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Suckers: How Alternative Medicine Makes Fools of Us All by Rose Shapiro Feb 2008

complementary medicine

Complementary medicine is another expression for "alternative" medicine, though the two are often linked as complementary and alternative medicine and referred to as CAM. The term 'complementary' seems to have been introduced by the purveyors of quackery in an attempt to produce the bias that untested or discredited treatments should be used along with conventional medical treatments. There really is no such thing as "alternative" medicine; if it's medicine, it's medicine. 'Alternative medicine' is a deceptive term that tries to create the illusion that a discredited or untested treatment is truly an alternative to an established treatment in conventional medicine. By adding 'complementary medicine' to the repertoire of misleading terms, the purveyors of quackery have improved on the illusion that their remedies somehow enhance or improve the effects of standard conventional treatments.

See also holistic and integrative medicine.

further reading

• Social and judgmental biases that make inert treatments seem to work by Barry L. Beyerstein (1999)
• Why the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) Should Be Defunded by Wallace I. Sampson, M.D.
• Analysis of the Reports of the White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Policy (WHCCAMP) from the National Council Against Health Fraud
• The WHCCAMP "Minority Report"
• NCAHF Position Statement on White House Commission on Complementary and Alternative Medicine
• QuackWatch by Dr. Stephen Barrett
• Fraud & Quackery: Internet Resources: Alternative Medicine
• Alternative Medicine Topical Index Skeptic's Dictionary
• The Museum of Questionable Medical Devices
• The Medical Messiahs: A Social History of Health Quackery in Twentieth-Century America Chapter 18: Anti-Quackery, Inc. James Harvey Young, PhD

Barrett, Stephen and William T. Jarvis. eds. The Health Robbers: A Close Look at Quackery in America, (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1993).

Bausell, R. Barker. (2007). Snake Oil Science: The Truth about Complementary and Alternative Medicine Oxford.

Gardner, Martin. Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science(New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1957), ch. 16.

Park, Robert L. Voodoo Science: The Road from Foolishness to Fraud (Oxford U. Press, 2000).

Randi, James. The Faith Healers (Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1989).

Raso, Jack. "Alternative" Healthcare: A Comprehensive Guide (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1994).

Raso, Jack. "Mystical Medical Alternativism," Skeptical Inquirer, Sept/Oct 1995.

Sampson, Wallace and Lewis Vaughn, editors. Science Meets Alternative Medicine: What the Evidence Says About Unconventional Treatments  (Prometheus Books, 2000).

Stenger, Victor J. "Quantum Quackery," Skeptical Inquirer. January/February 1997.

complementary medicine

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