How can we say alternative medicines orks weather they are unscintefic and unproven?

Question

aromatherepy, acupunture, naturopathy, homeopathy, ayureda, yoga, prayer and herbal treatments

Answer 1

We actually have no idea WHY antidepressants work- We have theories but have no real proof as to why...but because it is "science" it is okay that we don't know why.

We have been using cholesterol lowering drugs for YEARS now...but new research shows that cholesterol may have NOTHING to do with risk of heart attack.

Prayer and meditation are scientifically proven to change brain wave patterns. Lots of medicines come from herbal beginnings.

I'm not saying that everything that is "natural" is good for you- arsenic is natural- I don't want to eat any! But just because something can't be quantified doesn't mean it doesn't have a positive effect- even if it is simply placebo.

Answer 2

Natural medicine does not lend itself to the same sorts of clinical trials as allopathic medicine. We do not go from diagnosis of condition to predetermined treatment. Treatments for conditions are determined on an individual basis so the narrow range of inquirey used in western medicine does not fit with any of the older medicine traditions.

Many clinical trials into medicines such as herbs and homeopathics do not use the medicines in the same way that a natural medicine practitioner would use them and so, surprise, they don't work. For example, they are often wrongly prescribed for conditions, the wrong dose is used or they are not used for the correct period of time.

It is not true that natural medicines are unproven though. Some of them have been used effectively for thousands of years. Patient's go to a clinic, use natural medicine and their condition improves. This is proof from a real world context.  There are also some good clinical trials that prove the efficacy of these medicines but not many because there isn't enough money in it for pharamceutical companies.

Many medicines used in allopathy aren't properly "proven" either. For example, vaccinations aren't subjected to the gold standard medical inquirey - the placebo controlled, double blind multicentre cross-over trial. And yet, we say they are proven and effective.

Answer 3

Because as we all know Science is part of a big conspiracy to keep these cheap and effective treatments from us.

A number of the above have been subjected to scientific experiments and alas for the revolutionaries fighting to make sure we all get these effective panaceas don't seem to work.

Homeopathy has been totally shot to pieces in well designed clinical trials. Intercessory prayer has been tested as well and shown not to work, and acupuncture is no better than placebo (and the experimental design for trick needles in these were very clever!). Yoga is just stretching, and that's good for you, but has no special powers to cure disease. Herbal treatments could work because herbs are drugs. Each herb has to be evaluated individually.

But again, this is all part of the big conspiracy to keep the people from getting cheap cures for cancer which Big Pharma has but won't reveal because they get rich off not letting us have (which makes me wonder why someone as clever to make such a conspiracy work so well was dumb enough to try to cure cancer in the first place, much less succeed).

Answer 4

This is a big question in today's world. I can can only speak about homeopathy, based on my personal and professional experience. Homeopathy was the only thing (conventional or natural) to change my health from a bedridden state as a single mom in my early 30's, to healthier than I'd been for the previous 20 years. Before that, I had successfully used it for my animals and infant daughter. I wanted to effectively offer this healing modality to others, so became a homeopath. Science is a tricky thing, because homeopathy is highly scientific. Emphasis on what constitutes "science" is largely based on individual opinion. Like the saying actions speak louder than words, though, my experience bears out that we may also apply this wisdom to health care.

Answer 5

I agree with many of the answers above. And I add my own experience:

School medicine is ALSO unscientific. It must not be confused with Pharmacy which has to be scientific (= tests are reproducible and will give the same results in 70 + some % of the cases).

This is not the case with Medicine which proposes various medicaments (= trial-and-error method) to the patient and in the end perhaps surgery (which may not work either). Plus all the trial-and-error diagnoses in a lot of cases (and the errors of diagnosis which we never hear about!).  Never let a medical doctor tell you that his/her methods are scientific! That is absolutely not the case.

And this is the big problem for us Alternative Practitioners: they demand of us what they themselves can't provide, i.e. - that the one and same solution shall work on different people in 70 ++ % of cases.

This CANNOT be, will NEVER be and MUST never be the case for alternative health methods. Our methods work because they are specifically tailored to the needs of each client. Acupuncture is, homeopathy is, kinesiology is, aromatherapy is, hypnotherapy is.

They HAVE to be. We are all different, with different genes, different lifestyles, different life experiences, different emotions and thought patterns. Thank God! We ARE all different. Why try to cure us all in the same way even if the disease appears to be the same? The cause will definitely be different.

That's why school medicine often fails. Precisely because they try to cure all symptoms in the same way with everyone. And yes: they do try to cure symptoms, and rarely the cause. You can't cure a symptom. A symptom is simply the body telling you that something is wrong. "Curing" a symptom is making the body shut up. That's all.

It's like trying the remove the smoke and let the flames continue to burn. Yet, they firmly believe in that and don't understand when the same patient returns 6 months later with a new set of symptoms. They take it as a new problem instead of seeing it as the body having found a new way of saying that the original cause has not yet been cured.

Let us remain unscientific and let our alternative methods work. We have nothing to prove to school medicine or to the rest of the world. I have yet to see school medicine curing MS, ME or chronic hepatitis, or reversing Parkinson's or helping Down syndrome people function perfectly normally. Kinesiology can do that, but will never be reckoned as scientific because a different approach is used for each and every patient. And thank God for that too! It works!

Another important and necessary difference between us and school medicine is that alternative practitioners think nothing of using one whole hour with each patient to find out how to tailor the solution to that patient. You will never see a GP using more than 10 to 15 minutes with one patient. What can they possibly achieve in 10 minutes?  Fooling the world? I think they mostly fool themselves!

Take care! All the best to you!

Answer 6

Clinical trials are subject to error and agencies are subject to corruption. Many of the medicines in use today have not been tested for long term effects on humans (ten or more years of use). That's why some teenagers are adversely affected by antidepressants, and they are moved to suicide by the chemical imbalance those "scientifically proven" medications cause. Why should we trust government agencies that can't even keep our schools running, to regulate what cures we use in our own bodies? If something has been used for hundreds or thousands of years, I'd trust that more than some new drug that just came on the market.

Answer 7

many alternative medicines and natural ways of healing HAVE been proven to work, and have been used with good results for hundreds, even thousands of years.  some of them also have the backing and funding of the scientific and/or medical community.  many alternative medicines are used in or to compliment allopathic medicines.