Talk:Complementary and alternative medicine/Archive 2

message: The terms "alternative medicine", "complementary medicine" and "CAM" are generally understood in terms of their relationship to mainstream medicine, as described above.alternative medicine Function: noun: "any of various systems of healing or treating disease (as chiropractic, homeopathy, or faith healing) not included in the traditional medical curricula taught in the United States and Britain." ; retrieved from Merriam-Webster Online on 5 August 2006.
Other definitions exist that are based on or include other criteria.
David M. Eisenberg relies on a "usage-based" definition, based on its inclusion in medical school curricula, and defines it as
: "medical interventions not taught widely at U.S. medical schools or generally available at U.S. hospitals."Unconventional Medicine in the United States -- Prevalence, Costs, and Patterns of Use. Eisenberg D, et al. N Engl J Med 1993; 328:246-252.
Marcia Angell, former editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine, takes exception to his definition and relies on an "evidence-based (EBM)" definition, based on its relation to scientifically proven evidence of effectivity (or lack thereof):
: "That is not a very satisfactory definition, especially since many alternative remedies have recently found their way into the medical mainstream....There cannot be two kinds of medicine - conventional and alternative. There is only medicine that has been adequately tested and medicine that has not, medicine that works and medicine that may or may not work. Once a treatment has been tested rigorously, it no longer matters whether it was considered alternative at the outset. If it is found to be reasonably safe and effective, it will be accepted."
Others like George D. Lundberg, former editor of  the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), and Phil B. Fontanarosa,  Senior Editor of JAMA, share Angell's use of an EBM definition:
: "There is no alternative medicine. There is only scientifically proven, evidence-based medicine supported by solid data or unproven medicine, for which scientific evidence is lacking. Whether a therapeutic practice is 'Eastern' or 'Western,' is unconventional or mainstream, or involves mind-body techniques or molecular genetics is largely irrelevant except for historical purposes and cultural interest. As believers in science and evidence, we must focus on fundamental issues-namely, the patient, the target disease or condition, the proposed or practiced treatment, and the need for convincing data on safety and therapeutic efficacy."Alternative medicine meets science. Fontanarosa P.B., and Lundberg G.D. JAMA. 1998; 280: 1618-1619. 
Richard Dawkins, Professor of the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford,Simonyi Professorship web site also uses an EBM definition:
: "Alternative medicine is defined as that set of practices which cannot be tested, refuse to be tested, or consistently fail tests. If a healing technique is demonstrated to have curative properties in properly controlled double-blind trials, it ceases to be alternative. It simply...becomes medicine."A callous world. Richard Holloway. Book review Richard Dawkins A Devil's Chaplain. The Guardian, February 15, 2003. He also states that "There is no alternative medicine. There is only medicine that works and medicine that doesn't work."
The last three professionals use a definition that is based on the objectively verifiable criteria of  the scientific method, not one based on the changing curriculums of various medical schools. According to them it is possible for a method to change categories (main stream vs. alternative) in either direction, based on increased knowledge of its effectiveness or lack thereof.
Well-known proponents of evidence-based medicine who study CAM, such as the Cochrane Collaboration and Edzard Ernst, Professor of Complementary Medicine at the University of Exeter, have retained CAM's generally-accepted definition and do not define CAM as Dawkins does. In their view, there can be "good CAM" or "bad CAM" based on evidentiary support.The Cochrane Collaboration Complementary Medicine Field, www.compmed.umm.edu/Cochrane/index.html. Retrieved 5 August 2006.The HealthWatch Award 2005: Prof. Edzard Ernst
Complementary medicine: the good the bad and the ugly.  www.healthwatch-uk.org/awardwinners/edzardernst.html, retrieved 5 August 2006"Complementary medicine is diagnosis, treatment and/or prevention which complements mainstream medicine by contributing to a common whole, by satisfying a demand not met by orthodoxy or by diversifying the conceptual frameworks of medicine."  Ernst et al British General Practitioner 1995; 45:506
-- Fyslee 06:32, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Alternative definitions 

message: To begin with, this really isn't English.  But what's far more problematic is that assertion that this estimate was made in 2002.  Cassilith doesn't cite a source for this estimate, so there's no way of telling when this estimate was made.  In addition, of course, if we want to report 1995-2005 growth rates, we should be reporting growth rates, not estimates.  Guettarda (talk) 06:51, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Really?

