Totally Fake Treatments
Acupuncture
Homeopathy
Chiropractic
Magnets
Cupping
Ear candles
Crystals
Gadgets
Diagnostic techniques
Leveopathy
(1). Acupuncture (3/5)
I was talking to a colleague of mine named Samer. He is a geriatric medicine physician. We were discussing my new book entitled Placebo Medicine. He said, “Yeah, a lot of those treatments are pretty questionable but acupuncture … now, there is something to that one.”
He may have been more right than I realized. Acupuncture may be an excellent NPI. Sticking needles in the body is a great way to maximize the placebo effect. For example, it has been demonstrated that you can induce analgesia and see corresponding changes on functional brain imaging.
As an NPI, I think that acupuncture works fairly well. The problem is a slight risk of bleeding and infection. Once and a while an artery is hit and it gets kind of messy. Except for that slight drawback, it is a nice way to elicit the placebo effect.
They have now perfected several types of sham acupuncture. There is a retractable needle that appears to puncture the skin but it does not. It was designed to be a placebo control for an acupuncture study and it turned out to work as well as the real thing. They also have magnetic acupuncture, acupressure, and several techniques that involve electricity, light, heat, and vibrations. I’m thinking we should use these safe alternatives.
It has also been shown that it doesn’t matter where you place the needles. The meridians are false. You can place the needles on the tip of the nipple and get the same effect. Ouch, sorry about that poor choice of suggested needle placement.
I think that the doctor-patient relationship and the patient’s expectation are the critical variables. I also think that most acupuncture specialists are very good at maximizing the effects of these things.
Samer’s thinking was probably a little different. You see, he married a woman who is Chinese. Her family believes in the healing effects of oriental placebo medicine. Samer is a good enough man to know when to shut up and go along with something. He is motivated mostly by a desire to get laid.
Acupuncture has recently received a tremendous amount of research funded through the NIH. Personally, I wish our tax dollars would be spent researching things that actually have a plausible rationale. However, due to its popularity I suppose we need to produce some answers. Thus, after doing all this work the bottom line is:
Acupuncture is a placebo but it is a darn good placebo.
These studies have shown that you can do the same kind of analgesia studies with acupuncture that you can do with hypnosis. There has been no reliable science that demonstrates anything else.
I would like to be able to refer patients to an acupuncturist. I think that I could select an appropriate patient, perhaps one of my more somatic individuals, and educate them about the placebo effect. I would tell them how it can facilitate the brain to produce naturally occurring endorphins. I would refer patients for chronic idiopathic pain or for nausea and I would encourage them to fully buy into the story that the acupuncturist tells. I would say that the more they are able to do this the better it will work. Finally, I would follow the patient up afterwards.
There would be no deception and, thus, no ethical concerns. The danger of failing to accurately diagnose and treat real conditions is minimized by appropriate patient selection and adequate follow-up care.
The placebo medicine industry is a formidable opponent. The AMA tried raming them head-on and failed. Perhaps, it is wiser to use their strength against them. Maybe their ability to criticize organized medicine could be reduced by doing what they are doing but doing it better. Do you think that we could possibly take some of the wind out of their sails?
If an acupuncturist is willing to use sham acupuncture and they don’t mind the patient being fully informed and they don’t cost too much, then I would gladly make referrals. I would not use the term placebo effect, as this term has such negative karma. Instead, I would call it non-pharmacologic intervention.
“Yes, Mrs. Smith, I want to refer you to an NPI specialist.”
(2). Homeopathy (5/4)
Dr. Hahnemann
Christian Friedrich Samuel Hahnemann was a German physician who practiced medicine in the eighteenth century. At that time there were only a few remedies that were available and they tended to be pretty toxic. One of these remedies was cinchona bark from which we derive quinine. It was used to treat malaria.
Dr. Hahnemann consumed some of this bark and got all hot and bothered. He thought this was kind of like having malaria. The infectious theory of disease was not yet known and he got the idea that “like cures like.”
He figured out that you could be totally healthy and yet experience symptoms if you consumed a toxin. Somehow he got the idea that a toxin that produces certain symptoms will treat an illness that has those same symptoms.
