki masters could take the pressure off A+E departments throughout the country;
- homeopathic vaccinations would protect us all from Ebola and other nasty infections;
- astrology could replace expensive screening programs which are of disputed value anyway.
I find it truly depressing to realise that we live in a time where great visionaries like Tredinnick are viciously belittled and their progressive messages ignored. We certainly do this at our very own peril! To me it is clear that none other than BIG PHARMA is behind this deplorable development.
I for one urge the good citizens of Bosworth to continue voting for this genius, and I vow to plead with the next prime minister to make Tredinnick secretary of health – this shrewd move would significantly strengthen the Tory’s effort to save out National Health Service for the benefit of us all.
Few subjects lead to such heated debate as the risk of stroke after chiropractic manipulations (if you think this is an exaggeration, look at the comment sections of previous posts on this subject). Almost invariably, one comes to the conclusion that more evidence would be helpful for arriving at firmer conclusions. Before this background, this new publication by researchers (mostly chiropractors) from the US ‘Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice’ is noteworthy.
The purpose of this study was to quantify the risk of stroke after chiropractic spinal manipulation, as compared to evaluation by a primary care physician, for Medicare beneficiaries aged 66 to 99 years with neck pain.
The researchers conducted a retrospective cohort analysis of a 100% sample of annualized Medicare claims data on 1 157 475 beneficiaries aged 66 to 99 years with an office visit to either a chiropractor or to a primary care physician for neck pain. They compared hazard of vertebrobasilar stroke and any stroke at 7 and 30 days after office visit using a Cox proportional hazards model. We used direct adjusted survival curves to estimate cumulative probability of stroke up to 30 days for the 2 cohorts.
The findings indicate that the proportion of subjects with a stroke of any type in the chiropractic cohort was 1.2 per 1000 at 7 days and 5.1 per 1000 at 30 days. In the primary care cohort, the proportion of subjects with a stroke of any type was 1.4 per 1000 at 7 days and 2.8 per 1000 at 30 days. In the chiropractic cohort, the adjusted risk of stroke was significantly lower at 7 days as compared to the primary care cohort (hazard ratio, 0.39; 95% confidence interval, 0.33-0.45), but at 30 days, a slight elevation in risk was observed for the chiropractic cohort (hazard ratio, 1.10; 95% confidence interval, 1.01-1.19).
The authors conclude that, among Medicare B beneficiaries aged 66 to 99 years with neck pain, incidence of vertebrobasilar stroke was extremely low. Small differences in risk between patients who saw a chiropractor and those who saw a primary care physician are probably not clinically significant.
I do, of course, applaud any new evidence on this rather ‘hot’ topic – but is it just me, or are the above conclusions a bit odd? Five strokes per 1000 patients is definitely not “extremely low” in my book; and furthermore I do wonder whether all experts would agree that a doubling of risk at 30 days in the chiropractic cohort is “probably not clinically significant” – particularly, if we consider that chiropractic spinal manipulation has so very little proven benefit.
My message to (chiropractic) researchers is simple: PLEASE REMEMBER THAT SCIENCE IS NOT A TOOL FOR CONFIRMING BUT FOR TESTING HYPOTHESES.
During the next few weeks, I will post several short excerpts from my new book ‘A SCIENTIST IN WONDERLAND‘. Its subtitle already discloses much of what it is all about: ‘A MEMOIRE OF SEARCHING THE TRUTH AND FINDING TROUBLE’.
Some of my critics are likely to claim that I engage in this form of ‘promotion’ because I want to maximise my income by enticing my readers to buy the book. This is partly true, of course: after having worked very hard on this book for about 5 years, I want it to be read (but, at the same time, my critics would be mistaken: I do not expect to get rich on my new book – I am not that naïve; this ‘memoire’ will never be found in any best-seller list, I am sure). So, I suggest (if you do not want me to profit in any way) that you read my memoire after you got it from your library (which obviously would not affect my cash-flow all that much).
