Homeopathy "not good for anything" report says

[deleder2k]

Homeopathy not effective for treating any condition, Australian report finds

Report by top medical research body says ‘people who choose homeopathy may put their health at risk if they reject or delay treatments’


Homeopathy is not effective for treating any health condition, Australia’s top body for medical research has concluded, after undertaking an extensive review of existing studies.

Homeopaths believe that illness-causing substances can, in minute doses, treat people who are unwell.

By diluting these substances in water or alcohol, homeopaths claim the resulting mixture retains a “memory” of the original substance that triggers a healing response in the body.

These claims have been widely disproven by multiple studies, but the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) has for the first time thoroughly reviewed 225 research papers on homeopathy to come up with its position statement, released on Wednesday.

Read more here: http://www.theguardian.com/lifeands...reating-any-condition-australian-report-finds

 

[Misfit Toy]

I have a terrible time with homeopathy. The other day when I wrote, "Emotionally Distraught" on here...I was on a homeopathic medicine. I was so sick from it. It was for pain....it threw me into more pain and I had to put on a fentanyl patch. Plus, I had an acute histamine reaction from it. Homeopathy is the strongest most dangerous substance I have taken. I have immediate reactions to every single med. It always makes me deathly ill.

I believe it works for that reason. If it actually makes me deathly ill, it also turns people around. It's finding the right tincture and that is hard. Or..dosage.

A girl I once knew tried everything for Lyme...I saw her because she came to my area to be treated from Las Vegas. She was so sick. Much sicker than me. She looked like death.

She eventually did homeopathy by a woman in CA and got well. She then went back to school and became a nutritionist/ND. It worked.

 

[deleder2k]

It doesn't work. Most homeopathy medicine contain only coloured water. It is quackery. If I was PM I would make it illegal.

 

[Tammy]

I've personally known several people that have been helped with homeopathy.............but they didn't have a complicated illness like cfs/me.

 

[Esther12]

It is just a placebo.

If this is making the news in 2015 that does not fill me with faith over the speed with which we're going to be able debunk some of the dodgy CFS stuff floating around.

 

[catly]

It doesn't work. Most homeopathy medicine contain only coloured water. It is quackery. If I was PM I would make it illegal.

My feelings exactly--about the making it illegal part. I do wish I could get the $$$ I spent on it back so I could donate it to one of the handful of important MECFS researchers who are striving to find real answers and treatments.

 

[GracieJ]

I beg to differ.

Homeopathy is one of my favorite go-to remedies. 30 years and counting. It is not quackery.

 

[melamine]

"In some areas of the United Kingdom homeopathic treatment by doctors is covered by the National Health System. In Belgium and Latvia the fees for homeopathic treatment are partially covered by the statutory health insurance. In Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom by private insurance companies." http://www.homeopathyeurope.org/regulatory-status

I have personally only used it for a very short time, as prescribed by an MD, and was not comfortable with it because it didn't make sense to me. I have heard good testimonies about it from other sources besides on here. I don't believe in authoritarian denial of access to such treatments.

 

[Dufresne]

Yawn.

 

[Wayne]

I've personally known several people that have been helped with homeopathy.............but they didn't have a complicated illness like cfs/me.

The Osteopath I see claims he had all the hallmarks of CFS for several weeks. Conventional medicine was not helping him, so he turned to homeopathy (reluctantly as I recall). He was completely well within 3 days. I'm guessing his recovery was so dramatic because he was in the initial acute stage. Had it progressed much further, I suspect his positive results would have been much more difficult to achieve.

 

[TigerLilea]

The Osteopath I see claims he had all the hallmarks of CFS for several weeks. Conventional medicine was not helping him, so he turned to homeopathy (reluctantly as I recall). He was completely well within 3 days. I'm guessing his recovery was so dramatic because he was in the initial acute stage. Had it progressed much further, I suspect his positive results would have been much more difficult to achieve.

If he was only sick for a few weeks he did not have CFS and chances are that what he had was a virus.

 

[PennyIA]

If he was only sick for a few weeks he did not have CFS and chances are that what he had was a virus.

And suspiciously? The worst viruses resolve themselves right around that three week mark. Just good timing.

 

[JPV]

It doesn't work. Most homeopathy medicine contain only coloured water. It is quackery. If I was PM I would make it illegal.

Cool, let's make ineffective pharmaceuticals illegal too...

Why Antidepressants Are No Better Than Placebos (Newsweek)

Tamiflu Is No Better Than a Placebo, Researchers Say (Now)

A Bitter Pill to Swallow: Cough Medicines Won't Cure You (The Guardian)

Paracetamol ‘No Better Than a Placebo’ for Treatment of Back Pain Despite Being Recommended by Doctors for Years (Daily Mail UK)

Tylenol and Panadol Prove No Better Than Placebo at Helping Back Pain (Time)

Sinus Infections Not Cured With Antibiotics, Study Suggests (CBS News)

 

[IreneF]

Some things are going to clear up on their own, no matter what you do. Homeopathy is a philosophy from the 18th or 19th century. It wasn't even based on observations, and there is no evidence it works besides anecdotes. We don't bleed people anymore, either, because no one thinks disease is caused by evil humors, and because it just doesn't work. At least homeopathy isn't directly harmful.

