Which medicine, “does not cure better“,
– a conventional medicine, prescribed by your doctor and purchased at a pharmacy, or
– an alternative medicine, purchased at a pharmacy or health food store, or
– a homeopathic medicine, purchased at an alternative health clinic or
– a placebo? Continue reading
Why don’t we know the causes of our disease? Today, most adults have a disease or two. According to the US Centers For Disease Control, “As of 2012, about half of all adults—117 million people—had one or more chronic health conditions. One in four adults had two or more chronic health conditions.… Seven of the top 10 causes of death in 2014 were chronic diseases.” More than half of US citizens have, not just a disease, but a chronic disease. Older adults might have two, or three diseases.
What is the cause of your disease? Why don’t you know? Think about it.
Continue reading
What is the true cause of a placebo effects? Webster’s dictionary provides a not-cause, but no cause: “improvement in the condition of a patient that occurs in response to treatment but cannot be considered due to the specific treatment used“.
Oxford’s dictionary offers a similar definition, but suggests a cause “A beneficial effect produced by a placebo drug or treatment, which cannot be attributed to the properties of the placebo itself and must therefore be due to the patient’s belief in that treatment“.
Is Oxford’s dictionary right? Are the patient’s beliefs the ‘true cause’ of a placebo effect? Let’s look at the logic. First, what is NOT the cause of a placebo effect?
Dictionaries agree, Webseter: “cannot be considered due to the specific treatment used“, Oxford: “cannot be attributed to the properties of the placebo itself“. Continue reading
On November 15th, the US/FDA announced a new policy for homeopathic drugs. You can read the press release here if you like. They US/FDA has announced that for homeopathic medicines,”Efficacy and Safety Claims Are Held to Same Standard as Other OTC Drug Claims” Is this good news?
It might be good news, if the efficacy and safety claim standards for other OTC drugs were useful. It might be good news, if the standard efficacy and safety claim standards for other OTC drugs made sense.
Note: This post has been entirely re-written, updated to the current concepts of healthicine and cures. You can see the up to date version here.
Our medical systems do not study health and hardly study illness, preferring the concept of ‘disease’, which is controlled by the medical profession. As a result, there are no useful definitions of health or illness to be found in medical reference texts. There is also no simple definition of disease. We can only say that “a disease is what a doctor diagnoses“. It is sometimes said that “A patient visits a doctor with an illness, and goes home with a disease.” Continue reading
