Category Archives: General

Edzard Ernst on How to Spot Medical Nonsense

Edzard Ernst is well known as an “insider” in the world of alternative medicine who has come to see the need for rational, scientific analysis and evidence to justify inflicting any treatment of whatever provenance on patients. His book, with … Continue reading

Posted in General | 13 Comments

Dr. Walt’s Warning Signs of Quackery

I ran across a series of posts from a physician which I think do a thorough job of identifying warning signs of unscientific, irrational or outright quack medical treatments. They’re not organized in a particularly systematic way, but they cover … Continue reading

Posted in General | 15 Comments

Holistic Vet Asks, “IF CAM doesn’t work, why is it allowed?”

A certain “holistic” veterinarian about whom I’ve written before (here, here, here, and—well, you get the idea) has asked a couple of good questions on his own blog, though not surprisingly I don’t find his answers at all convincing. I’m … Continue reading

Posted in General, Law, Regulation, and Politics | 7 Comments

Uncertainty-What It Means and What It Doesn’t

It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn’t get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before … Continue reading

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The Placebo Effect In Song

Happy Birthday, SketpVet! 🙂 Today marks the first anniversary of this blog. Not a momentous event for the world at large, but yet another reminder of the fleeting nature of time for me. Apparently, in the last year I have … Continue reading

Posted in General, Humor | 4 Comments

Don’t Be Such a Scientist or The Negating Culture of Science and its Costs

I recently finished reading Randy Olson’s book Don’t Be Such a Scientist, and I definitely recommend it. It is an entertaining read and has a number of useful insights into the perennial problem of communicating complex, nuanced, and incomplete scientific … Continue reading

Posted in Book Reviews, General | 4 Comments

Evaluating Medical Advice and Credentials on the Internet

Dr. Susan Wynn, a veterinarian and veterinary nutritionist who promotes “holistic” veterinary medicine, has put up a couple of blog posts recently which I rather liked, so I thought I’d comment briefly on them. I more commonly find myself disagreeing … Continue reading

Posted in General | 13 Comments

Therapies to Soothe all Four Legs–From the NY Times

There was a scary article yesterday in the New York Times talking about the popularity of a variety of CAM therapies for racehorses. It is a laundry list of nonsense complete with outrageous prices and weak rationalizations. I also thought … Continue reading

Posted in General, Miscellaneous CAVM | 7 Comments

Veterinary Quackery–Circa 1921

I recently ran across an edition of the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association from 1921 which contained a few tidbits that I found interesting concerning the distinction between scientifically trained veterinarians and their “empirical” competitors. Such documents are … Continue reading

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“Holistic Medicine”–It means whatever we say it means

The American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association (AHVMA) has a statement on their web site explaining what “holistic” medicine is. I was interested in this because it’s a slippery word, seemingly simple on the surface but hard to pin down. Superficially, … Continue reading

Posted in General | 13 Comments