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Naturopath Education vs Med School

kellyb said:
Well, to be fair, rather a lot actually have been properly tested and found ineffective. That information just appears to be omitted from the curriculum at Woo Schools where you can get your degree in the cornucopia of woo known as "naturopathy".
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In the interest of fairness, yes, I would have to concede. :)
 
kellyb said:
Well, to be fair, rather a lot actually have been properly tested and found ineffective.
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And (again, to be fair) every now and then one of them is tested and found to work. Then it ceases to be alternative medicine.
 
kellyb said:
So what's the point of naturopathy?
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I'd guess that most woo-med use has a socio-economic origin.
When you can't afford to see a doctor, you'll try something else.
Some of the something else can even be effective, almost inadvertently.

Some herbs, for instance, have useful drugs in them, even in their crude state.
Science has not rejected this; quite the opposite.
It has removed the harmful akaloids, for instance, or made a synthetic copy of the useful one.
 
quarky said:
I'd guess that most woo-med use has a socio-economic origin.
When you can't afford to see a doctor, you'll try something else.
Some of the something else can even be effective, almost inadvertently.

Some herbs, for instance, have useful drugs in them, even in their crude state.
Science has not rejected this; quite the opposite.
It has removed the harmful akaloids, for instance, or made a synthetic copy of the useful one.
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But that isn't the point of naturopathy, that's the point of medicine. Naturopathic use of herbs cannot control for potency and side effects and they don't have the extensive pharmacology backgrounds to know, understand and look for drug interactions. I'd rather be healed intentionally and safely than just get lucky inadvertently.
 
Doing what, and in what capacity did you "switch" to "natural medicine" (or whatever).
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Exactly why is this relevant? While I was in school I was a Nurses Aide Worker in the oncology department. Later I moved to a Long Term facility but still worked with cancer patients. I then went on to do home care while they lived out their days at home. I had 4 in home patients die and I did not deal very well with it. Also there was a lot of politics in the hospital. There was a lot of over-medicating in the long term facilities. AND IMHO there was a lot of medicating period to patients thought to be psychotic. They were not, they were just contrary old birds who were vocal. These and many other factors are reasons I switched over to Natural Health. Again, why is this relevant?
 
Estellea said:
I'd rather be healed intentionally and safely than just get lucky inadvertently.
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You don't always have that choice.

Sometimes you can't afford the "intentional" healing.
Sometimes it's simply not available.

As Moloch put it in Watchman: "You know the kind of cancer you get better from? Well, that ain't the kind of cancer I got." As you might expect, he was popping any pill he could get his hands on on the off chance that it might succeed where the doctors had already admitted failure.

And sometimes you just don't want the intentional healing, because the doctors have a nasty habit -- mandated by law -- of telling you the downsides as well as the upsides of a treatment. So, sure, this pill will cure your disease, after causing all your hair and teeth to fall out. If someone else says that their pill can do the same thing, "without the side effects" (as the quacks are so prone to advertise), it sounds like a much better deal.

The real problem is that people believe advertisements, and that there's usually no way to keep the quacks from advertising.
 
quarky said:
I'd guess that most woo-med use has a socio-economic origin.
When you can't afford to see a doctor, you'll try something else.
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I'd guess it has more to do with fitting in with pre-existing new agey beliefs, combined with vague and incorrect notions about how humans adapted to their environment, or ID.

But politically, cheap woo "medicine" has been promoted before (in part) for the sake of cost-control.
http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/?p=505
 
WitchyWoman said:
Exactly why is this relevant? While I was in school I was a Nurses Aide Worker in the oncology department. Later I moved to a Long Term facility but still worked with cancer patients. I then went on to do home care while they lived out their days at home. I had 4 in home patients die and I did not deal very well with it. Also there was a lot of politics in the hospital. There was a lot of over-medicating in the long term facilities. AND IMHO there was a lot of medicating period to patients thought to be psychotic. They were not, they were just contrary old birds who were vocal. These and many other factors are reasons I switched over to Natural Health. Again, why is this relevant?
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Do you work in natural health (or have you in the past)?
 
Naturopath Education vs Med School
"NEITHER" (waisting your time and money)

Have discovered a CURE for ALL disease including CANCER and you, them and they HAVE NOT!

Bruce Voigt Science
 
Estellea said:
But that isn't the point of naturopathy, that's the point of medicine. Naturopathic use of herbs cannot control for potency and side effects and they don't have the extensive pharmacology backgrounds to know, understand and look for drug interactions. I'd rather be healed intentionally and safely than just get lucky inadvertently.
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Sure,who wouldn't?
Actually, when I mentioned socio-economic factors, I was thinking more third world than superstitious yuppies. That's a billion or so folks.

I'm not insured, and eschew doctors as much as possible. I also self-medicate, at times, with plants that I can grow in my garden or harvest from the forest.
Its hard to beat an infusion of the inner bark of the slippery elm, for instance, for a non-threatening up-set stomach. Senna is good as an occasional laxative. Extracts of that plant are still prescribed by M.D.s, btw.

The difference for me is in having a background in chemistry and medicine. I don't accept the package deal of natural. In fact, I have several plants in my garden that would kill you if you drank and infusion of their dried leaves.
Others, all legal, would make you crazy and give you the runs at the same time.
 
I've worked in Natural Health ever since the oncology ward, which was 1989. I am not in a clinic anymore but do still consult when asked. I'm a registered nutritionist. I still do home care.

and again, why is this relevant? I don't see you asking everyone else for their occupations.
 
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WitchyWoman said:
FLS, you are so far off base that you aren't even in the same playing field. Denying the origins of medicine is ridiculous.
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It is not the case that the body of knowledge built up around the use of herbs was a progressive endeavour which has culminated in our current practice. Rather herbs and other natural substances were used in a way which didn't allow practitioners to discover whether or not they were effective or harmful, except when their effects were overt and straightforward. As we have shifted to a scientific approach to medicine, we have had to discard the bulk of body knowledge surrounding the traditional use of herbs as useless.

The majority of our medicines in current use have a natural source. Yet traditional use failed to discover the vast majority of those uses while suggesting many that were ineffective. To suggest that folk medicine serves as the origin of medicine is to say that the throwing of bones in order to discover the cause of a disease serves as the origin of the MRI machine.

Linda
 
WitchyWoman said:
Well then, you , yourself just proved that they work beyond a placebo effect. Nicely done.
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No, I didn't "prove" anything. See I made a comment, an opinion, and this is not PROOF. you do know what proof is right? What I said was, there are herbs that have medicinal value. These herbs contain the medicines within them. Every medical doctor on this forum will tell you this. No one here has said any different. Digitalis is a good example. What does this have to do with (A) the educational qualifications of an ND, or (B) as to whether what they practice is valid scientifically or medically?

No absolutely not. Well you can, I would pay good money to see that. I've said before there are lots of 'practices' that never evolved and we realize now, did not stand up to the test of time and efficacy. Not long ago we supported the use of lobotomies and electric shock therapy but we know better now.
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Fine then, bring out the list of therapies that ND's use that have scientific proof (in the form of Metanalysis of DBRCTs) that they work.

Incidently, Electric Shock Therapy is still used, and effective in some cases of resistant depression.

As for lobotomies, well I swear to god when I argue with some people they convince me they have had them...present company excluded, of course.

TAM:)
 
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*chuckling* I guess you missed the sarcasm. I was being facetious.

You stated that you 'knew for a fact' and then in the same breath asked me to prove more then anecdotal.
 
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