message: Let decide what it's going to be? "Relationship between alternative and conventional medicine" or "Migration from alternative to medicine." Either that or we can keep bouncing back and forth. Maybe give equal time to both. ;) Anthon01 (talk) 04:09, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Migration from alternative to medicine -- John Gohde (talk) 04:20, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

text: We're writing in English.  "Migration from alternative to medicine" is gibberish.  Guettarda (talk) 06:52, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Relationship or Migration

message: Here's a link that may be useful:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3859/is_200401/ai_n9362735
It's a longer book review of the book that is summarized in one paragraph in this reference used in the article:
Cassileth, Barrie R. (2002). "The Role of Complementary & Alternative Medicine: Accommodating Pluralism.". NEJM 347: 860-861. 
I'm posting it here in case anyone wants to check it out.   --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 08:38, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  a more detailed review of a footnoted reference 

message: I for one cannot tell what the heck has been updated on this talk page without spending all day on it.  Can the editors please put the new comments on the very bottom of this page? -- John Gohde (talk) 18:49, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Someone requested new comments be added above the references section.  I've never seen that done on a talk page before, it does seem a bit confusing.  Then again, complicated talk pages are always confusing because they have multiple discussions going on at the same time in several places.  You could check the talk page history and look at a comparison since the last time you edited - that will show you all the changes added after that.  --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 22:24, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The post a comment feature of Wikipedia puts new comments on the very bottom of the page. I see no reason why this talk page should be any different. -- John Gohde (talk) 01:08, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  No problem, just as long as the refs code isn't deleted, since we do use it on this page. This page is used for discussing edits and their references (the legitimate purpose of an article talk page!), and in the process of developing finished products it's important to be sure the codes are working properly. We can just move the section to the bottom once in awhile. -- Fyslee / talk 02:47, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  The post a comment feature is only practical when starting a new section. Otherwise the edit button to the right of each section heading is the button to use. -- Fyslee / talk 02:51, 25 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  What the heck is going on? 

message: This page will turn into an extension of Quackwatch if left to the devices of editors who are anti-alt med. Although I agree with much of the criticism of alt med therapies, I do believe that there are some therapies that have some merit. The fact that every non-conventional therapy could fit under alt med could make some of the better aspects of alt med get lump together with the worse. Remember many conventional therapies and some of the biggest money makers have turned out to be not so hot after completion of RCTs. And most conventional modalities have never been subject to RCTs, the standard by which CAM therapies are being held up to. My point is that a reader trying to find out information about CAM will not be served well if all they get is a rehash of Quackwatch and 'pseudoskeptics.com.' It might make sense to distinguish between the 'fringe of the fringe' and more 'conventional alternatives.' Anthon01 (talk) 21:14, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't agree. This post is germaine to the direction that this article should take. I appreciate your attempts to keep the talk page on topic, in fact I supported your  previous attempt on QW. But this one is different as it is germaine to the metamorphosis this page is likely to undergo. Anthon01 (talk) 18:16, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

text: The first banner on Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines states "it is not set in stone and should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception."  Ronz, what you just did was to make a conclusion.  I am of the opinion that common sense should prevail in this particular situation.  Please articulate, Ronz, why common sense should not make this particular instance an acceptable exception. -- John Gohde (talk) 19:30, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Guilty by association

