by Cina, Joshua A. Perper, Stephen J. ; Cina, Joshua A. Perper, Stephen J.
– Ear candling, also called ear coning or thermal-auricular therapy, is a dangerous and ineffective practice intended to assist the natural clearing of earwax from a person’s ear by lighting one end of a hollow candle and placing the other end in the ear canal. It should fall into the “don’t try this at home” category of things
– Homeopathy is a form of alternative medicine devised by Dr. Samuel Hahnemann in the late 1700s. The theory goes that if a substance can kill you in large doses or cause symptoms similar to the ones you are suffering from, then that same substance can cure you when administered in sub-microscopically, diluted doses.
Though it is unlikely to help a sick person it was less risky than blood-letting and blistering, treatments commonly employed by Dr. Hahnemann’s colleagues back in the day
– Hydrotherapy is one of our personal favorites. Warm water jetted around the body is very relaxing and it can be a wonderful way to meet new friends.
Immersion in hot water, however, can lead to hyperthermia, loss of consciousness, and death by drowning. People using drugs and alcohol in hot tubs are particularly at risk for bad outcomes. In particular, DO NOT take a wine enema while you are in a hot tub. Very bad things can happen (a real case!)
– Hypnosis can be a valuable technique when used by certified health care professionals. It can be extremely embarrassing if it is employed by a nightclub entertainer who makes you squat down and quack like a duck
– Meditation techniques can soothe the mind and relieve stress. Care should be taken to avoid malnutrition and dehydration since fasting often accompanies
“hard-core” meditation therapy
– Naturopathy is an alternative type of medicine that recommends using only natural remedies such as herbs and healthy foods instead of synthetic drugs or surgery. In the United States naturopaths are formally trained in 16 states and entitled to use the title ND or NMD. One should remember that just because something is a natural product, such as a plant, doesn’t mean it is good for you.
Socrates, a very smart guy, went to meet Zeus after he ingested hemlock.
Cocaine and heroin, which are bad for you, are derived from the coca plant and poppies, respectively. It is no wonder that Dorothy felt woozy and passed out 182
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while crossing that field of poppies in the Wizard of Oz. Or perhaps Judy Garland just thought it was a good place to crash for a while
– Ozone therapy involves the administration of ozone, oxygen or hydrogen peroxide by various means including blood treatments, ozone gas saunas, rectal and vaginal insufflation, and injection into the joints. It has some legitimate uses in modern medicine but other applications are likely quackery. The use of oxygen by inexperienced “healthcare providers” poses a risk of fire and incinerating patients. Also, hydrogen peroxide can be fatal if ingested in large quantities by producing bubbles that are absorbed through the stomach wall and into the bloodstream
– Polarity therapy is an untestable methodology developed by Randolph Stone in the late 1940s to early 1950s. It was claimed that healing could be achieved through manipulation of what was described as complementary (or polarized) forces within the body, similar or identical to the yin and yang spiritual forces described in Chinese philosophy. Since no one can find these forces or measure them, this theory cannot be proven wrong or right
– Reflexology is the practice of massaging, squeezing, or pushing on parts of the feet (and occasionally the hands or ears) to improve general health. The practice is based on the belief that certain areas of the foot are interconnected with different body organs
– Reiki is a type of therapeutic touch developed in 1922 by Mikao Usui. After 3
weeks of fasting and meditating on Mount Kurama in Japan, Usui claimed to have received the ability of “healing without energy depletion.” A portion of the practice, tenohira or palm healing, is a technique whereby practitioners believe they are moving “healing energy” through their palms and into the patient
– Tai chi, the traditional Chinese gymnastic movement technique is believed to decrease stress, reduce hypertension and improve the movement of individuals with Parkinson’s disease. It also contributes to generalized health and gives you a cool Ninja look while you are doing it, and
– Yoga, a cluster of Indian healing techniques, involves transcendental meditation, control of posture and breathing, and stretching. It is designed to both improve health and purify the soul from our earthly constricting passions and urges.
