Eli5: how are treatments like acupuncture, kinetic tape and homeopathy still a thing, if scientific studies disproving their effectiveness are publicly available to everyone and doctors?
In: Biology
This is the first I’ve heard about K tape being sus. It’s just a stretchy tape isn’t it? Like a strapping tape but with some give so you’ve got better range of motion? Is there some mumbo jumbo about the tape’s “powers” or something (like yoga is more than just stretching exercises)?
So, as several others have pointed out: acupuncture has been (edit : NOT) proven effective by randomized controlled trials. Homeopathy has not, at least no greater effect than a placebo.
There’s a saying that you might have heard: what do you call alternative medicine that works? Medicine. Modern scientific health care is very interested in just about anything that’s actually effective. It’s just that a lot of traditional or alternative medicine isn’t, or we’ve identified the part that is and made it into a stronger version. For example, willow bark tea can ease pain, but now we have the purified version of the isolated compound that relieves pain (Aspirin).
As for why people still use them… Look, sometimes? Whatever works. I’ve told several patients that while there is no evidence for XYZ, if they’re getting results and there’s no risk? Carry on.
Edit: So, I apologize. As several people have brought up, the RCT evidence for acupuncture is not as solid as I stated. Today I learned. Thank you for everyone who pointed this out. Overall, the evidence seemed to be mixed and highly dependent on the problem being treated, the skill of the practitioner, the therapeutic relationship and the individual patient.
-Here is a report regarding the problems with properly structuring and designing acupuncture RCTs : https://atm.amegroups.org/article/view/24002/html
-Here is a study on the effectiveness of sham vs expert acupuncture in treating migraines: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1053811909005904
-Here is a brief overview from Johns Hopkins on acupuncture, its benefits and limitations: https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/acupuncture#:~:text=Scientific studies have not fully,with your healthcare provider first.
My theory is a big part of it is “alternative medicine practitioners” have more time and are generally better with the soft skills than GPs. It feels good to be listened to after being fobbed off by real doctors.
There has been a serious decline in trust in institutions and expertise.
Many people believe that because the scientific consensus changes when new information comes out and scientific studies often come to contradictory findings, that the scientific method is no more reliable than “common sense” or their “gut feeling”.
It also depends on the malady in question. Nobody is going to use homeopathy alone to set a broken bone or treat acute appendicitis, but there are many conditions (minor, persistent fatigue, chronic back pain, “brain fog”, fibromyalgia, mood disorders, etc.) that medical science doesn’t have a great handle on and a placebo is sometimes not the worst thing in the world.
Because humans are bad at making decisions individually. They will take quick and easy “solutions” that don’t actually work over harder/scarier ones that do ESPECIALLY when it means challenging their preconceived notions and/or admitting they might be wrong about something.
Look at the pandemic, we had a proven method to reduce both individual risk and the risk to others, something that should have been lauded as a great achievement of mankind and adopted as quickly and widely as possible. Yet some people, out of sheer obstinance and stupidity eschewed it in favor of useless and even dangerous alternatives.
Many humans are illogical and remain ignorant by choice.
Different things have differing amounts of bunkum to them. Homeopathy is complete and utter bullshit. Acupuncture has enough positive effect on enough people that there may be more than placebo effect to it, but we don’t have the data to know for sure and Western medicine doesn’t account for the concepts behind it. There are things that work even though they shouldn’t by our measurements.
KT Tape is a weird one. It’s useful in giving a little extra support to joints and muscles for some movements, especially when working through a degree of injury. A lot of people consider it a miraculous device, and as someone who’s used it I think that’s a load of crap. But I have a shoulder that I damaged my rotator cuff in decades ago, before arthroscopic repair was a thing. Sometimes when I’m doing overhead lifting I’ll put KT tape on – and it helps a little. Not huge at all, and it’s not like I lift PRs with it, but if I tape up properly there’s some extra support, the lift hurts less, and I’m not as sore after. Totally anecdotal, of course, but at least for me in some cases it’s useful.
And that’s the case with a lot of things that don’t tie in to the classic system. Science has made amazing strides in curing and preventing disease, Vaccines have done more to keep humans alive than anything else short of maybe the invention of the sewer system, and surgeons can work miracles to repair conditions that were once life-threatening (just for myself, I’ve had Lasik on my eyes back in the late ’90s and I had both my knees replaced in 2022). There are things that help people but we don’t understand the mechanisms well enough yet (I’d put things like cannabis and acupuncture in that list), and things that are entirely psychosomatic like homeopathy. If you start with a concept like “water has memory” you’re in the weeds already.
For acupuncture, there are positives clinical trials that show relief in cancer related symptoms beyond placebo.
You can search “review of acupuncture in cancer care” for reputable papers and randomized clinical trials.
What? Acupuncture has reams of scientific research detailing its effectiveness.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S109621909800033X
Homeopathy has not, though its adherents are trying.
No idea about kinetic tape.
Science is a lot more complex than you might imagine. Just because one or even many studies have shown no effect from certain treatments, that _doesn’t mean there is no effect_. That’s why we document our experimental methods, so that further research can vary the parameters to see if that affects the results.
As an example, you mention acupuncture. This has actually been shown to be effective by a large number of studies, but many studies have also shown no effect. By claiming it has been disproven, you are placing more reliance on the studies that showed no effect.
Simply put, science requires interpretation and filtering. Many folks aren’t capable of that interpretation, so they rely on those they respect as experts. Often, humans being what they are, that respect comes from something other than a person’s scientific credentials, which is why celebrity endorsement is more effective than scientific research at getting people to buy your product.
So even more simply put, people trust movie stars more than scientists.
Some people have bad experiences with mainstream medicine – maybe because there’s no good mainstream (or possibly any) treatment for what ails them, maybe they’ve seen a few jerky or disrespectful doctors, maybe they’ve had bad side effects to pharmaceuticals, or whatever else, and they’re looking for something else, for anything to help them.
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