Dugald Seely

"Integrative medicine" is a term for a form of medicine in which pseudoscience and quackery are "integrated" with real medicine. Unfortunately, as Mark Crislip puts it, when you mix cow pie with apple pie, it doesn't make the cow pie better; it makes the apple pie worse. Unfortunately these days, there's a lot of cow pie being mixed with apple pie. Worse, it's gotten to the point where integrative medicine is subspecializing. For instance, there is now a specialty known as "integrative oncology," which particularly burns me. Indeed, supportive care oncology has been very susceptible to the…

It's no secret that I'm not a big fan of naturopathy. It is, as my good bud Kimball Atwood has said, a prescientific system of medicine rooted in vitalism, the idea that there is a "life energy" and a "healing power of nature." Naturopaths invoke very simplistic concepts to explain the cause of disease, such as "toxins," widespread food allergies, gluten, imbalances in qi (the life force energy), and many other pseudoscientific principles. To give you an idea of the kind of pseudoscientific quackery naturopathy encompasses, consider this: You can't have naturopathy without homeopathy, which…

It's no secret that I don't have a high opinion of naturopathy. Just enter the word "naturopathy" into the search box of this blog, and you'll quickly see what I mean. Indeed, when last I mentioned the topic a couple of weeks ago, I was discussing the revelations of Britt Marie Hermes, a former naturopath who realized what a load of pseudoscientific quackery she had bought into, unfortunately, after having finished naturopathy school with a quarter million dollars of debt and having practiced for a while. Her account confirmed my impression of naturopathy as a veritable cornucopia of quackery…

Supporters of science-based medicine and keeping pseudoscience out of medicine have a few years to prepare for an onslaught of crappy studies “proving” the value of “integrative” oncology. No doubt at this point you’re wondering just what the heck Orac is talking about. I will tell you. It involves an institution we’ve encountered before and a naturopath we’ve met before, specifically the Ottawa Integrative Cancer Centre and Dugald Seely, ND (translation: Not a Doctor), FABNO (translation: Not an Oncologist). Somehow, Dugald Seely and his brother Andrew have somehow scored some sweet,…