When ACSH writes about bloodsucking creatures, you might expect to read an article about plaintiff's attorneys suing over multiple chemical sensitivity. But this time, we are writing about the actual aquatic animal, the leech, which is almost synonymous with pre-modern medicine.
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Thanks to better FDA oversight, even the use of leeches must now be subjected to safety and efficacy reviews. Indeed, the leeches have just passed their tests with flying colors and have been approved by the FDA.
The new rules used to evaluate medical treatments are beneficial because they require the FDA to weigh medical risks in comparison to health benefits -- protecting patients against scientifically unproven and potentially dangerous medical devices. The Battle Creek Vibrating Chair, for instance, popular in the early twentieth century, was purported to cure headaches and backaches by violently shaking patients to increase oxygen flow in the body. For an amusing look at some other examples, please see: http://www.mtn.org/quack/ . Given the ubiquity of medical quackery still surrounding us today, mandated safety and efficacy testing of so-called alternative treatments is necessary to protect consumers. That is, alternative therapies including medical devices should be held to the same stringent standards required of conventional therapies and devices in order to gain FDA approval.
Now that the FDA has granted leeches leave from the Museum of Questionable Medical Devices, they squirm proudly in the same legal class as stents and pacemakers.
As I told the Associated Press in 1999, "It's good to see that mainstream medicine is coming on board to defend itself" against unproven treatments. These comments echo the September 1998 New England Journal of Medicine editorial that emphasized the importance of implementing equally rigorous research on alternative medicine.
Once tested, alternative treatments or devices, be they leeches, acupuncture, or even the Battle Creek Vibrating Chair, by definition, will no longer be "alternative." We at the American Council on Science and Health do not have a problem with any specific approach per se; our concern lies in the fact that alternative medicine methods are not tested for safety and efficacy. "There is no such thing as 'alternative medicine'," as ACSH medical director Dr. Gilbert Ross says. "It's either medicine -- or it's not, in which case it's hope or belief, but it is not science...If it is not evidence-based, don't call it medicine."
Jeff Stier is an associate director of the American Council on Science and Health.
