"Health Freedom"

Good quote, LP.  All healthcare treatments should submit to the same burden of proof.

The government should stay completely out of the "alternative health industry".  Let the folks decide what they want to put in their bodies or take as medicine.  If a company is fraudulent, victims can sue.  Otherwise, hands-off Mr. Harper!

polly bee wrote:

[tongue in cheek]  Luckily there is a clear and concise dividing line, and the scientificky treatments have all been proven beyond a doubt to be beneficial and harmless.  [/tongue in cheek]

 

 

Actually the bunkum you can pick up at your local supplement shop is not held to as rigorous a standard as pharmaceuticals, so long as they print a "quack miranda" on the back of the label in teeny, tiny text. 

May I recommend "Bad Science", by Ben Goldacre?  He talks about what's wrong with both alt med and big pharma - doesn't give anybody a pass and talks about exactly the kind of comment you just made.  Big pharma bad = everybody else good.  Funny thing, they're the same damn parent company most of the time, and they don't give a shit whether you spend your money on the stuff that might work or the stuff that doesn't have a hope in hell of working, so long as your money ends up in their pockets.

If I'm not mistaken, you can buy some Valerian if you're having trouble sleeping, or some Echinacea if you have a cold, or even some compounded water with a memory, if you believe in that.   None of these are banned, or even restricted, substances.

So what are they really demanding?  Obviously not Valerian, Echinacea, "magical memory water" or any of the dozens and dozens of alternative remedies currently available. 

Okay, there is good medicine in European-based science, in various other (North American, South American, African, Asian and Australian - all different) traditional treatments, and in the herb-lore that informs all of their aphothecaries.

There is bad medicine in modern chemistry as well. And there is plenty of bad medicine in modern quackery, whether it pretends to be traditional, native, spiritual or scientific.

Most practitioners of one style of medicine are unfamiliar with the principles - let alone the details! - of those s/he did not study. No layman can be expected to judge the claims of all these different schools, nor to choose the most appropriate treatment, especially if it comes from another culture.

What would be a fair and effective means of weeding out quackery - the the fraudulent and harmful - while retaining the various forms of good medicine?

(I mean, short of letting them buy whatever they want, die, become paralyzed, kidney-damaged, poxy or impotent, and sue?)

Quote:

What would be a fair and effective means of weeding out quackery - the the fraudulent and harmful - while retaining the various forms of good medicine?

Start with the harmful. The ineffective stuff will eventually weed itself out.

I would assume that would mean testing of any product for sale in Canada, and perhaps warning labels for mild or moderate side effects.

Quote:

What about procedures? Just about everything doctors do can hurt some patient, and doctors are not always entirely up-front about the bad stuff that might happen.

What about the whole healthcare system? The rate of hospital and other iatrogenic aquired infections is shockingly high. What does "safe" even mean in terms of health/wellnesscare?

Quote:

Nobody is going to ante up with those same big bucks to run trials on something they cannot personally guarantee a financial return on - like comfrey, mullein, mint, feverfew, or other plants which some people choose to use in a medical way.

Are any of these currently illegal to grow or sell? I'm thinking, for example, that mint might get grandfathered with regard to costly clinical trials.

Quote:

What about procedures?

A fair question, but I don't think this proposed Act has anything to do with them.

And I'm still a bit confused as to what the Health Freedom folk are really after. It's not the decriminalization of mint.

Le T wrote:

What about the whole healthcare system? The rate of hospital and other iatrogenic aquired infections is shockingly high. What does "safe" even mean in terms of health/wellnesscare?

There is a lot of talk about those problems - some of it even useful, meaningful and optimistic. We have a damn good health-care system. I'm for making it better, and more inclusive, not restricting it more.

@ Le T

Actually I am more interested in the legislation. I have no doubt that there are some flakes and people with their own agenda on both sides of the debate.

And yes, C-36 allows for prohibition in the case of  "potential" danger. That can mean a lot of things.

absentia wrote:

Le T wrote:

I was talking about whether the way that we organize healthcare in terms of how "safe" it is could be problematic. Is it really "damn good" or is it more like the best that we can do given the restraints of certain stakeholders?