So here it is: with much trepidation and even more excitement I present to you the very first, short excerpt (as I said, there will be more).
Prelude
There are some people, a fortunate few, who seem to know from an early age where they want to go in life, and have no trouble getting there.
I was not one of them. I was born in Germany in the years immediately following the end of World War II and, like many German children of that era, I was acutely aware of the awkwardness and unease that my elders displayed when it came to discussions that touched on the country’s recent history. Even as a young boy, I was conscious that there was a large and restive skeleton in the nation’s closet, and that it belonged to all of us – even to those of us who had not been alive during the Nazi era were somehow nevertheless its legatees, inextricably bound to it simply by the awareness of its existence.
With time, the growing realization that so many of our peers – teachers, uncles, aunts; perhaps even our own parents – had lent their assent, or worse, their enthusiastic assistance to the Nazi regime robbed their generation of its moral authority and left us, their children, unmoored and adrift.
In a profound sense I felt homeless. An accident of fate had landed me on the planet with a German passport, and with German as my mother tongue, but where did I really belong? Where would I go? What would I do with my life?
There had been physicians in my family for generations and there was always an expectation that I, too, would enter that profession. Yet I felt no strong pull towards medicine. As a young man my only real passion was music, particularly jazz, with its anarchic improvisations and disobedient rhythms; and the fact that it had been banned by the Nazis only made it all the more appealing to me. I would have been perfectly happy to linger indefinitely in the world of music, but eventually, like a debt come due, medicine summoned me, and I surrendered myself to the profession of my forebears.
In hindsight I am glad that my mother nudged me gently yet insistently in the direction of medical school. While music has delighted and comforted me throughout my life, it has been medicine that has truly defined me, stretching, challenging and nourishing me intellectually, even as it tested me on a personal level almost to the limits of my endurance.
Certainly, I had never anticipated that asking basic and necessary questions as a scientist might prove so fiercely controversial, and that as a result of my research I might become involved in ideological wrangling and political intrigue emanating from the highest level.
If I had known the difficulties I would face, the stark choices, the conflicts and machinations that awaited me, would I have chosen to spend my life in medicine? Yes, I would. Becoming a physician and pursuing the career of a scientist has afforded me not only the opportunity to speak out against the dangerous and growing influence of pseudoscience in medicine, but also, paradoxically, has given me both the reason and the courage to look back steadily at the unbearable past.
This is the story of how I finally found where I belong.
Guest post by Louise Lubetkin
(A SCIENTIST IN WONDERLAND: A MEMOIRE OF SEARCHING FOR TRUTH AND FINDING TROUBLE has now been published. An apt opportunity perhaps to post a letter and comment from the person who helped me GREATLY in finishing it.)
People write memoirs for a variety of reasons but perhaps one of the strongest impelling forces is the need to make sense of one’s own experiences. It is not surprising that you, who spent your entire professional career searching for explanations, identifying associations and parsing correlations, found yourself looking at your own life with the same analytical curiosity. Memoir is in many respects a natural choice in this regard.
That you chose to undertake a profoundly personal inventory at this juncture is also understandable in human terms. Retirement, whether anticipated and planned for, or (as in your case) thrust rudely upon you, reorders one’s sense of identity in ways that cannot fail to prompt reflection. It would have been surprising had you not felt an urge to look back and take stock, to trace the narrative arc of your life from its beginnings in post-war Germany all the way to the quiet house in rural Suffolk where you now sit, surrounded by the comfort of books and the accumulated paraphernalia of a life spent digging and delving in search of the building blocks of truth.