He went on to decide that the more you diluted the toxin the stronger it would become as a treatment. Many years later it was shown that these dilutions caused there to be no molecules of the toxin in the water at all. Homeopaths retrospectively invented the idea that the water has a “memory” of the toxin. They now claim that this memory is what is really therapeutic.
Not knowing that you could be infected by something from outside your body, he reasoned that the internal “vital force” was altered by disease and corrected by a diluted toxin. At the time, the suggestion that we treat people with water was not that crazy. It was certainly better than bleeding them or treating them with leeches.
Today, this practice makes no scientific sense and the only quality research that has been done shows that it is equal to placebo. On a positive note, it is safer than tap water. In fact, due to the repeated dilutions it is probably cleaner and more pure than tap water.
Hey, I have an idea. Why don’t we bottle and sell water and call it a homeopathic remedy and make tons of money. Oh, someone already did that.
Actually there is an entire industry that does that including two national organizations: The National Center for Homeopathy (NCH) and The American Institute of Homeopathy (AIH) Interestingly, both centers have the same address but different phone numbers. Go figure?
To this day The National Center and the American Institute can’t seem to agree about whether or not the pitcher should swing a bat.
There is also a popular magazine:
Homeopathy is an NPI that Dr. Levy approves of because the safety factor is so high. Actually, as I am writing this chapter my friend David called to tell me he was on his way to the store to purchase a remedy that his doctor told him to try. He said it is called Zicam®. Since I am his doctor friend he wanted me to tell him what I thought.
He recently had a flu that lasted longer than he thought it should. His doctor told him to try Zicam® instead of an antibiotic. He got better and now believes that Zicam® is as good as an antibiotic. Therefore, he is willing to do it again.
I told him,”Most colds and flues are viral and not bacterial. Therefore, antibiotics are probably over-prescribed in this country. If you are suffering from a mild to moderate viral infection and you are given some Zicam®, don’t complain. Your doctor probably just saved you from needlessly taking an antibiotic.”
I went on to say, “He also saved you the heartache of going home from his office feeling that he had done nothing. He had done nothing but nothing was the right thing to have done. Most people have a hard time with that one. Just eat your Zicam® and be happy.”
Actually, I must add an addendum to the Zicam® story. I saw a news article on-line today that said a number of people are complaining that nasal administration of Zicam® caused them to lose their sense of smell. The makers of Zicam® counter that the preparations are so diluted that this effect cannot be true. They point out that a small percentage of people with colds sometimes lose their sense of smell.
Hmmm … well … either way you want to look at it you should probably not be taking Zicam®.
(3). Chiropractic (2/5)
(The following article is true, however, it is also true that most modern day Chiropractors are legitimate health care providers who use multiple legitimate therapeutic modalities. Most of them no longer use the questionable practices described below.)
In America, eighty-seven thousand Chiropractors treat roughly one-hundred eighty million people and rake in about three billion annually. They are the largest placebo medicine provider and they are the third largest health care provider behind only doctors and dentists. They are licensed in all fifty states and many insurance companies provide for their services.
They also have a beautiful antique college in Davenport, Iowa. Check it out:
Palmer School of Chiropractic
Daniel David Palmer, nicknamed D.D., was a charismatic and narcissistic magneto-therapist in (1895). He believed that he had cured one man’s hearing loss and another man’s heart condition by hyper-extending their vertebral joints. He made up the term “Chiropractor” to describe this kind of manual manipulation of the spine.
He invented the idea of an “innate intelligence” that is in our bones and needs to be correctly aligned in order to prevent illness. This is a metaphysical explanation of disease.
He created the notion that our vertebrae are “subluxated.” This is a medical term that means a joint which is partially dislocated. This subluxation impinges on spinal nerves which run all over the body and it causes the vast majority of physical illness.
Daniel David Palmer
He loudly proclaimed, “The germ theory of disease is not true and ninety-five percent of all illness is due to displaced vertebrae.”
He was a true believer. He made everything up but he worked very diligently for a number of years in order to make it all up. His son reports that making this stuff up was the only thing he cared about and that he and his siblings were severely neglected.
