Are you serious? (not about that article which I think says more about the society we live in today rather then anything else - who doesn't want to live in "dreamland" after all!!) ...I mean - I know funding is getting cut - but I am not sure that cancer/cancer patients got the message from our mate dave that in *his* big society there is no place for them...or maybe I am seeing this from the wrong angle - maybe they should talk to themselves and make themselves feel better...sigh!
how about we "fill" containers with "outer space" (which has a density of 10 to 100 hydrogen atoms per cubic meter) and sell it to those who believe in homeopathy as diluted air! the best air that they'll ever breathe, thus completing selling... ...ice to the eskimo's ...sand to the saharans ...air to the homeopaths nice to see one group of people who actually live up to the standard "less is more" ... ... i'm so bored.
What year and where are you studying, out of interest? Here at UCL, we have a whole morning each week dedicated to improving communication and being more complete doctors, which can only be a good step forwards.
That is great to hear. Doctors get some of the crappiest tasks in having to break bad news proposing harrowing treatments and containing patients throughout, and used to get no training in it at all. Unfair on the patient, but also the doctor IMO. So training is very necessary.
We still do. First couple of months of the second year are almost entirely made up of that. It gets old quickly.
I'll be starting in August on the MBBS four year course for graduates at St George's. The course structure does indeed involve a lot of the communication skills, but then the GMC have woken up to the realities (see Future Doctors publication).
I'm a bit more prgmatic and I'd say that if it works I'm well up for it. Placebo is a tricky thing though, I read a while ago that they did a test to find out the effectiveness of placebo, they gave some particpants placebo and told them explicityly "you are being given a placebo" and for some strange reason it worked, all of the subjects had a noticable improvement. it seems like placebo works even if you know it's a placebo.
It does. But then a nocebo works when you know it is a nocebo. When you eat something that you know is alright but you expect to make you feel ill (by association with some unpleasant memory or sensation), you still feel sick. The placebo effect has also grown stronger over the last 50 years, as people have got used to tablets in our daily lives and their supposedly miraculous properties. It would be worth researching the phenomenon and exploiting it --with the patient's knowledge and consent-- rather than colluding with magical thinking. Evidence-based practice, remember? Homeopathy has none.
Do you not feel it a bit morally reprehensible to represent something that effectively does nothing as though it does something? While I don't specifically object to the notion of an informed populace, I just see it as being a bit dubious to give ourselves snake-oil in hopes that we can fool ourselves healthy. Placebo's and nocebo's have their place (hypochondriacs), but I don't believe we should give them as much credit as practises like homeopathy would demand, or allow them as substitutes for patients in dire circumstances.
I'm surprised that the OP has picked homeopathy as an enemy of rationality. There are far larger threats to rationalism. (hint, religion)
Amount spent by the NHS on homeopathy per year (est): £4m Amount spent by the NHS on faith healing per year (est): £0 </derail> Also, this made me snicker.
I know someone that does homeopathy and acupuncture, He has a program on his laptop which gives him questions to ask which he enters and the program tells him what treatment to give. As for the acupuncture he did a six week course and took the exams home with him and passed of course, He hasn't got clue about it.
We've crossed that river many times already, so I felt we should leave the horse lay, rather than kick it once more. I don't doubt that religious belief is far more powerful and destructive a force, but it is too indoctrinated and defended within our culture to lay bare and decloak as practises like homeopathy, acupuncture, chiropracty, "faith" healing (which most religious leaders would say is an aside from so-called "real" or mainstream religion), vitamin/mineral supplements, herbalism, naturopathy, ayurveda, and the ilk. There is a great deal of distractive garbage in our world; this is just one topic. If you should so wish to discuss other such ills of society (or indeed the veracity of calling such things "ills") I would happily do so, but within the context of their own threads. I would actually welcome the addition of controversial debate topics within this forum.
Religion does have its place in the NHS in offering psychological comfort to those of faith. That is proven to be beneficial for them. But the chaplaincy service does not claim to heal the sick by prayer or blessing, nor does it claim to have a scientific rationale.
'A threat to rationality?' Can there really be any threat to 'rationality'? * strokes chin and ponders *
But then someone thinking irrationally would not then be a rational thinker and so the rational thinking that still exists won't be threatened... Confusing myself now. Starting to stray into 'known knowns' territory.
Sorry to re-open an old thread, but I haven't dropped by this part of the forums in a while. What I would like to see is for homeopathy to be subject to the same regulations as proper medicine: namely that it has to prove efficacy for it to be sold as "medicine". Otherwise it should carry a big fat warning label that reads: "THIS PRODUCT HAS NO MEDICINAL EFFECT". If this were to happen, you'd soon see the sales of the stuff drying up. Homeopathy is currently excluded from such regulations, and that alone beggars belief. Tim Minchin also puts it rather well: "I've got a degree in homeopathic medicine!!!" "You've got a degree in baloney!" (From Futurama's Crimes of the Hot ). The problem is that it does not work - homeopathy is not efficacious, it has no scientifically measurable effect. In fact it goes against many established scientific principles: the fact that the stuff is diluted to the point where there is not a signle molecule of the original substance left should be a big warning sign. The placebo effect may come into play, but most people aren't aware of that - all they see is: I felt ill, I took this stuff, then I got better. Ignoring that what really happened was that they felt ill, they took a sugar pill that did nothing other than make them feel good about taking it, then they got better because the body dealt with/fought off whatever was making them ill in the first place. Once people get into that mind set, they start substituting real medicine for homeopathy when they have serious conditions that require proper medical attention.
