Shiatsu: fatally flawed research is an unethical waste of resources

Shiatsu is one of those alternative therapies where there is almost no research. Therefore, every new study is of interest, and I was delighted to find this new trial.

Italian researchers tested the efficacy and safety of combining shiatsu and amitriptyline to treat refractory primary headaches in a single-blind, randomized, pilot study. Subjects with a […]

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A new homeopathic remedy for migraine “providing effective relief quickly” | Edzard Ernst

This website tells us that ‘Stopain Migraine’ is the first topical product to effectively relieve migraine pain. It is a safe alternative to other migraine relief products that begins to work as soon as it’s applied. And the press release informs us that Troy Healthcare extended its Stopain line with a Stopain Migraine offering – […]

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Chiropractic manipulation for migraine is a placebo therapy | Edzard Ernst

A new study tested the efficacy of chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy (CSMT) for migraine. It was designed as a three-armed, single-blinded, placebo -controlled RCT of 17 months duration including 104 migraineurs with at least one migraine attack per month. Active treatment consisted of CSMT (group 1) and the placebo was a sham push manoeuvre of the lateral edge of the scapula and/or […]

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Osteopathy for migraine? | Edzard Ernst

Osteopathy is a difficult subject. In the US, osteopaths are (almost) identical with doctors who have studied conventional medicine and hardly practice any manipulative techniques at all. Elsewhere, osteopaths are alternative healthcare providers specialising in what they like to call ‘osteopathic manipulative therapy’ (OMT). As though this is not confusing enough, osteopaths are doing similar […]

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Feverfew: hope for migraine sufferers? | Edzard Ernst

Lots of alternative therapies are advocated for migraine. Few of them are supported by good evidence. An exception could be the herbal remedy FEVERFEW.

This review is an update of a previously published review in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews on ‘Feverfew for preventing migraine’. Feverfew (Tanacetum parthenium L.) extract is a herbal remedy, […]

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“The evidence does not support treating migraine or osteoarthritis with homeopathy” | Edzard Ernst

“If ever there was a permanent cure for migraine, homeopathic medicines are the only one that can do this miracle. It may sound like an overstatement and quite quackerish, but it’s true. Long term treatment with homeopathy has an excellent cure for migraine headaches.”

Statements like this can be found by the thousands on the internet, not just in relation to migraine but also about osteoarthritis. Both migraine and osteoarthritis are important domains for homeopathy, and most homeopaths would not doubt for a second that they can treat these conditions effectively. This is why it is so important to highlight the few sources which are not misleading consumers into making the wrong therapeutic decisions. […]

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