Yes, it is damn good. I have recent personal experience and no hesitation in praising our health-care system. Of course it could be better if we spent more money - but money isn't the only obstacle to improvement: there is the usual array of human frailties. Nobody can make those go away altogether, but some well-meaning and clever people are working on it.

Plus it depends on what you mean by safety. I know there are plenty of competent people working very hard within our health care system, but the fact is the only times anyone in my family has been injured or almost killed it was by an approved drug which was used wrong and without the proper warnings. So quality controls are no assurance of safety. And as a matter of fact, when it involved powerful drugs it is even more risky than a less potent or refined medicine.

But I think part of what we are talking about (some people are talking about it, anyway) is limiting or getting rid of healthcare modalities that aren't taught in medical school.

I would have thought the medical system might have learned that they don't have a monopoly on health and healing when it was demonstrated that there were more complications in hospitals than there are with home births, that modalities like massage or lymphatic drainage can sometimes do as well or better than treatment with drugs, or with the medical marijuana lobby kicking their way back in the door.

I guess not.

Lord Palmerston wrote:

This statement in particular:  "And there are actually some - not as many as we need, yet - medical practitioners who are open to ideas that are old, new, different or unexpected"

The implication here being that medical practitioners need to be more "open minded" towards alternative medicine, etc.  That's how it reads to me.

How about being open to old ideas that don't generate revenue? When a patient in Canada goes to a doctor for high blood pressure, they are prescribed medicine  (vasotec, capoten, accupril, diovan, avapro, beta blockers) for hypertension.  That is it, the whole visit, thank you see you in the OR down the road.  Do you know what all those meds have in common?  NONE of them treat the underlyiing disease, they simply treat symptoms.

That patient is not told that it is most likely their own lifestyle creating the problem.  That patient is not told that a fat-free or vegetarian diet may be beneficial (or may cure) the high blood pressure.  That patient is not told to get off their ass and exercise.  That patient is not counselled for stress, or to lose a few pounds.  Just pat them on the head, write them a scrip and on to the next guy.  We'll see you again when you stroke.... It's criminal.

But for sure, its scientificky.  Doctors typically get less than a few weeks training -  in their entire curriculum - on nutrition.  Yet we trust them to make these terribly important decisions on our behalf.

"Doctor, I am thinking of adopting a low fat vegan diet".....Physician:  "Oh, no!  You will be protein deficient.  Here, take some pills.. and if you really want to lose weight try the atkins approach"....jeeebus.  Even the Atkins's won't try the Atkins method.

A whole country full of obese hyper tensive patients and we can't figure out that the status quo is all fucked up.  It's scary.

@ LP

That is a fun article, though it is kind of over the top.

I think pollybee hit the nail on the head with the nutritional root of many ailments. What good does it do to treat symptoms and acute conditions and not look for underlying conditions like poor nutrition, lack of sleep, bad posture or stress that can leave a person open to illness?

I spoke with a man some years back who was told by his doctors he would be crippled and in a wheelchair from arthritis (this was before the days when joint replacements were common). Instead, he did some investigating himself and looked for mechanical aids and dietary triggers - acidic foods and wine - which aggravated his arthritis. As of the time I spoke with him, 1986, he was walking and his hands were working.

And again, the (thankfully reversed) trend of turning childbirth into a disease is a case of medicine overcomplicating something (and no, I am not saying that monitoring for high-risk pregnancies is a bad thing).

Likewise the recent trend of treating childhood behaviour as a disease and medicating children (boys in particular) because they won't learn the way the school system thinks they are supposed to.

Or using drugs for pain or treatment when less-invasive techniques work fine. Lymph drainage rather than drugs. Massage rather than painkillers. Magnesium and electrolytes instead of painkillers for muscle pain.

A final, very simple and personal example: I think I mentioned once already that recenty my father was told he could not eat bananas (one of his favourite foods) because of the potassium in them. Once his kidney condition was stabilized the doctor did not tell him it was okay to eat bananas; instead he prescribed potassium pills. Would it not be simpler to figure out the amount of potassium by weight in a banana (what are those nutritional guides for, after all?) and prescribe that instead?

