BBC website pushing sCAM (why am I not surprised?)

 
I just visited the BBC pages to remind myself of what was there.

This page;

http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/healthy_living/complementary_medicine/therapies_chiropractic.shtml

threw up an error message at the end of its body text.

"A medical opinion
Professor George Lewith, head of the complementary medicine research unit at Southampton's University's school of medicine, says: "Chiropractic is widely available and used by many people for all sorts of aches and pains, particularly back pain. Many patients report considerable benefit from visiting chiropractors, but there's a real need for more research so we can understand more about this important and widely available treatment."

[an error occurred while processing this directive]"

I love that. Does the BBC's webserver itself have more critical ability than the authors of the page?
 
Badly Shaved Monkey said:
I just visited the BBC pages to remind myself of what was there.

This page;

http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/healthy_living/complementary_medicine/therapies_chiropractic.shtml

threw up an error message at the end of its body text.

"A medical opinion
Professor George Lewith, head of the complementary medicine research unit at Southampton's University's school of medicine, says: "Chiropractic is widely available and used by many people for all sorts of aches and pains, particularly back pain. Many patients report considerable benefit from visiting chiropractors, but there's a real need for more research so we can understand more about this important and widely available treatment."

[an error occurred while processing this directive]"

I love that. Does the BBC's webserver itself have more critical ability than the authors of the page?
Click to expand...
George Lewith is enough to upset anyone's system. He certainly turns my stomach.
 
Badly Shaved Monkey said:
Does the BBC's webserver itself have more critical ability than the authors of the page?
Click to expand...

:D

A little rant...

Elsewhere on that page it says that the General Chiropractic Council (GCC) is responsible for regulating, developing and promoting chiropractic in the UK, that it maintains a register of qualified chiropractors, and that it will deal with any serious complaints.

But does that offer any real assurances to the public? Remembering that the GCC was initially established to protect the public and set standards of chiropractic education and practice, let’s take a look at its new
FAQ page:

http://www.gcc-uk.org/files/page_file/DRAFT ANSWERS TO FAQs March 07.pdf

Under ‘Is chiropractic safe?’ it says “Yes, all the evidence is that chiropractic is a safe and effective form of care.”

Oh really?....

Cerebrovascular Complications Associated with Spinal Manipulation

…serious cerebrovascular complications of spinal manipulation continue to be reported. Their incidence is unknown. Large and rigorous prospective studies are necessary in order to define the risks of spinal manipulation accurately.

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/maney/ptr/2004/00000009/00000001/art00002

[my bold]
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If the true incidence of serious complications following spinal manipulation is currently unknown, how on earth can the GCC possibly claim that chiropractic is safe? Surely saying that chiropractic is thought to be safe would be a fairer representation of the facts.

More on the matter in this May 2007 six-page magazine article:
"A deadly twist - Chiropractors are causing strokes in young, healthy women. Read this before your next appointment.”
http://www.self.com/livingwell/articles/2007/04/0507chiropractors_1_of_6

And more here as well:

Adverse events associated with chiropractic care of children.

A systematic review has identified 34 cases in which spinal
manipulation in children was associated with adverse events. [Vohra
S. Adverse events associated with pediatric spinal manipulation: A
systematic review. Pediatrics 119(1) January 2007, pp. e275-e283]
http://pediatrics.aappublications.o...INDEX=0&volume=119&issue=1&resourcetype=HWCIT
Fourteen of the cases involved "direct" events in which the treatment
was followed by death, serious injury, symptoms requiring medical
attention, or soreness. The rest involved "indirect" events in which
appropriate diagnosis was delayed and/or inappropriate manipulation
was done for serious medical conditions such as meningitis. The
reviewers commented that despite the fact that spinal manipulation is
widely used on children, pediatric safety data are virtually
nonexistent. This type of review cannot determine how often adverse
events occur. That would require a prospective study with active
surveillance. The article did not consider harmful aspects of
chiropractic care that are far more common than the reported events.
These include (a) decreased use of immunization due to misinformation
given to parents, (b) psychologic harm related to unnecessary
treatment, (c) psychologic harm caused by exposure to false
chiropractic beliefs about "subluxations,"
http://www.chirobase.org/01General/chirosub.html and (d) financial
harm due to unnecessary treatment.

[my bold]
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Interesting that point [c] above remarks that a harmful aspect of chiropractic care is psychologic harm caused by exposure to false chiropractic beliefs about “subluxations”. And yet according to the GCC’s FAQ page, subluxations are genuine lesions:

Q. What is a subluxation and is it dangerous?

A. As used by chiropractors the term ‘subluxation’ doesn’t mean something that poses any danger to you. A subluxation is simply the name give to a joint that does not function and/or move as well as it can. Alternatively, a chiropractor may say a joint is misaligned. This may influence the way the body functions. A chiropractic subluxation may not be seen on an x-ray because x-rays look for changes in the structure of joints, not problems with function and movement.
Click to expand...