Given the contentious circumstances surrounding your departure from academic life, it is quite likely that you will be asked whether your decision to write a memoir was driven, at least in part, by a desire to settle scores. I think you can dismiss such a question unhesitatingly. You have no scores to settle: you came to England after a steady and unbroken ascent to the apex of your professional career, voluntarily leaving behind a position that most people would regard with envy and deference. You were never a supplicant at Exeter’s door; far from it. The fact that things went inexorably downhill over the course of your 20 years’ tenure there, and ended so deplorably, is not a reflection on you, your department, or the quality or quantity of work you turned out. Rather, it is a reflection on the very nature of the work you went there to do – and if there is any message in your memoir, it is this:
Alternative medicine is not, at its heart, a logical enterprise, and its adherents are not committed to – nor even interested in – a rational evaluation of their methods. Rather, alternative medicine is primarily an ideological position, a political credo, a reaction against mainstream medicine. To many of its adherents and impassioned advocates, its appeal lies not in any demonstrable therapeutic efficacy but in its perceived outsider status as the countercultural medicine, the medicine for Everyman, the David to the bullying medical-pharmaceutical Goliath. That your research work would elicit howls of protest was perhaps inevitable, given the threat it posed to the profitable and powerful alternative medicine industry. But it didn’t stop there: astonishingly, your work drew the ire of none less than the meddlesome heir apparent to the British throne. Prince Charles’ attempts to stymie your work call to mind the twelfth century martyr Thomas à Becket, of whom Henry II reputedly cried: “Oh, who will rid me of this turbulent priest?” (Henry’s sycophantic henchmen were quick to oblige, dispatching the hapless cleric on the steps of Canterbury cathedral.)
It’s clear that you were acutely aware, as a young man growing up in Germany, that science was not immune to the corrupting influence of political ideology, and that the German medical profession had entered – enthusiastically – into a Faustian compact with the Nazi regime. You have exhibited a courageous insistence on confronting and examining a national past that has at times felt like an intensely personal burden to you. It is ironic that in going to sleepy Exeter in an earnest, conscious attempt to shake off the constricting, intrigue-ridden atmosphere of academic Vienna, you ultimately found yourself once again mired in a struggle against the influence of ideology and the manipulation of science for political ends.
You went to Exeter strictly as a scientist, a skilled inquirer, a methodical investigator, expecting to be able to bring the rigors of logic and the scientific method to bear on an area of medical practice that had until then not been subjected to any kind of systematic evaluation. Instead, you were caught in a maelstrom of intrigue far worse than that which you had gratefully left behind in Vienna, buffeted and bruised by forces against which a lesser man would surely not have had the fortitude to push back so long and so hard.
On 1/12/2014 I published a post in which I offered to give lectures to students of alternative medicine:
Getting good and experienced lecturers for courses is not easy. Having someone who has done more research than most working in the field and who is internationally known, might therefore be a thrill for students and an image-boosting experience of colleges. In the true Christmas spirit, I am today making the offer of being of assistance to the many struggling educational institutions of alternative medicine .
A few days ago, I tweeted about my willingness to give free lectures to homeopathic colleges (so far without response). Having thought about it a bit, I would now like to extend this offer. I would be happy to give a free lecture to the students of any educational institution of alternative medicine.
I did not think that this would create much interest – and I was right: only the ANGLO-EUROPEAN COLLEGE OF CHIROPRACTIC has so far hoisted me on my own petard and, after some discussion (see comment section of the original post) hosted me for a lecture. Several people seem keen on knowing how this went; so here is a brief report.
I was received, on 14/1/2015, with the utmost kindness by my host David Newell. We has a coffee and a chat and then it was time to start the lecture. The hall was packed with ~150 students and the same number was listening in a second lecture hall to which my talk was being transmitted.
We had agreed on the title CHIROPRACTIC: FALLACIES AND FACTS. So, after telling the audience about my professional background, I elaborated on 7 fallacies:
- Appeal to tradition
- Appeal to authority
- Appeal to popularity
- Subluxation exists
- Spinal manipulation is effective
- Spinal manipulation is safe
- Ad hominem attack
Numbers 3, 5 and 6 were dealt with in more detail than the rest. The organisers had asked me to finish by elaborating on what I perceive as the future challenges of chiropractic; so I did:
- Stop happily promoting bogus treatments
- Denounce obsolete concepts like ‘subluxation’
- Clarify differences between chiros, osteos and physios
- Start a culture of critical thinking
- Take action against charlatans in your ranks
- Stop attacking everyone who voices criticism
I ended by pointing out that the biggest challenge, in my view, was to “demonstrate with rigorous science which chiropractic treatments demonstrably generate more good than harm for which condition”.