It also improves flexibility and strength
Increasingly, physicians who practice allopathic medicine (the traditional M.D.-type of doctor) are recognizing the value of some of these techniques (such as yoga) and have encouraged patients to pursue these options of adjunctive therapy. Most doctors feel that alternative medical practices should be used in cooperation with traditional medicine and not in place of it. When alternative therapies run amuck, people die.
Alternative Medicine Gone Bad
Some homeopaths still believe Dr. Hahnemann’s original theory that diseases are produced not by bacteria or other injurious biological or chemical agents but by “miasmas”-deranged vital sources that affect both the body and mind.
Alternative Medicine Gone Bad
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Homeopaths treat diseases by administering extremely diluted medications. At these low concentrations, the alleged cures cannot cause any harm but progression of disease or death may occur when these ineffective remedies are chosen over essential prescription medications or appropriate surgery. Some homeopathic practitioners have been arrested and indicted for manslaughter and murder for allowing patients to ignore sound medical advice and opt for non-scientific, imaginative forms of treatment.
Mitra Javanmardi, a 50-year-old Naturopath from Montreal has recently been accused but not convicted of criminal negligence and manslaughter in the death of a 64 year-old patient who died of a heart attack after getting an intravenous injection of a “mineral” treatment. In 2004, Dr. Marisa Viegas, a homeopathic doctor, emailed instructions to a patient of hers not to take any of the medications prescribed to her by another physician for a severe heart condition. Shortly thereafter the patient expired – the cause of death was determined to be: “acute heart failure due to treatment discontinuation.” Viegas had her license to practice medicine revoked for professional misconduct as a result of this incident. In another tragedy, Mr. Russell Jenkins sustained a foot injury in December 2006. The wound later became ulcerated and the infection spread to his leg but the 52 year-old shunned conventional treatment saying his ‘inner being’ told him not to go to hospital. He allegedly sought advice from a homeopath, Susan Finn, who suggested he treat his wound with Manuka honey. Not surprisingly, despite this state-of-the-art (for 200 B.C., maybe) treatment the patient continued to deteriorate rapidly and he became bed-ridden. When Finn visited him the following day, she saw blood on the bed sheets and described a foul smell in Mr. Jenkins’s bedroom. His foot was swollen and one of his toes was discolored – the honey wasn’t working. He developed gangrene and died in the early hours of April 17. His mother Eileen Jenkins reportedly stated during a Coroner’s inquest: “To lose my son is devastating, absolutely.
But the way he died, I just can’t come to terms with it, when I know all it needed was a phone call for a doctor or ambulance to be called, for antibiotics, and my son would be here today.” Susan Finn later stated that despite her best efforts, Jenkins refused to go to a hospital – and she honored his wishes.
In early 2004, a 44 year-old woman was diagnosed with breast cancer by her family physician. She was scheduled for surgery to remove two malignant tumors, one under her right arm and the other in her right breast. The patient refused surgery, however, and chose instead to be treated by a holistic medicine provider, David Eugene Pontius. The treatments began in May 2004 and continued until the patient’s death on October 20, 2004. His therapeutic modalities included body “scanning” using a d
evice he called the “Body Scan 2010” and treatments with a Rife Machine and an Oscillator (don’t worry, we don’t know what they are either).
In June 2004, a CAT scan showed that the cancer had spread and that various organs in her body were now affected. Mr. Pontius also examined her during this month and diagnosed that the pain in the patient’s arms was due to a “rib head”
being out of alignment. He then performed chiropractic services and “manipulated”
the rib in order to relieve the pain. The manipulation relieved the discomfort for 184
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approximately 1 hour and then it returned with a vengeance. Mr. Pontius then examined her mouth and told the patient that she had gangrene under two of her teeth and mercury poisoning beneath two others. He then confidently informed her that the infected gums and teeth were the basis of her cancer. Examination by a dentist failed to confirm his diagnoses. Furthermore, cancer is caused by genetic mutations some of which are inborn and others which develop from external factors (our educational tip for the chapter).