Hasn’t the GCC read the Crelin study that debunks chiropractic subluxation theory?
http://www.chirobase.org/02Research/crelin.html

And what about these two excellent factual articles on chiropractic?

http://www.skeptics.org.uk/article.php?dir=articles&article=chiropractic.php
http://www.ukskeptics.com/factsheets/Chiropractic.pdf


With the official chiropractic line leaving a lot to be desired, I’m seriously thinking about writing to the BBC again asking for some of the above sceptical links to be included in the external links section of its chiropractic page.
 
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Blue Wode said:
:D

A little rant...

snipped


With the official chiropractic line leaving a lot to be desired, I’m seriously thinking about writing to the BBC again asking for some of the above sceptical links to be included in the external links section of its chiropractic page.
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Oh yes, please do. They are rather on the back foot right now, and have agreed to include sceptical links so the more the merrier.
 
Asolepius said:
Oh yes, please do. They are rather on the back foot right now, and have agreed to include sceptical links so the more the merrier.
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Well I see some progress. On http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/healthy_living/complementary_medicine/therapies_chiropractic.shtml we have a link to one of the site you mentioned above

What's the evidence?
Studies have suggested that chiropractic can be effective in the treatment of low back pain, and it may help to ease non-migraine headaches and certain types of joint pain, but not all research results have been favourable. Some studies have been inconclusive owing to poor design, so more high-quality research is needed.

Some review studies are available online from Cochrane Reviews, which provides independent evidence on specific healthcare topics.

The NHS Complementary and Alternative Medicine Specialist Library also has research on chiropractic.
Click to expand...
 
Stitch said:
Well I see some progress. On http://www.bbc.co.uk/health/healthy_living/complementary_medicine/therapies_chiropractic.shtml we have a link to one of the site you mentioned above
Click to expand...
Well yes, but the Cochrane Reviews are no longer free, and they would do much better with Bandolier. The NHS CAM Library is hopeless on this topic. The link goes to a page which says `no results found', and if you try to navigate to chiropractic the links are circular. I think the BBC is trying, but very feebly.
 
 
sCAM section deleted from BBC Health website

A big update on this:

Last week the controllers of BBC Health (www.bbc.co.uk/health http://www.bbc.co.uk/health), the health section on one of the most accessed websites in the world, decided to remove all coverage of complementary medicine! They used to have substantial coverage with over 40 pages on this subject covering all the major therapies, their pros and cons, evidence for their effectiveness, how to find a qualified practitioner, etc.

However the site has in recent months been sent a deluge of letters and emails claiming that complementary therapies such as homeopathy and cranial osteopathy should be removed. As a result large chunks of this part of the site were simply removed overnight and now, following recent cutbacks, it was decided that, rather than update this part of the site, it should simply be removed altogether!

It may seem incredible that a public service site this prominent can deem complementary medicine so insignificant that it no longer warrants any coverage other than the odd news story. This is despite the fact that complementary medicine is used favourably by a significant proportion of the population (recent surveys have estimated that around 1 in 5 Britons use it at some point or other) and that increasing numbers of people are now seeking to train in these therapies.

However, as the 'quack busters' become more organised and active, evidence of the backlash against complementary medicine is appearing all over the place - such as the removal of PCT funding for homeopathy, the threatened closure of the homeopathic hospitals, many negative news stories in the press and so on.

Rather than taking a reasoned view and considering the evidence from good research studies on complementary medicine some groups seem simply hell bent on trying to 'stamp out' complementary medicine in any way possible. The BBCi removal of complementary medicine coverage (which has been in place for almost 15 years!) is one example.

More...
http://www.cybermed.it/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=17240&Itemid=134
Click to expand...
 
Nice pile of straw. Accusing people concerned about others and wanting to make sure things WORK of just being activists bent on "stamping out" sCAM.

Hypocrites.

Good thing there's only 1 in 5 dupes, instead of 4 out of 5 getting duped.

When the "evidence for" sCAM is actually examined it is always found lacking. No matter, the anecdotes are penned and still used over and over and over again. No matter that the mountain of anecdotes include people that delayed getting real treatment and DIED. Those anecdotes aren't weeded out, but that's okay... the scammers still add to their mountainous pile of anecdotal doo doo.
 
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However the site has in recent months been sent a deluge of letters and emails claiming that complementary therapies such as homeopathy and cranial osteopathy should be removed.
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The people have spoken. To everyone who wrote to the BBC, many many thanks. I had an exchange which went on for months, At every stage the BBC refused to admit there was anything wrong, but still removed the pages bit by bit. There are though still some isolated pages in among the ones on specific diseases, eg arthritis. These need to be mopped up.


Rather than taking a reasoned view and considering the evidence from good research studies on complementary medicine some groups seem simply hell bent on trying to 'stamp out' complementary medicine in any way possible.
Click to expand...
Er, not quite right. The whole point is that people have been asking the BBC to look at the evidence, and they came to an inevitable conclusion.
 
rjh01 said:
But I look forward to the day when people go to sites like JREF for information on alternative medicine.
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On WikiPedia, Dana Ullman wanted references to all the usual homeopath organisations, I suggested a number of bloggers to balance these as there are no anti-CAM official organisations. Dana went into a minor rant about JREF. His experience here has obviously scarred him as JREF wasn't in my list.:D. Must now add it.
 
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