Resources

Websites

Quackwatch: www.quackwatch.org Website of the National Council Against Health Fraud. Hands-down the best source of accurate information on unscientific health care practices on the web and winner of numerous awards, deservedly so. It is also one of the few health websites to maintain an HON [Health on the Net] Code seal, a guarantee that the website subscribes to standards of accurate, updated reporting. It is not the prettiest or easiest to navigate site, only the best. Topics include chiropractic, quack medical devices, homeopathy, naturopathy, acupuncture, craniosacral therapy, and reflexology, among many others. Also contains good advice concerning how to spot a health care fraud.

National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine: http://nccam.nih.gov A center of the National Institutes of Health. WARNING: Be very careful if you visit this site. You should know that NCCAM has received two and a half billion dollars in taxpayer funds over the last ten years but has not come up with convincing evidence that any complementary or alternative practice is worth using. That alone is quite instructive. Yet the site remains uncritical of complementary and alternative practices and fails to state the obvious: that they have no plausible basis in science. It does contain some useful advice about talking to your physician concerning any CAM use and how to question a CAM practitioner about a particular treatment.

Books

R. Barker Bausell, Snake Oil Science: The Truth About Complementary and Alternative Medicine (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2007) Bausell explains scientific research to the non-scientist and builds upon this to show how complementary and alternative medicine is really no better than placebo, or as he puts it, “CAM therapies are nothing more than cleverly packaged placebos.” You’ll never be fooled by a testimonial again.

Simon Singh and Edzard Ernst, Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts About Alternative Medicine (New York: W.W. Norton 2008): A great reference work on alternative treatments backed by impeccable research. Ernst is one of the foremost alternative medicine researchers in the world.

Dan Hurley, Natural Causes: Death, Lies and Politics in America’s Vitamin and Herbal Supplement Industry (Broadway 2006). Written by a top-notch investigative reporter, it demonstrates how the mega-bucks vitamin and supplement industry overrode the consumer’s best interest in writing toothless regulatory legislation. Do you know what’s really in your supplement? No, you don’t, and furthermore, there’s no way to find out. Feeling better yet?

Paul Benedetti and Wayne MacPhail, Spin Doctors: The Chiropractic Industry Under Examination (Toronto: The Dundurn Group, 2002) A both hilarious and frightening look at the chiropractic industry by two top Canadian journalists.

Blogs

Science Based Medicine www.sciencebasedmedicine.org. No one eviscerates alternative medicine like these guys. Thoughtful and often entertaining posts on unscientific therapies by some very smart people. And you can participate!

Suggestions for our reference list?

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