MPs recommend the NHS stop funding homeopathy

[touchingcloth]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/8524926.stm
A rare triumph of rational thought - hopefully the advice will be followed and the money that was once sunk into homeopathy will be put to good use.

The House of Commons Science and Technology Committee said using public money on the highly-diluted remedies could not be justified.

The cross-party group said there was no evidence beyond a placebo effect, when a patient gets better because of their belief that the treatment works.

[DannyM]

I think the NHS should not be so hasty as the jury is well and truly out regarding homeopathy. If the NHS would like to save money then perhaps it should focus its radar on over-management and crude waste. Here are just two examples...

http://www.publicfinance.co.uk/news/200 ... -alliance/

http://www.nursesforreformblog.com/2009 ... -alliance/

There are many more where these came from.

[touchingcloth]

Yep - they are certainly fond of throwing cash away.

In the case of homeopathy though there's no excuse for funding it.

[DannyM]

Yep - they are certainly fond of throwing cash away.

In the case of homeopathy though there's no excuse for funding it.

Okay TC, since we're on the same level regarding gross NHS waste I'll keep the rest of my links in the locker Homeopathy though is far from a waste when there is evidence- albeit nowhere near conclusive- that the effects of homeopathy work far beyond the placebo effect. Some patients, e.g. MS sufferers, rely on homeopathy alone to ease their pain; and it *does* ease their pain. Now the majority of these patients are National health patients. Surely the NHS has no business turning its back on these patients?

[touchingcloth]

Okay TC, since we're on the same level regarding gross NHS waste I'll keep the rest of my links in the locker Homeopathy though is far from a waste when there is evidence- albeit nowhere near conclusive- that the effects of homeopathy work far beyond the placebo effect. Some patients, e.g. MS sufferers, rely on homeopathy alone to ease their pain; and it *does* ease their pain. Now the majority of these patients are National health patients. Surely the NHS has no business turning its back on these patients?

I've no doubt that it does ease their pain, but it does so under false auspices. Whilst there might be something to be said for knowingly prescribing sugarpills in addition to quality one-on-one patient care, I think doing so goes against the ethics of medical care (because all of the best-controlled trials have shown repeatedly that homeopathy performs no better than placebo).

The NHS should not turn their back on these patients, but the recent MP report is correct to acknowledge that homeopathy is an expensive way of delivering a treatment that is not - pharmacologically speaking - efficacious.

[DannyM]

I've no doubt that it does ease their pain, but it does so under false auspices. Whilst there might be something to be said for knowingly prescribing sugarpills in addition to quality one-on-one patient care, I think doing so goes against the ethics of medical care (because all of the best-controlled trials have shown repeatedly that homeopathy performs no better than placebo).

The NHS should not turn their back on these patients, but the recent MP report is correct to acknowledge that homeopathy is an expensive way of delivering a treatment that is not - pharmacologically speaking - efficacious.

This is from Dana Ullman, expert in homeopathic medicine:

"Homeopathic medicines are made through a specific pharmacological process of dilution and vigorous shaking. However, when sceptics say that there is nothing but water in homeopathic medicine, they are proving their ignorance, despite the incredible arrogance in which they make these assertions. Dr. Martin Chaplin, a respected British professor who is one of the world's experts on water, has verified that "homeopathic water" and "regular water" are not the same, and his review of almost 2,000 references to the scientific literature on water (!) confirm this fact.

Homeopathic medicines can and should be considered to be a type of "nanopharmacology" Although the word "nano" also means one-billionth of a size, that is not its only definition. In fact, "nano" derives from the word "dwarf," and "nano" is the only word in the English language that is used on common parlance as denoting extremely small AND yet extremely powerful. Homeopathic medicines are both extremely small in dose and yet extremely powerful in their therapeutic effect."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dana-ullm ... 89146.html

There are certainly experts who support homeopathic medicine and while the evidence is still ambiguous I think we should hold fire. Like I said, if the NHS
wants to save money (and I am very suspicious of this) then all it need to is cut the waste in which it so wantonly indulges.

[touchingcloth]

I've come across that Ullman article before - his claim that "homeopathic water is not the same as regular water" doesn't hold water (hur hur), and certainly doesn't warrant the extrapolation that homeopathy is therefore clinically effective,

When the literature is considered, the evidence for homeopathy is not at all ambiguous - there is a clear pattern that the better designed a study is, the more any effect over placebo vanishes to zero. So not only is homeopathy implausible at the outset (at dilutions above a certain level - the most potent ones, according to practitioners - remedies contains not a single molecule of active substance), but the clinical evidence shows that it is no more effective than placebo.