We had agreed that my lecture would be followed by half an hour of discussion; this period turned out to be lively and had to be extended to a full hour. Most questions initially came from the tutors rather than the students, and most were polite – I had expected much more aggression.
In his email thanking me for coming to Bournemouth, David Newell wrote about the event: The general feedback from staff and students was one of relief that you possessed only one head, :-). I hope you may have felt the same about us. You came over as someone who had strong views, a fair amount of which we disagreed with, but that presented them in a calm, informative and courteous manner as we did in listening and discussing issues after your talk. I think everyone enjoyed the questions and debate and felt that some of the points you made were indeed fair critique of what the profession may need to do, to secure a more inclusive role in the health care arena.
My own impression of the day is that some of my messages were not really understood, that some of the questions, including some from the tutors, seemed like coming from a different planet, and that people were more out to teach me than to learn from my talk. One overall impression that I took home from that day is that, even in this college which prides itself of being open to scientific evidence and unimpressed by chiropractic fundamentalism, students are strangely different from other health care professionals. The most tangible aspect of this is the openly hostile attitude against drug therapies voiced during the discussion by some students.
The question I always ask myself after having invested a lot of time in preparing and delivering a lecture is: WAS IT WORTH IT? In the case of this lecture, I think the answer is YES. With 300 students present, I am fairly confident that I did manage to stimulate a tiny bit of critical thinking in a tiny percentage of them. The chiropractic profession needs this badly!
According to the ‘General Osteopathic Council’ (GOC), osteopathy is a primary care profession, focusing on the diagnosis, treatment, prevention and rehabilitation of musculoskeletal disorders, and the effects of these conditions on patients’ general health.
Using many of the diagnostic procedures applied in conventional medical assessment, osteopaths seek to restore the optimal functioning of the body, where possible without the use of drugs or surgery. Osteopathy is based on the principle that the body has the ability to heal, and osteopathic care focuses on strengthening the musculoskeletal systems to treat existing conditions and to prevent illness.
Osteopaths’ patient-centred approach to health and well-being means they consider symptoms in the context of the patient’s full medical history, as well as their lifestyle and personal circumstances. This holistic approach ensures that all treatment is tailored to the individual patient.
On a good day, such definitions make me smile; on a bad day, they make me angry. I can think of quite a few professions which would fit this definition just as well or better than osteopathy. What are we supposed to think about a profession that is not even able to provide an adequate definition of itself?
Perhaps I try a different angle: what conditions do osteopaths treat? The GOC informs us that commonly treated conditions include back and neck pain, postural problems, sporting injuries, muscle and joint deterioration, restricted mobility and occupational ill-health.
This statement seems not much better than the previous one. What on earth is ‘muscle and joint deterioration’? It is not a condition that I find in any medical dictionary or textbook. Can anyone think of a broader term than ‘occupational ill health’? This could be anything from tennis elbow to allergies or depression. Do osteopaths treat all of those?
One gets the impression that osteopaths and their GOC are deliberately vague – perhaps because this would diminish the risk of being held to account on any specific issue?
The more one looks into the subject of osteopathy, the more confused one gets. The profession goes back to Andrew Still ((August 6, 1828 – December 12, 1917) Palmer, the founder of chiropractic is said to have been one of Still’s pupils and seems to have ‘borrowed’ most of his concepts from him – even though he always denied this) who defined osteopathy as a science which consists of such exact exhaustive and verifiable knowledge of the structure and functions of the human mechanism, anatomy and physiology & psychology including the chemistry and physics of its known elements as is made discernable certain organic laws and resources within the body itself by which nature under scientific treatment peculiar to osteopathic practice apart from all ordinary methods of extraneous, artificial & medicinal stimulation and in harmonious accord with its own mechanical principles, molecular activities and metabolic processes may recover from displacements, derangements, disorganizations and consequent diseases and regain its normal equilibrium of form and function in health and strength.
