homeopathy... aibu to say i think of it's a crock of crap?

[ILetHimKeep20Quid]

Was at my brothers for dinner yesterday. My baby has a touch of eczema. As a chronic sufferer myself I roll my eyes whenever people start on the 'oh have you tried this' thing but smile and nod. I have used steroid creams in the past, of various strengths, to deal with outbreaks. I'm well versed in the treatment.

So, the wee touch my ds has isn't concerning me and I'm moisturizing him regularly.

Cue my sil practically gushing over her homeopath (not just a normal one. He's a gp but does this on the side it seems).

I smiled and nodded. Not wanting to get into the whole thing. But she would not give up. So I asked 'what is homeopathy?'

Apparently, get this, water has a memory. What the actual fuck? How can water have a memory?

That's frightening and weird Toys. Oddly ethical as well. Interestingly the placebo effect still works when people are told there is no active ingredient in their pills. We should all have a wo/man in a white coat, listening to us and our complaints and doling out pick liquid and sugar pills. We would all feel much better.

I think the same as you MrsTP about homeopathic hospitals. I can't see why else the NHS would keep funding them. And they probably get good results.

I don't have a problem with the placebo effect as it works. There is a very interesting study done on women with repeated miscarriages that if they are given regular scheduled appointments during a subsequent pregnancy with a doctor each month they are less likely to miscarry.

I think the impact of the mind on our bodies is immense and poorly understood.

Curlew, to show they are bollocks mostly. I'm not sure how much has been done and I'd like to know if there is any useful aspect that conventional medicine can learn from them.

daddypig I was being factitious about homeopathic hospitals.

<a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=i.stack.imgur.com/jiFfM.jpg&imgrefurl=scifi.stackexchange.com/questions/2013/which-episode-is-the-double-facepalm-image-macro-from&h=600&w=750&sz=67&tbnid=4N5DJ744xVTZlM:&tbnh=91&tbnw=114&zoom=1&usg=__mm0NsgYeoWDRElrz5H6rgFx0ZG0=&docid=Whg_ZCAmoybnfM&sa=X&ei=QUU6UvKtFcjQyAHxhIDACQ&ved=0CDUQ9QEwAw&dur=400" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Picard understands

Thanks lweji I love him
daddypig ok. I won't call it a placebo. But I can tell you that RCTs for CO have shown no demonstrable efficacy. The "theory" behind CO ("waves" of CSF influenced by external touching, for want of a better, less sleep deprived description) is fundamentally flawed, and in studies examining the practice of CO researchers find no reliable consistency in diagnosis or "treatment"
Also, even anecdotal reports of efficacy are inconsistent.

And don't get me started on ear candles.

The placebo effect does not work on everything. It's important to be clear about its effect and limitations.

Hmmm. Not sure whether that's it lweji can't check as would wake everyone up.
But thank you.

yanbu

YANBU because it has been proven that it is. I remember a quote from a scientist saying something along the lines of 'I'd be concerned about tap water considering all the memories it could have picked up going through sewage treatment' that made me chuckle.

BUT it can produce a strong placebo effect in some people, which will aid recovery. Most doctors/scientists think it unprofessional to take money to 'trick' people into mending themselves and so reject it, but the placebo effect is real and for lesser ailments, potentially helpful. It's when you start on sugar pills for things like cancer that you can come unstuck.

I have cross posted with everyone through thread laziness - sorry.

It also annoys me that so many mainstream doctors still deny that dietary changes can cure conditions That has not been my experience. Where there is good evidence that diet or herbal cures can work, they have been suggested to me. I used to gt IBS and still get migraines. HCPs have suggested dietary changes and things like peppermint tea. Doctors and nurses don't ignore well documented cases like this.

Mrs TP I appreciate that but it's ironic it can lead to a similar conclusion.

I agree with the poster about conventional medicine/diet/conventional drugs. People lump all alternative medicine, including dietary issues, into one "it doesn't work" dismissal.