D.D. was jailed due to fraud and practicing medicine without a license. His son, B.J., took over the movement and was able to significantly expand it through clever marketing. When D.D. got out of jail a power struggle developed with his son over who would rule the empire.
D.D. had also spent time in jail on several occasions due to child abuse. I assume that there was not a tremendous amount of love-loss from his son.
B.J. got in his automobile, which was actually the first one ever purchased in Davenport, and ran his father down and killed him. This happened at a parade in D.D.’s honor. Remembering that I’m a psychiatrist, I urge you not to get me started on this one.
Since the concept of vehicular homicide had not yet been invented, it was ruled an accident. Subsequently, this true charlatan expanded Chiropractic medicine with the aid of a new radio station and he became a very wealthy man.
The jailing and subsequent death of D.D. immortalized him. He became a martyr for the cause of Chiropractic care. His son, the true charlatan, exploited it and his father soon became an icon and a cult hero.
Interestingly, some Chiropractors still follow the original work of the immortal D.D. He actually fancied himself during his lifetime as a sort of religious leader. In death, he has attained the status of a saint. His original work has been deified and these hard-line or “straight” Chiropractors of today still follow it.
Most Chiropractors reject the D.D. Dogma. He … he … I’m not stuttering. In any case, they focus on physical therapy of the back and neck and don’t make the cure-all claims. They also accept traditional medicine and often work in close connection with mainstream MDs and DOs. They recognize the extent of their ability to treat and are well trained regarding when to refer a patient to a neurologist or neurosurgeon.
In the past, many Chiropractors did a number of unacceptable things. They recruited patients in a less than ethical way. They often attended seminars that taught them how to create a “million dollar per year practice.” They over exposed patients to needless and repeated full body X-rays. They used fake diagnostic equipment. They prescribed repeated spinal adjustments for almost every patient they saw. They were loath to discontinue treatment. Two thirds made unproven claims in regards to non-back related illnesses. They often attempted to function as primary care physicians despite a severe lack of training. They authored bogus books and promoted bogus supplements. Compared to regular doctors they were twice as likely to be the subject of disciplinary action and nine times more likely to be convicted on fraud charges. Diagnoses were notoriously variable from one Chiropractor to the next. Healthy individuals who were sent to a Chiropractor were almost always told that they had a condition that will require repeated adjustments. The Chiropractic profession failed to monitor untoward side effects and it was rare for a Chiropractor to inform a patient of potential risks prior to an adjustment.
Worst of all, neck manipulations sometimes cause fatal strokes and vertebrae are sometimes fractured.
The idea that cracking a joint is therapeutic has never been clearly established through medical research. That is why this treatment is included in the section entitled, “Totally Fake Treatments.” However, as an adjunct to physical therapy for muscle and joint related injuries or painful conditions it works pretty well. The placebo effect is maximized when doing a spinal manipulation. It just feels really good.
Remember, the whole point of this book is that treatments for which there is no evidence of actual physiologic effect can, nevertheless, be very effective. The neuroscience of the placebo effect in which real chemical alterations in your brain ameliorate symptoms such as pain can explain how this phenomena works.
(4). Cupping (4/5)
I asked my fiancé, “Have you ever done any cupping?” Her eyes got pretty big so I quickly added, “Not spooning, cupping.”
She said, “No, what is that?”
I asked her to lie on the floor and pull her shirt up to reveal her belly. I produced a plastic measuring cup and a BiC® lighter. I must have looked like I didn’t know what I was doing. She said, “Oh, you mean bañki.”
I said, “Pardon me?”
She said, “In Russia we call it bañki. It’s very popular. My mother used to do it to me when I was a child. You know, if I got a cold or something. She would put a mustard wrap on my back and give me tea with honey and she would do bañki.”
She added, “You are doing it wrong. It’s done on the back and you need a glass cup. Be careful because it gets hot and can burn.”
I explained that I was including it in the chapter about totally fake treatments. She did not seem to experience any emotion but went on to tell me how good it used to make her feel. She said, “It was one of the few times when I really felt nurtured by her mother.”