 

[JPV]

The Placebo Problem Big Pharma's Desperate to Solve (Wired)

The fact that an increasing number of medications are unable to beat sugar pills has thrown the industry into crisis. The stakes could hardly be higher. In today's economy, the fate of a long-established company can hang on the outcome of a handful of tests.

Why are inert pills suddenly overwhelming promising new drugs and established medicines alike? The reasons are only just beginning to be understood. A network of independent researchers is doggedly uncovering the inner workings - and potential therapeutic applications - of the placebo effect.

Ironically, Big Pharma's attempt to dominate the central nervous system has ended up revealing how powerful the brain really is. The placebo response doesn't care if the catalyst for healing is a triumph of pharmacology, a compassionate therapist, or a syringe of salt water. All it requires is a reasonable expectation of getting better. That's potent medicine.

 

[alex3619]

I don't think the failure of many medications, prescription or not, has to do with comparison with fantastic effects from placebo. We know that placebo doesn't work either.

Its that bad research practices, and in particular leaving research in the hands of those with a vested financial interest, can often lead to over-interpreting and inflating results, that is in cases where its not due to stacking the deck with multiple studies or deceptive methodology. This is not always the case, but it is the case often enough for loss of confidence in pharma.

Its also that objective endpoints are not always present

In some cases there is no doubt medication is oversold, useful for some things but then touted as effective for things they do not affect.

One of the reasons dodgy practices that are institutionally accepted are not stopped, and this is only my opinion, is that if they did that they would have to turn on psychiatry which has a seriously deficient lack of evidence for most things. No mechanisms, no tests, no certain diagnoses, no cures, and often ineffective treatments. Psychiatry is mostly about getting people to cope, not curing them.

 

[JPV]

We know that placebo doesn't work either.

Well, that's not what the Wired article claims...

Part of the problem was that response to placebo was considered a psychological trait related to neurosis and gullibility rather than a physiological phenomenon that could be scrutinised in the lab and manipulated for therapeutic benefit. But then Benedetti came across a study, done years earlier, that suggested the placebo effect had a neurological foundation. US scientists had found that a drug called naloxone blocks the pain-relieving power of placebo treatments. The brain produces its own analgesic compounds called opioids, released under conditions of stress, and naloxone blocks the action of these natural painkillers and their synthetic analogs. The study gave Benedetti the lead he needed to pursue his own research while running small clinical trials for drug companies.

Now, after 15 years of experimentation, he has succeeded in mapping many of the biochemical reactions responsible for the placebo effect, uncovering a broad repertoire of self-healing responses. Placebo-activated opioids, for example, not only relieve pain; they also modulate heart rate and respiration. The neurotransmitter dopamine, when released by placebo treatment, helps improve motor function in Parkinson's patients. Mechanisms like these can elevate mood, sharpen cognitive ability, alleviate digestive disorders, relieve insomnia and limit the secretion of stress-related hormones such as insulin and cortisol.

Further research by Benedetti and others showed that the promise of treatment activates areas of the brain involved in weighing the significance of events and the seriousness of threats. "If a fire alarm goes off and you see smoke, you know something bad is going to happen and you get ready to escape," explains Tor Wager, a neuroscientist at Columbia University. "Expectations about pain and pain relief work in a similar way. Placebo treatments tap into this system and orchestrate the responses in your brain and body accordingly."

In other words, one way that placebo aids recovery is by hacking the mind's ability to predict the future. One of the most powerful placebogenic triggers is watching someone else experience the benefits of an alleged drug. Researchers call these social aspects of medicine the therapeutic ritual.

Read More: http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/arc...problem-big-pharmas-desperate-to-solve/page/2

 

[Woolie]

Why Antidepressants Are No Better Than Placebos (Newsweek)

Thanks for posting this @JPV, I read with interest.

But there's a major flaw to this guy's logic. Clinical pharmacological trials typically use placebo controls, double blinding and they randomly allocate participants to treatment/placebo. They produce small effects. Psychotherapy studies - that typically meet none of the standards just mentioned... guess what, show big effects!!! Not at all surprising, the standards of evidence are SO much lower.

Not a fair competition, the psychs will always win, at least till they're held to the same standards as everyone else.

 

[deleder2k]

@JPV, we should ban drugs if we know they do not work at all.

 

[PeterPositive]

It is just a placebo.

If this is making the news in 2015 that does not fill me with faith over the speed with which we're going to be able debunk some of the dodgy CFS stuff floating around.

It doesn't work. Most homeopathy medicine contain only coloured water. It is quackery. If I was PM I would make it illegal.

I'd be careful in making blanket statements. The world is not just black and white and quackery is a phenomenon that is pretty much well distributed across all approaches to medicine.

Surely homeopathy has attracted a lot of bad rap for many different reasons, but these sort of generalization are not helpful, imo.

Keep in mind that most modern homeopathy contain active substances, any dilution below 12C or 24D is actually active and the preparation is very similar to the more scientific sounding approach of "low dose medicine".

There's also a lot of ideology entangled in these sort of discussions, which tend to get highly polarized, making it even more difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff.

cheers