Weeks after the dental fiasco Dr. Wendy Breyer, an oncologist and breast cancer specialist, told the withering woman that if she did not receive medical treatment immediately she would die within months. Dr. Breyer was right on with the prognosis – the patient died that Fall. The State of Utah charged Pontius with the unlicensed practice of medicine or naturopathic medicine, both of which were third degree felonies.
In 2006, the family of Dennis G. McDaniel filed a lawsuit against Gregory Haag, Tosca Haag, and Vivian V. Vetrano charging that their “treatment” had resulted in McDaniel’s death. For many years, according to their Website, the trio deceptively represented themselves as “doctors” operating the Rest of Your Life (ROYL) Retreat in La Vernia, Texas. The suit charged that the 55 year-old McDaniel, who was suffering from obesity, hypertension and diabetes, died following “detoxification” that included 2 weeks of complete fasting, followed by two more weeks of a
“nut milk” diet, and thereafter a diet of raw fruits, vegetables and nut seeds. After several weeks of this therapy, he became unresponsive, non-communicative, and comatose and had to be hospitalized. Upon admission he was dehydrated, malnourished, and in shock. Heroic efforts to save his life proved to be unsuccessful.
Whereas most alternative medical remedies are harmless, others entail significant risks. Yohimbine extracts prescribed for male impotence have been proven to induce hypertension and spasms in the lungs. Blue-green algae may contain a toxic substance (microcystin) that, in large doses, causes acute liver failure in humans. Chiropractic spinal manipulation can rarely cause vertebral artery damage leading to paralysis, stroke, and death. Nonetheless, adults are free to make their own choices when it comes to medical care (at least for now) and they can opt for either traditional or alternative treatment. Unfortunately, children may die due to no fault of their own when a parent or caretaker makes poor choices on their behalf.
Attachment Therapy
A particularly tragic death caused by unorthodox “medical” treatment involves the case of 10 year-old Candace Newmaker. Candace spent time in five foster homes before she was adopted at age six by a single woman, Jeane Newmaker, a nurse practitioner. As occurs in many adoptions, after an initial “honeymoon” period Jeane began to complain that her new daughter was behaving negatively. After just a few months, Jeane attended a national Attachment Therapy (AT) convention in Attachment Therapy
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suburban Washington, DC, where she met Bill Goble. Mr. Goble was a North Carolina Attachment Therapist whom she hoped would help Candace bond with her and cure any (real or imagined) problems the girl may have had. Goble had Newmaker fill out a questionnaire at the convention, from which he was able to say Candace was a “fairly severe” case of Reactive Attachment Disorder (RAD), although she apparently did not meet the established medical criteria for that diagnosis. In April 2000, Candace and Jeane Newmaker traveled to Evergreen, Colorado for a $7,000, 2-week, “intensive” session of Attachment Therapy with Jean Connell Watkins and her associate, Julie Ponder.
Attachment therapy (widely known as “holding therapy,” “rebirthing,” “rage-reduction,” or “dyadic developmental therapy”) is a dangerous and entirely unscientific practice that preys on adopted and foster children who already have had tough lives. The “rebirthing” procedure is intended to bring children back to the time of their birth by re-enacting labor and delivery from the perspective of the fetus.
Reliving this trauma is supposed to recover deeply repressed memories of the original experience of birth: the pain of contractions, the suffocating passage through the birth canal, and the struggle to enter an entirely new world. Following this “treatment”
the child is supposed to be reduced to a helpless, infant desperate for a mother. For example, in this case Candace would undergo attachment therapy, be reduced to a neofetus, and bond with her new mother, Jeane, upon her “birth.” Attachment therapy techniques rely on forceful physical coercion and restraint, non-consensual touching, verbal abuse, intimidation, enforced eye contact and punishments which included limiting food, water and air intake. The mainstream psychiatric community considers rebirth therapy as being “harmful pseudoscience” and the procedure is severely restricted or banned in several states. Several cases of attachment therapy have culminated in the deaths of the very children whom the therapists were attempting to “heal.”
In the Newmaker case many of the treatment sessions had been videotaped.