Once it gets to the point where doctors are prescribing drugs to treat the side effects of other drugs I think it might be a good time to ask if there is not a simpler and easier way.

@ Le T

Yes, I think it is important to keep the focus on the government and it's legislation, rather than the legitimacy or illegitimacy of one group which says it opposes it. Whatever this group is, they are not the only people questioning these bills.

The most established alternative health organization I am aware of is the Natural Health Practitioners of Canada:

www.nhpcanada.org

I also just remembered that two people I know have recently gotten treatment for sleep disorders - wearing a mask to ensure they get enough oxygen. This has meant that both of them have been able to get completely off the drugs they were taking for stress, panic attacks and physical complaints that disappeared once they started to get uninterrupted deep sleep.

It's not that I don't recognize that often the simpler and truly effective solution isn't often to be found through western medicine. It's just that some doctors who work in that system don't make the effort to find those solutions.

6079_Smith_W wrote:

I also just remembered that two people I know have recently gotten treatment for sleep disorders - wearing a mask to ensure they get enough oxygen....It's just that some doctors who work in that system don't make the effort to find those solutions.

It's a huge problem, and there are various reasons why this happens (workload/burnout/ the way doctors are compensated).

My "open to ideas" comment in #23 seems to have gone a bit off the rails. Open means just that, and no more. It does not mean accept everything uncritically. Quite the contrary. When mainstream western doctors tested marijuana in a clinical setting, they found it effective and included it in their repertoire. The more you know, the more good you can do, right? Some doctors hear reports, read up on ingredients and regimens, ask questions, examine patients, try things and test stuff. That's open. Some doctors dismiss out of hand everything that wasn't invented by a European in the 20th century. That's closed.

One result of a closed medical community is that many patients from other cultures will go to practitioners of their own ethnic background... even if those practitioners are incompetent or fraudulent. If there is no responsible, informed body that recognizes those traditional treatments, who will certify the practitioners - who will protect those patients? And the Western patients who are, for one reason or another, dissatisfied with mainstream medicine and want to try an alternative? They may well end up seeing a charlatan (or fool) who has only superficial acquaintance with eastern or native healing. 

Alternatives exist; they can't be eradicated. Some are good, some are bad. They don't all need to be accepted or brought into mainstream medical practice. They do need to be examined, tested, standardized, licensed, regulated - brought under informed public control.

polly bee wrote:

How about being open to old ideas that don't generate revenue? When a patient in Canada goes to a doctor for high blood pressure, they are prescribed medicine  (vasotec, capoten, accupril, diovan, avapro, beta blockers) for hypertension.  That is it, the whole visit, thank you see you in the OR down the road.  Do you know what all those meds have in common?  NONE of them treat the underlyiing disease, they simply treat symptoms.

That patient is not told that it is most likely their own lifestyle creating the problem.  That patient is not told that a fat-free or vegetarian diet may be beneficial (or may cure) the high blood pressure.  That patient is not told to get off their ass and exercise.  That patient is not counselled for stress, or to lose a few pounds.  Just pat them on the head, write them a scrip and on to the next guy.  We'll see you again when you stroke.... It's criminal.

As a hypertension patient I can most certainly tell you that exercise is highly encouraged as well as a change of diet and I was sent to a dietitian to help with that. That said, the drugs are still needed if the blood pressure you started out with is above a certain level or if the lifestyle changes don't reduce it enough. 

So when evidence based medicine is administered poorly, or the science behind it is faulty, or the side effects are intolerable; this is considered being poorly served by mainstream medicine.  But when alternative treatments are administered poorly, or the science behind them is faulty, or they triggers intolerable side effects; this is considered dangerous nonsense.  Why does "mainstream medicine" get a pass on the dangerous nonsense label?  It would seem that according to NRK's post, it goes well beyond that at times.

Plus, alternative therapies are only dangerous when a person does not recognize when he or she has a condition that should be treated by a medical doctor. Both our kids were born in hospital, and we have gotten most immunizations, so I wouldn't consider myself an enemy of western medicine - though I am, with good reason, sceptical of it.

