For fun: Medical Claptrap

Community Fun and Games
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Several discussions recently have included side-discussions about the incredible cures for diabetes that we all are missing, sage advice delivered from the unwashed masses. Sometimes, it's pretty funny, sometimes incredibly audacious in its idiocy, always ill-informed.

So, this got me thinking about some of the quackery I've seen in my life. There have been some doozies. Thought I'd start a discussion for us all to share, laugh, and have some fun. To that end...

Perhaps the biggest BS treatment I've ever encountered was something called Radionics (link is wikipedia, pretty good article). The idea is the body has all sorts of oscillating electric fields at different frequencies that can be measured to diagnose any and all illness/ailment, and then injecting radio energy at the right frequencies will heal the problem. Here's a brief excerpt:

According to radionics practitioners, a healthy person will have certain energy frequencies moving through their body that define health, while an unhealthy person will exhibit other, different energy frequencies that define disorders. Radionic devices purport to diagnose and heal by applying appropriate frequencies to balance the discordant frequencies of sickness. Radionics uses "frequency" not in its standard meaning but to describe an imputed energy type, which does not correspond to any property of energy in the scientific sense. ![](upload://OTYTsvOrk3z2vt136t4keEI83j.jpeg)

My mother-in-law, heavily into alternative medicine, got sucked up in this one time. Went to a seminar, spent thousands on a "device", etc. etc. One day we got a call from her in Socal (I'm in northern cal) saying we should send a polaroid of me (has to be an instant picture -- where do you find a polaroid camera these days?), so she could put it in the machine and cure my diabetes. Apparently polaroid photos also capture a profile of your radionic something or other. Those primitives in the jungles who were afraid cameras would capture their souls were apparently on to something.

Anyhow, you can imagine how I reacted to all this -- after hanging up, of course. I still laugh. Anyway, we sent the picture (have a polaroid camera at work). That was 10 years ago.

I still have diabetes.

Haven't heard about radionics for, oh, probably 7 years now. She's moved on to Dr. Wallach and his pig pak, chelation, and some other stuff :-)

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At least your mother in law was trying to help :-) The scoundrels who rob people with this nonsense deserve a very different response.

Whenever I run into an alternative health practitioner making extravagant claims for their system, I ask if they can help with my diabetes. A few have said that they might be able to help with some side effects and complications but none have said that they could provide a cure.

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lol, that is really funny! But not funny that she spent thousands on that device. I haven't encountered anyone in person trying to cure diabetes although some people thought I could get off insulin with various diet changes etc. and one said the new way to get off insulin was drinking okra water. I do use some homeopathic remedies and they have worked for me and my cats. I'm using one now for a bad cold: alfa C cold and flu. I thought at first it was dropping me but now I'm running high, so I think it has more to do with fighting off a virus, who knows. It does seem to lessen the severity of a virus like this for me and it has less side effects than the traditional remedies like guaifenesin.

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When I first saw the word I thought this would be about a different favorite medical subject of mine - the selling of radioactive toothpaste and water as promoting health.

One of the brand names of the time was "Radithor". A prominent sports figure, Eben Byers, was a big user spokesperson for this brand. Not long after, there was a Wall Street Journal headline "The Radium Water Worked Fine Until His Jaw Came Off"!