These recordings showed Candace being subjected to cruel and degrading procedures over a period of 2 weeks. In one 2-hour session Candace had her face grabbed 90 times to ensure eye contact with the therapists. In another session, her head was violently shaken 309 times. Adults within inches of her face screamed at her over 50 times while she was being held in Watkins’s lap; another adult sat on her legs to ensure her restraint. Attachment therapists call this a “gentle, nurturing,” embrace intended to convey an impression of “safety and love.” The bonding continued when Candace’s obese, adoptive mother lay on top of her for almost 2 hours while licking her face. On several occasions, Watkins and others required this naturally energetic 10-year-old to sit motionless for 10, 20, and 30 minutes at a time. Candace also had her treasured long hair hacked off into a short, ragged mop.
Candace died during the second week of her treatment during a so-called
“rebirthing” procedure. Participating in the fatal videotaped session were Watkins and Julie Ponder along with two assisting “therapy parents”, Brita St. Clair and Jack McDaniel. Jeanne Newmaker, witnessed the joyous event, ready to step in at the right time and play “Mommy.” Following the script for that day’s treatment, Candace was placed in a fetal position on the floor and wrapped in a flannel sheet 186
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to simulate a womb. Four adults used their hands, feet, and about a dozen large, thick pillows to push against the 75-pound girl with a combined weight of 673 pounds. Candace attempted to free herself while she pleaded and screamed for help and air to no avail. Candace stated several times during the session that she was dying to which Ponder responded, “You want to die? OK, then die. Go ahead, die right now.” Twenty minutes into the session, Candace had vomited and urinated inside of the sheet; she was kept restrained. Forty minutes into the session, Jeane Newmaker asked Candace “Baby, do you want to be born?” Candace faintly responded “no”; this would ultimately be her last word. Ponder then screamed at the dying child, “Quitter, quitter, quitter, quitter! Quit, quit, quit, quit. She’s a quitter!”
Jeane Newmaker felt rejected by Candace’s inability to be reborn and was asked by Watkins to leave the room so that Candace would not “pick up on (Jeane’s) sorrow.”
Soon thereafter, Watkins requested the same of McDaniel and Brita St. Clair, leaving only herself and Ponder in the room with Candace. Fifty minutes into the session, Candace went completely quiet. The therapists sat on top
of her for another 20 minutes before unwrapping the sheet. By this time Candace was motionless, not breathing and her lips were blue. Upon seeing this, Watkins declared, “Oh there she is, she’s sleeping in her vomit.” Jeane Newmaker, who had been watching the stillbirth on a monitor in another room, rushed into the room and began CPR while Watkins called 9-1-1. Paramedics were able to restore the girl’s pulse and she was flown by helicopter to a hospital in Denver. She was declared brain dead the next day as a consequence of asphyxia.
After a 3-week trial in which the jury twice viewed the 70-minute videotape of the last therapy session the jurors deliberated about 5 hours before finding Watkins and Ponder guilty of reckless child abuse resulting in death. Each received 16-year prison sentences. Watkins was also convicted of a misdemeanor – the unlawful practice of psychotherapy. Jeane Newmaker pled guilty to neglect and abuse charges and was given a 4-year suspended sentence. During the last week of the trial, Colorado Governor Bill Owens signed “Candace’s Law” which banned re-enactment of the birth process when it uses restraint that carries a risk of death or physical injury. Unfortunately, it was too late for one pretty, little girl.
Chapter 19
Contagious Caregivers
All sorts of bodily diseases are produced by half used minds.
– George Bernard Shaw
Many infectious diseases are unwittingly transmitted in different ways from one individual to another. Physicians are particularly prone to carrying microbes around since they come into contact with many people who are infected by a myriad of bacteria and viruses. Although doctors take precautions to avoid spreading disease from patient to patient, sometimes hand washing and surgical masks are not enough. Inadvertent spread of infections between patients is not uncommon; it is no wonder that a hospital is a great place to catch a cold or even a more serious, potentially fatal disease. There is no way for doctors to eliminate entirely the possibility of spreading diseases from one person to another – it just goes with the territory. Willfully exposing patients to serious infections, however, is much more serious and may result in civil litigation and even criminal prosecution.