I said, “Are you OK? I mean, how are you doing emotionally?”
She said, “Fine, why do you ask?”
I said, “I just told you that a remedy your mom used on you as a child is a totally fake treatment.”
She said, “I don’t feel anything. I don’t feel bad or good. It was a good remedy and it treated my illnesses very well.”
I nodded my head and realized that she didn’t believe me. She continues to think that bañki is a reasonable treatment. She feels nothing because, for her, nothing just happened. She was not affected by what I said at all.
I will never stop being amazed at how people decide to deal with reality. Especially when it confronts them directly.
Cupping or bañki is a popular NPI in which there is mild pain and it leaves a welt. It is a potent placebo. It hurts but, oooooh, it hurts so good.
Actually, it’s really just a hickey. The experience is kind of a weird sadistic yet mildly erotic pleasure.
If you aren’t currently experiencing a flashback to your youth, then I feel sorry for you.
In any case, the cupping therapist puts numerous hickeys all over your back. If you don’t get burned or set on fire by mistake the hickeys go away in about a week.
There is a possibility that they could cause relaxation of tense back muscles or that they might treat punctate lesions such as bee stings. However, there is little chance of any systemic effect. They simply don’t treat colds or the flu except as a placebo.
Cupping or bañki has been used worldwide for about two millennia. I think it is due to the erotic sadistic feeling it gives but the official theories generally have to do with aligning you chi and stuff like that. In fact, there is a Chinese form of it called “wet cupping” in which you cut the skin and suck the blood at meridian sites. Sort of a leeching acupuncture thing I guess.
Interestingly, the actress Gwyneth Paltrow came to a gala event recently wearing a backless dress that revealed cupping spots. It was all the rage and cupping experienced a surge in popularity as a result. Go to this article and it will explain all about cupping in a much better way than I am capable of doing.
If you wish to become a cupping therapist (it couldn’t be all that difficult) you can visit the International Cupping Society website and read all about it.
(5). Ear candles (3/4)
Ear candling or thermal-auricular therapy, as it were, is a placebo medicine treatment that involves placing a hollow candle in the ear and lighting the open end. The idea is that the heat will create a vacuum and suck out ear wax and other impurities. These “other impurities” frequently include cognitive processes in the brain.
Certainly I have known girls whose thoughts I would like to suck out of their heads with a hollow candle but there is one little tiny problem with this logic. The ear canal does not connect to the brain!
Oh, yeah, and even if it did connect I don’t think that thoughts could be sucked out. I guess that is sort of obvious, or maybe not.
In order for ear wax to be “sucked out” it would require a pretty strong suction apparatus. This apparatus would likely suck out the ear drum before it sucked out the wax. Unfortunately, it has been demonstrated that there is no suction at all produced by most thermal-auricular devices.
There is some residual black wax that is often left in the ear canal but this came from the candle not from the ear. To my chagrin, I’m relatively certain that bad thoughts were not sucked out.
This would all be quite cute except that this procedure caries unacceptable risk. Ear, nose, and throat physicians deal with injuries from it all the time. If you will notice that the woman in the photo has placed the candle strait up with her ear directly under it. This seems to be the preferred technique. The upper end is then lit and wax is burned.
Not that this is an obvious question but … where do you think this hot wax is going to drip?
Fortunately, ear drums do a pretty good job of growing back but sometimes they don’t. I would not want to risk it. Actually, if you believe there is a direct cerebral connection then you are risking really serious injury. In your case, I’m thinking you probably want to lobotomize your frontal lobe and not your temporal lobe.
For whatever reason, Biosun® has decided to blame the Hopi Indians for creating ear candles. They actually call their product Biosun® Hopi Ear Candles. The word Hopi is even in their web site address: www.biosunhopiearcandles.co.uk/
The Hopi Indians have repeatedly asked Biosun® to discontinue claiming that ear candles are in any way associated with them. They point out that there is not one shred of evidence to indicate that the Hopi Indians ever had anything to do with ear candles.
Biosun® has refused.