This and many other of his statements seem to indicate that the art of using language for obfuscation has a long tradition in osteopathy and goes back directly to its founding father.
What makes the subject of osteopathy particularly confusing is not just the oddity that, in conventional medicine, the term means ‘disease of the bone’ (which renders any literature searches in this area a nightmare) but also the fact that, in different countries, osteopaths are entirely different professionals. In the US, osteopathy has long been fully absorbed by mainstream medicine and there is hardly any difference between MDs and ODs. In the UK, osteopaths are alternative practitioners regulated by statute but are, compared to chiropractors, of minor importance. In Germany, osteopaths are not regulated and fairly ‘low key’, while in France, they are numerous and like to see themselves as primary care physicians.
And what about the evidence base of osteopathy? Well, that’s even more confusing, in my view. Evidence for which treatment? As US osteopaths might use any therapy from drugs to surgery, it could get rather complicated. So let’s just focus on the manual treatment as used by osteopaths outside the US.
Anyone who attempts to critically evaluate the published trial evidence in this area will be struck by at least two phenomena:
- the wide range of conditions treated with osteopathic manual therapy (OMT)
- the fact that there are several groups of researchers that produce one positive result after the next.
The best example is probably the exceedingly productive research team of J. C. Licciardone from the Osteopathic Research Center, University of North Texas. Here are a few conclusions from their clinical studies:
- The large effect size for OMT in providing substantial pain reduction in patients with chronic LBP of high severity was associated with clinically important improvement in back-specific functioning. Thus, OMT may be an attractive option in such patients before proceeding to more invasive and costly treatments.
- The large effect size for short-term efficacy of OMT was driven by stable responders who did not relapse.
- Osteopathic manual treatment has medium to large treatment effects in preventing progressive back-specific dysfunction during the third trimester of pregnancy. The findings are potentially important with respect to direct health care expenditures and indirect costs of work disability during pregnancy.
- Severe somatic dysfunction was present significantly more often in patients with diabetes mellitus than in patients without diabetes mellitus. Patients with diabetes mellitus who received OMT had significant reductions in LBP severity during the 12-week period. Decreased circulating levels of TNF-α may represent a possible mechanism for OMT effects in patients with diabetes mellitus. A larger clinical trial of patients with diabetes mellitus and comorbid chronic LBP is warranted to more definitively assess the efficacy and mechanisms of action of OMT in this population.
- The OMT regimen met or exceeded the Cochrane Back Review Group criterion for a medium effect size in relieving chronic low back pain. It was safe, parsimonious, and well accepted by patients.
- Osteopathic manipulative treatment slows or halts the deterioration of back-specific functioning during the third trimester of pregnancy.
- The only consistent finding in this study was an association between type 2 diabetes mellitus and tissue changes at T11-L2 on the right side. Potential explanations for this finding include reflex viscerosomatic changes directly related to the progression of type 2 diabetes mellitus, a spurious association attributable to confounding visceral diseases, or a chance observation unrelated to type 2 diabetes mellitus. Larger prospective studies are needed to better study osteopathic palpatory findings in type 2 diabetes mellitus.
- OMT significantly reduces low back pain. The level of pain reduction is greater than expected from placebo effects alone and persists for at least three months. Additional research is warranted to elucidate mechanistically how OMT exerts its effects, to determine if OMT benefits are long lasting, and to assess the cost-effectiveness of OMT as a complementary treatment for low back pain.
Based on this brief review of the evidence origination from one of the most active research team, one could be forgiven to think that osteopathy is a panacea. But such an assumption is, of course, nonsensical; a more reasonable conclusion might be the following: osteopathy is one of the most confusing and confused subject under the already confused umbrella of alternative medicine.
