Shadow Medicine: The Placebo in Conventional and Alternative Therapies

268 Pages·2014·1.89 MB·English

by  John S. Haller Jr.

SHADOW MEDICINE
JOHN S. HALLER JR.
SHADOW MEDICINE

The Placebo in
Conventional and
Alternative
Therapies
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS
NEW YORK
Columbia University Press
Publishers Since 1893
New York Chichester, West Sussex
cup.columbia.edu
Copyright © 2014 Columbia University Press
All rights reserved
E-ISBN 978-0-231-53770-4
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Haller, John S., Jr., 1940– author.
Shadow medicine : the placebo in conventional and alternative therapies / John S. Haller Jr.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-231-16904-2 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-231-53770-4 (ebook)
I. Title. II. Title: Placebo in conventional and alternative therapies. [DNLM: 1. Placebos. 2.
Complementary Therapies. 3. Evidence-Based Medicine. 4. Placebo Effect. WB 330]
R733
615.5—dc23
2013048051
A Columbia University Press E-book.
CUP would be pleased to hear about your reading experience with this e-book at cup-
[email protected].
Cover design: Mary Ann Smith
References to websites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor
Columbia University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the
manuscript was prepared.
For Clio,
my feline companion
and ever-present muse
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.
—Phil B. Fontanarosa and George D. Lundberg,
“Alternative Medicine Meets Science” (1998)
The only solid piece of scientific truth about which I feel totally confident
is that we are profoundly ignorant about nature…. It is this sudden
confrontation with the depth and scope of ignorance that represents the
most significant contribution of twentieth-century science to the human
intellect.
—Lewis Thomas, The Medusa and the Snail (1979)
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction
1. EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE
Normative Science
Big Pharma
Cochrane Collaboration
Cochrane Complementary Medicine
Ethics and Equipoise
2. POSTMODERNIST MEDICINE
Psychosomatic Medicine
Spirituality
Open Door
CAM Popularity
American Medical Schools
3. “THE POWERFUL PLACEBO”
Beecher’s Discovery
What and How
Doctor as Drug
The Factor of Trust
The Assumptive World
4. POLITICS OF HEALING
Office of Alternative Medicine
Wayne Jonas
Quantitative Methods Working Group
NCCAM
White House Commission
Institute of Medicine Report
The Next Decade
5. COMPLEMENTARY AND ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE’S
CHALLENGE: A CASE STUDY
More of Less Is More: Homeopathy
Homeopathic Practice
Matter and Energy
Ships in the Night
To RCT or Not to RCT
The Rebuttal
The Dilemma
6. REASSESSMENT
Appendix
Notes
Bibliography
Index
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Special thanks go to Michael Flannery, professor and associate
director for historical collections at the Lister Hill Library at the
University of Alabama at Birmingham; Dennis B. Worthen, former
Lloyd Scholar at the Lloyd Library and Museum in Cincinnati; Kyle
Perkins, associate dean for academic affairs at Florida International
University; and Marc Katchen and Debra Katchen, who gave generously
of their time for support and guidance. My gratitude extends as well to
Columbia University Press editor Patrick Fitzgerald, assistant editor
Bridget Flannery-McCoy, copyeditor Annie Barva, and the press’s
anonymous reviewers, all of whom saw merit in my approach not to lay
waste one side or the other in the ongoing feud between proponents of
evidence-based medicine and those supporting unconventional
therapies. Others to whom I am indebted include former colleagues
David Werlich, John Dotson, Howard Allen, Mark Foster, Don Rice, and
David Wilson; the librarians and staff of the Lloyd Library and Museum in
Cincinnati, the Morris Library of Southern Illinois University at
Carbondale, the Southern Illinois University School of Medicine in
Springfield, the National Library of Medicine, Boston Medical Library,
Harvard College Library, the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine at
Harvard Medical School, the John Crerar Library of Chicago, the New
York Academy of Medicine Library, New York Public Library,
Northwestern University, the Stanford University Library, the University of
Illinois Library at Champaign-Urbana, the University of Wisconsin Library,
the University of Kansas Library, the University of Michigan Library, the
Yale University Cushing/Whitney Medical Library, Google Books, and
JSTOR.
As always, I am grateful to my wife, Robin, who offered inspiration,
encouragement, criticism, and substantial assistance, including the
reading of numerous drafts and the indexing of the book. Those errors of