(6). Crystal therapy (5/4)
My fiancé says, “If you get me a three karat Tanzanite necklace then I won’t keep making you feel so miserable.”
Perhaps, good health can be related to gemstones after all. Actually, I did get her a one karat marquis cut diamond set in antiqued platinum for an engagement ring. It seemed to make her feel very good inside.
Gemstones are a unique placebo medicine because they don’t really do anything except look or feel nice. You wear them or place them in a prominent location or put one in a pocket. During the day you can look at it or touch it and it gives you confidence or it centers your thoughts or it makes you calm.
In psychology, the term is “security blanket.” It is an item that makes you feel warm and safe. Normally, one is supposed to grow out of the need for a security blanket but many people find that they still need one as an adult. As a psychiatrist, I can’t totally condemn this behavior.
Of course, you need to come to a place in your life where you can live with a certain amount of risk or ambiguity or lack of control. You need to have relationships with living people that you can rely on to help you feel safe and secure. But … OK … if carrying a blankie makes you feel better; I guess that there are worse things you could be doing.
I must admit that I was a blankie and pacifier man myself as a child. I am pretty sure that this is not the real underlying explanation for my oral fixation. I’m pretty sure at any rate.
Certainly gemstones should be pretty safe. Unless it is a really expensive stone and you happen to be wandering around in a relatively bad neighborhood.
I actually went to Moscow to ask my fiancé’s father for her hand in marriage. I proposed to her in front of Moscow State University, the real one. I put a rather expensive engagement ring on her finger. She wore it as we walked around town and I became a little nervous. The funny thing was that every single Russian who saw the ring asked, “Is it real?”
There is no middle class in Russia and no one wears expensive jewelry but they do wear a lot of fake stuff all the time. We could walk down the street and nobody would think the ring was real. It would be highly unlikely that a theft would occur. How about that?
As long as the crystal is not claimed to cure cancer or AIDS but only to help with mood and affect, I can’t see a whole lot of harm in it. There are even stones that you can use to be happy. They are called Happiness Rocks.
I see their point.
If you should choose to purchase some healing crystals, I highly recommend Kellie. She is The Crystal Deva. Notice the pun on the word “Deva.” Spelled with an “i” it means a celebrated female singer. Spelled with and “e” it means a God or a deity.
I searched the web and she was by far my favorite.
I bet it would not be too difficult for her to make me shout out “Oh, God!”
(7). Magnetic therapy (5/4)
Electromagnetic fields are used in medical devices for both diagnostic and palliative reasons. For example, the letters MRI stand for magnetic resonance imaging. However, this section is not about powerful magnetic fields such as those found in an MRI. Rather, it is about the use of mild ordinary magnets like the ones you might find at a children’s toy store. The problem is that these toy magnets have no medicinal use but are marketed as though they cure everything.
One rationale is that blood contains iron (Fe) so a magnet should be able to affect its flow or align the direction of its cells.
The reality is that blood contains iron oxide and not pure iron. Iron oxide is the most common form that iron is found in nature. In order to get a metal that will respond to a magnet the oxygen needs to be removed. If you live in Pittsburgh, then you likely do this for a living.
The bumper of my SUV would probably have responded to a magnet six years ago when it was brand new but the iron in it has attracted so much oxygen that a magnet won’t stick to it anymore. For all you non-scientists out there, iron oxide is also called rust.
If you still think that a magnet may change the flow of blood, then there is a very simple experiment you can do. Place a magnet on your arm for any length of time and see if the skin turns white or red. If nothing happens, then you may conclude that blood is not affected by an ordinary magnet.
Or, if you are brave enough you can prick your finger and put a drop of blood on the table. Touch the blood with a magnet and see what happens.
The fact that ordinary magnets have no medicinal benefit has not prevented an industry from arising. They produce every kind of magnetic apparatus that you can think of.
The magnetized horse is particularly amusing.
The other major theory of action is that the magnets somehow cause nerve cell activity that results in pain suppression. There is no evidence that an ordinary toy magnet can affect a nerve cell in any way but you should check out the folks at Quadrabloc™. They make a compelling case. I especially enjoyed the phony news report by Greg Gumbel.