But it's changing. My mother's enlightened yet near retirement GP has been completely supportive and interested in her attempts to alleviate chronic severe UTIs through dietary change and herbal medicine. He could only offer her antibiotics all of which not only cause side effects (and wider bug resistance) but didn't work.

All the other doctors have previously scoffed at this.

I wonder in ten/twenty years time if we will see a marrying of the alternative treatments that actually work with western medicine.

Sleepy, what dietary changes have helped your allergies? (I have finally and reluctantly chucked dairy to rid myself of sinus issues - overnight relief - and wish I'd tried sooner (rather than be told by ten doctors there was no evidence it would make no difference)

Sleepy - wow - I'm delighted for your son's progress. I have read up on GAPS and I take my hat off to anyone who has the perseverance to stick with it. But what price for your child's health. What did the paeds say when you told them how you helped your son? Are you on GAPS still?

Since developing my sinus woes and other issues I am grain free - still eat rice though - and the improvement is immense and I hope to return to dairy some day as gawd I miss cheese....

I'm always surprised that conventional doctors do shrug off success stories of alternatives, especially diet when its effect on health is so obvious.

I often wonder if the "ah, there is no evidence that giving up gluten/dairy/eating frog legs" is rolled out because the studies just haven't been done. Why fund a huge double blind study into dairy exclusion (with all its complications) when a new drug can be funded instead?

I do have sympathy with that as the NHS is cash poor. But it leaves many of us looking for other options so it doesn't surprise me that homeopathy is popular even if I wouldn't use it myself.

There is an active paleo thread BTW if you are interested. I'm not paleo really as I eat rice/dark chocolate etc but I see it as a discussion forum for those really questioning the whole low fat/whole grain/vegetable oils/high carbs notions which surely do need proper revisiting now...

Sorry - I know I go on and I should PM you - but I wonder if the dairy allergies - yours and mine - will clear up eventually. That's my theory anyway given I was fine with it for three decades and only developed problems after living off bread and cheese for months of a difficult pregnancy...

Why fund a huge double blind study into dairy exclusion

Go on. Tell us about how you're going to blind a dairy exclusion study.

Ha ha yes, that would be hard. I meant a controlled study

How did we get onto diet? That is a completely different thing. And not remotely bonkers in anything like the same way.

This is what I hate about the conventional / woo divide: some of what ends up in the "woo" camp (and shares premises at woo clinics) is just stuff that the NHS can't be bothered with and has decided it can't afford, or normal drs are too arrogant to listen to: osteopathy (what is weird about that? Manipulating the body's structure affects how it sits and how it works) nutrition (come on, any idiot can see that the "normal" diet isn't working for an awful lot of people; and there is nothing remotely confusing about the fact that what you put in the body directly, physically effects it)

so you get a lot of useful (if expensive) stuff sitting alongside snake-oil, and vulnerable people get suckered into it. GATEWAY DRUGS, PEOPLE!

I'm always surprised that conventional doctors do shrug off success stories of alternatives, especially diet when its effect on health is so obvious.

Success stories are just that. Stories. Selected stories. We don't hear about the non successes.

Doctors are (should be) aware that anecdotes do not provide evidence.

Anecdotal cases may be reasons to start proper clinical studies (you know, with controls, double blind coding, proper sampling size, stratification, awareness of any bias and confounding, etc).

But, crucially, they are not reasons for doctors to start advocating any unproven treatment method.

But, most doctors working on diseases that can be demonstrably improved by diet are aware of the studies and will suggest dietary changes to patients.

Why fund a huge double blind study into dairy exclusion (with all its complications) when a new drug can be funded instead?

Actually studies to find new drugs are probably more expensive than clinical studies into dairy exclusion.

Drugs can be more profitable to drug companies, though. But only if there are enough people taking them.

How is the NHS fundinding it?

Until recently the NHS funded many homeopathic hospitals.

It still costs the NHS between £4 million and £12 million a year.

www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9982234/Homeopathy-on-the-NHS-is-mad-says-outgoing-scientific-adviser.html