message: I see that Guettarda reverted saying "this was discussed".   Looking at the archived discussion, I see some OR ("someone gives these criteria for PS, I think CAM fulfills them, etc.") but no sourcing of the claim.
The ArbCom addressed this issue, and WP:NPOV is now clear about when to use :Category:Pseudoscience.  Per WP:NPOVFAQ#Pseudoscience, attributable evidence of scientific consensus is necessary to use :Category:Pseudoscience, while evidence of a sig POV that the topic is pseudoscientific is necessary to mention PS in the article.   We have the latter, but for the former, we need a statement by a group such as an Academy of Science.  Please provide such a source if you wish to place the category on the article.  Thanks.  Jim Butler(talk) 21:37, 28 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Having just been working on the 'See also' sections in those articles, that ommission was probably my fault. It was certainly not intentional and I have now corrected it, purely so as to maintain parity. -- Vitaminman 10:59, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Agree, James, with your assessment re CAM in relation to that ruling.  (It is now part of WP:NPOV.)  The ArbCom set a higher threshold for using :Category:Pseudoscience than for including views of critics that a topic is pseudoscientific.  For topics with a significant following (as opposed to tiny minority absurdities like Time Cube), the threshold is whether a topic is "generally considered pseudoscience by the scientific community".  As with everything else in WP, assertions of general scientific agreement have to be sourced.  Such agreement does exist for some CAM topics (e.g., I gather, homeopathy), but not attributably for all of CAM.  regards, Jim Butler(talk) 03:34, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Pseudoscience category

message: The reference numbers for all these references are off by one.
It appears to me that somebody edited the lead something improperly, which resulted in one reference being skipped.  Can that editor please fix their edit? -- John Gohde (talk) 20:54, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Footnote numbers can't be used in Wikipedia to refer to specific references.  They change constantly when references are added or moved.  They can be dependably discussed either by copying the text of the footnote or by using the embedded ref name=" " parameter.  Probably whoever made the edit that changed the numbers doesn't even know that it happened or when. --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 23:00, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Try hopping back and forth in the edit history until you find the last edit where the numbers were right. That's where you'll find what went wrong and can fix it. -- Fyslee / talk 23:04, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  At present, reference #19 is repeated twice.  The mark up for #19 and #20 is correct.  But, when you attempt to edit the entire article the problem either disappears entirely, or a different reference number (usually #30) is repeated twice. -- John Gohde (talk) 23:42, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That's strange... there are no duplicates showing up in my browser.  Maybe you need to purge your local cache, or the Wikipedia server cache for your browser.  Take a look at this page:  Wikipedia:Purge, maybe that will help.  If not, you could try posting at the Village Pump - technical section.   --Jack-A-Roe (talk) 23:54, 29 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't understand the problem since I can't find anything wrong. -- Fyslee / talk 03:43, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Reference Numbers Are Off by One 

message: McCready. Putting Quackwatch at the top of the page makes wiki appear bias. Why the rush to mention QW? There are more important to discuss. Quackwatch isn't that important. Anthon01 (talk) 17:09, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Quackwatch is a self-published source and a poor V RS for scientific opinion, so it's a gross violation of WP:WEIGHT to put it alongside much better V RS's.  See WP:V and particularly WP:SOURCES.  Indeed, the ArbCom characterized Quackwatch as a unreliable and partisan source.  I don't say it can't be used at all on WP; I agree with WP:INDY that articles on fringe topics, which often have little more than self-published sources, can suffer from vanity and NPOV issues and thus require balancing with a Quackwatch-type, self-published source.  But the general field of CAM is extremely well-known, and we have much better sources (Dawkins, Angell) expressing the same significant, critical POV the Quackwatch does.  So I see little reason to include Quackwatch in this article at all, and certainly not dignify it in the lead as being on par with good (and, in the case of [IOM, impeccable) scientific sources. --Jim Butler(talk) 22:07, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Agreed. Anthon01 (talk) 23:48, 31 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Quackwatch at top of the page