Although I don’t know anything about fake MD’s or correspondence school MDs , I often wonder about doctor’s credentials, if they were not educated in the U.S. in a school that can be researched and is accredited. I know someone who flew to get plastic surgery in the Dominican Republic. She said the doctor was “the top of her class” at the medical school on the island. Just how good are those schools? I remember hearing jokes about doctors who went to school on various islands. Have they improved any in the past decade? I guess it counted as “medical tourism” although my friend was originally from Dominican Republic, trusted the area doctors since she grew up there, and was able to stay with her mother for 2 weeks to recover (tummy tuck). She only paid $3,000 (would have paid $11K in NYC area). I just wondered - how safe was it, since I don’t know anything about the hospitals and medical schools there. Although a lot of area hospitals are hiring doctors from abroad. Some of the top hospitals in my area are hiring doctors from India, which I hear has some excellent universities.
It varies from country to country. I remember in the 1980s when there was a acute shortage of doctors, we imported a LOT of doctors from various countries. Sometimes the problem we had with them was the training, but more often the problem of their inability to understand spoken English. We have to communicate frequently with doctors over the phone and the ability to understand English is essential. Most people learn to write a foreign language before they learn to speak it well. After the 80s they instituted new laws which greatly improved this problem.
I remember Costa Rica had a pretty good training program, and American doctors that couldn’t get into medical school in the US would go there. I am not familiar with other South American training programs.
A French trained doctor stopped rounds and floored us one night when she described a patient condition as ‘dire’. When she was met with stares of stunned silence, she said “I do not think that word means what I think it means” She was trying out a new word on us and got them mixed up, I don’t remember the word she intended, but the patient continued to recover uneventfully!
One of my favorite comparisons of secular humanism and traditional humanism is when those two NYC humanist groups of 2001 or 2002 held alternative-medicine events during the same week. CFI backed a big lecture debunking CAM, while the American Humanist Association chapter screened a movie praising Cuba’s support of CAM as a affordable and groundbreaking medicine.
But back to the HuffPo. Michael Specter’s upcoming book “Denialism: How Irrational Thinking Hinders Scientific Progress, Harms the Planet, and Threatens Our Lives” ( http://www.amazon.com/Denialism-Irrational-Thinking-Scientific-Threatens/dp/1594202303 ) confirms that the “Huffington Post . . . has emerged as the most prominent online home for cranks of all kinds, particularly people who find scientific research too heavily burdened by facts.”
Looks like this thread is loaded with people associated with healthcare, especially mainstream. It is all well and good to ridicule alternative medicine, but there are a lot of people using alternative medicine and quite successfully at that. Just a few examples of what has really worked for my family:
Oil of Oregano
Turmeric
Calendula Ointment (homeopathic)
I know it is only “placebo effect”, but nevertheless it works, unlike much of poisons they peddle for medicine.
Looks like this thread is loaded with people associated with healthcare, especially mainstream. It is all well and good to ridicule alternative medicine, but there are a lot of people using alternative medicine and quite successfully at that. Just a few examples of what has really worked for my family:
Oil of Oregano
Turmeric
Calendula Ointment (homeopathic)
I know it is only “placebo effect”, but nevertheless it works, unlike much of poisons they peddle for medicine.
Regards,
Skeptic
First I have to pick my jaw off the floor. You are admitting to using what you acknowledge as fake medicine that work by the placebo effect to cure diseases, and claim they are better than the ‘poisons peddled as medicine’. I don’t know what to say. I have never come across this level of cognitive dissonance. What you call success, I call LUCK!
Looks like this thread is loaded with people associated with healthcare, especially mainstream. It is all well and good to ridicule alternative medicine, but there are a lot of people using alternative medicine and quite successfully at that. Just a few examples of what has really worked for my family:
Oil of Oregano
Turmeric
Calendula Ointment (homeopathic)
I know it is only “placebo effect”, but nevertheless it works, unlike much of poisons they peddle for medicine.
Regards,
Skeptic
If you cut yourself how do you treat the wound? Do you use CAM treatment or evidence-based ointment? Which do you think would have a better chance of preventing infection?
If you contracted a serious disease would you still use CAM or would you consult a licensed physician?
Now now, we all know the real way to treat illness or injury is not with woo-woo herbs or big government healthcare. The correct way is to pray to Jebus to heal you on up.
Do you use CAM if you were in a serious auto accident? If you had crushing angina? Gallstones?? Neisseria Meningicoccemia? Haemophilus Influenzae type b, in your infant?
Now now, we all know the real way to treat illness or injury is not with woo-woo herbs or big government healthcare. The correct way is to pray to Jebus to heal you on up.
...unless, of course, you have an amputation…then you are on your own!
Now now, we all know the real way to treat illness or injury is not with woo-woo herbs or big government healthcare. The correct way is to pray to Jebus to heal you on up.
...unless, of course, you have an amputation…then you are on your own!
Well, then it was just God’s will, don’t you know?
Wow! That is amazing. Folks, it is it not always black and white, this or that, zero or one. I didn’t say I don’t consult doctors, nor did I say I always use CAM as you call it. Let me address your questions one by one.
First, let’s start with simple things like small cuts or colds and coughs. There is no need for medicine most of the time. From my experience, if you keep cuts and wounds clean and apply Calendula ointment, they heal very fast, no need to do anything else. I have two kids of eleven and seven and they have never had any major infections due to cuts. You may call it luck, I call it due diligence and good parenting.
Second, antibiotics use. Both of my kids have never had to use antibiotics, though they have had colds, coughs and ear aches many times. Sure, I have consulted doctors whenever the fevers have lasted longer than a day or two. Doctors did prescribe antibiotics on more than one occasion and we always managed to heal our kids without them. Sure sometimes it takes longer and more care. As I happen to work from home, I could afford to do it. Even the toughest colds yield to oil of oregano. You may call it placebo effect, faith healing or whatever, the fact is it has worked for us and countless others. The best part is that, unlike antibiotics, it does not have strong side effects. I have seen many families who have frequent sicknesses, stubborn colds and allergies and often such families have major dependence on prescription medicine. Is it possible that many of these medicines actually cause people to fall sick more often? Is it possible that people become dependent on antibiotics as they use it more often. These questions need to be studied in more detail.
To answer some other questions, yes modern medicine has done wonders for infections, accidental injuries etc. But for chronic diseases it leaves much to be desired. You may call taking lifelong medicines, such as for diabetes an improvement, but I think there are better ways.
... You may call taking lifelong medicines, such as for diabetes an improvement, but I think there are better ways…
So my father who died of diabetes last year, should have just given up on those insulin shots and amputations that kept him alive the last 15 years? Skipped the laser surgery when he started going blind? If he hadn’t taken those measures, he would have been dead 15 years ago. No amount of herb or oil would have changed that.
The parents in Oregon was it, who claimed to heal their diabetic daughter with prayer and herbal/natural medicine, it worked out really well for them. Her being dead and them being in jail…
Doctors did prescribe antibiotics on more than one occasion and we always managed to heal our kids without them. Sure sometimes it takes longer and more care.
Yes, it takes longer, which means there is a greater risk to infect people around you. This is one of the reasons doctors give you antibiotics. Next time please take them.
She was trying out a new word on us and got them mixed up, I don’t remember the word she intended, but the patient continued to recover uneventfully!