There is one last little tidbit that I tried not to include but just couldn’t help myself. It is the ever popular Magnetic “Joy Tool.”
(8). Gadgets
Q-Link® is the most advanced personal energy system available today.
All the famous people are wearing it. For only seventy nine dollars you can get the classic black Q-Link® pictured here or you can get it in titanium for only two-hundred and forty dollars.
The idea is that if you wear this pendant it will tune up your biofield through a resonant effect that harmonizes your energy … whatever that means. I had to add the word “biofield” to my Microsoft dictionary because it is not a real word. In any case, they claim you will have more energy and less stress and all your illnesses will melt away.
If you want to see all the gadgets on display at the Museum of Questionable Medical Devices just click on the crystaldyne above.
(9). Diagnostic techniques
Iridology is a technique in which the iris is thought to reveal what part of your body is diseased. The iris is the colored part of your eye and there are frequently irregularities in it. An iridologist will look to see if they can find an odd shape or asymmetry in the iris and then they will look on the official iridology chart to make a diagnosis.
Reading the iris is sort of like reading the clouds. You can always find some shape or form to imagine is this or that. In reality, the colors and irregularities in the iris are due to incomplete migration of pigment during the first year of your development.
If you have no pigment at all in your iris, then it will be completely blue. If you have the maximum amount of pigment, then it will be dark black. Everything else is due to a variable amount and distribution of pigment.
When you were born your eyes were blue, baby blue as it were. During the first year of your life the pigment slowly migrated in. This migration is rarely smooth and clean. Unfortunately for the iridologists, there is no connection between the pigment in your iris and the rest of your physiology.
The iris can give one interesting piece of information. Blood flow within the iris can change and affect the intensity of the color. Therefore, it acts kind of like a mood ring. If you are warm and happy, you might have marine blue eyes. If you are cold and frightened you might have sky blue eyes. Other than that the iris doesn’t tell us anything at all.
I finished up the iridology section and I thought I would find two or three or maybe even five more of the best diagnostic tools out there and present them to you. Low and behold I was overwhelmed. There are literally thousands of these tests that you can order on line. You can even call up Valerie and pay $45.00 for a fifteen minute consultation about which tool to get.
Valerie
Albert Abrams must be rolling over in his grave in sheer agony due to the deepest belly laugh ever recorded.
(10). Leveopathy (6/6)
Leveopathy is hundreds of years old. It was originally practiced by the Jewish Apaches of North America. They learned its secrets from the Great Spirit whose name they couldn’t say. It is a healing system that is in true harmony with nature. There are no harsh chemicals or other additives.
The Great Spirit bestowed on Kalib (this is the Jewish Apache word that means “The Chosen One”) a full and detailed description of the one and only true path to holistic and spiritual unity. He developed an understanding of the natural energy that binds all living things. Then, he chiseled into the eternal tablet specific instructions about how to attain total consciousness.
You won’t learn about Leveopathy from organized medicine because they want to take your money. Well, we want to take your money, too. I mean, we want to take it but we want to take it in a natural and holistic way.
There is an electromagnetic field that has been known to exist for many centuries. In order to bring your own aura in line with its chakra, you must meditate and smoke the holy pipe. The carefully grown holy cannabis is cultivated and allowed to mature to exactly the correct point. Then we lovingly prepare it for delicate insertion into the pipe.
While you experience the altered state that allows your energy to be focused, you should remove your clothing as it only gets in the way and prevents true harmony with nature. Once you have begun to relax and open your spiritual being you are ready to benefit from the full frontal message of breasts and genitalia that is essential to the healing process.
The high priest then enters and consumes the holy brew. He gently kneels and allows you to remove the healing fluid. Remember, you may need to polish his divine rod for some time before he deposits the fluid.
When he is … I mean … when you are satisfied you should leave the temple and make no attempt to stay overnight. This is particularly important if the Great Spirit has not bestowed upon you the gentle grace of a decent physical appearance.
If you have true faith and are able to follow the one path to total righteousness, then all medical infirmities will flow gently away and you will live a long and healthy life.
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