Given that, I don't consider it dangerous at all if I choose to use things like reiki, cranialsacral therapy, or homeopathic remedies in specific situations where they appear to work consistently, even though I know there is no medical evidence that they do.

They aren''t likely to put me into a coma, which is what nearly happened to my father when his doctor neglected to tell him that the glyburide he was taking would build up in his system.

On the other hand, when he was a kid he was saved by a bread poultice from blood poisoning which had already run a black streak up his leg.

Similarly, a friend of mine had a bowel infection which would not go away after he returned from Asia. It remained uncured for the better part of a year until he finally went to a doctor of Traditional Chinese Medicine.

Or maybe it was just return to mean.

I think part of the problem is that some people on both sides of the debate think this is a question of having to choose either alternative or western modalities.

And further, what people call "alternative medicine" covers a lot of ground from outright scams to therapies that have no evidence, a conflicting evidence, to treatments that are every bit as solid as what they teach in medical school.

.

polly b wrote:

Why does "mainstream medicine" get a pass on the dangerous nonsense label?

In fact it does not.  There are all sorts of checks and balances on the medical/pharmaceutical system.  Doctors with bad prescribing habits lose their licences or are forced to take remedial courses at their own expense.  Every week in my inbox I get alerts and warnings about products that have unforeseen adverse effects, or don't contain what the label says.  Earlier this year I was called in by my college, chosen at random to do a test of my drug knowledge in order to keep my licence.  The reason we know about dangerous drugs like, say, Vioxx, is because of all the checks on the medical system.  

People opposing Bill C51 & C6 want alternative health products to be exempt from the same rigorous standards as mainstream medical products.  So they'll say, come buy our products because they're safe and effective, unlike those dangerous mainstream medicine products.  But they don't want to subject their products to the same level of scrutiny.

Lord Palmerston wrote:

Since there seems to be a lot of anti-psychiatry sentiment on babble, why not start a thread about it?

I mention psychiatry because my education and experience is in the mental health field and psychiatry is the area of medicine that I am most familiar with. Psychiatry is considered to be evidence-based, scientific, empirically validated medical discipline by the medical establishment. Despite the fact that its theoretical underpinning of chemical imbalance theories have been demonstrated to be false and its practices shown to be harmful it is an excepted part of traditional western medicine. Psychiatry is instructive because although it has status and is excepted as a scientific discipline in reality it maintains all the aspects of quackery that are denounced in the so-called alternatives. The question remains why does conventional western medicine fiercely denounce one while excepting the other within their ranks?

The problem I see with threads like this is that they almost always start with a binary. Usually the binary consists of an idealized and fictitious presentation of traditional western medicine compared against the construction of the “alternative” which are dismissed as “dangerous quakery”. Even by pointing out the construction of this binary, and the underlying cultural narratives and assumptions is to invite denunciation. From the beginning the either/or prevails. If you question the assumptions that exist within the framework of conventional western medicine therefore must be supporting pseudo science or quackery. Or perhaps even worse a post modernist.

Let me be clear as to the use of the term Conventional western medicine. I use the term because within this dominant narrative there exists historical epistemological and cosmological beliefs that shape the manner in which those in the west not see health, healing, the body and other fundamental aspects of the western worldview. These epistemological and cosmological beliefs are distinct and in direct opposition to other cultures. Le T has already magnificently pointed this out above. It is important that we recognize that privileging the western constructions of health and wellbeing, of mind/body/spirit split, materialist, mechanistic and reductionist orientation, is an act of cultural imperialism. I also need to be clear that I am not equating western “alternative” medicine with traditional healing practices even though conventional medicine condemns both equally.

To me there are obvious flaws in some of the assumptions western medical model operates under. Polly B and Le T have already presented some of these. Western society and its ongoing colonial project have created social conditions that actually promote ill heath and sickness, including the way we live our lives and the food that different people have access to. Social determinants of health do get some mention in western medicine but they are certainly not the centre piece of medical interventions. Prevention is not viewed as relevant when compared to the profitable search for cures. It is important to acknowledge the extent that western medicine is embedded within a system that promotes and encourages corporate profit beyond human well-being.