Quackwatch

Quackwatch is a website operated by Quackwatch, Inc., an American non-profit organization incorporated in the state of Pennsylvania whose stated purpose is to "combat health-related frauds, myths, fads, and fallacies" and whose claimed "primary focus is on quackery-related information that is difficult or impossible to get elsewhere". Quackwatch is operated by Stephen Barrett, M.D., who founded the non-profit in 1969, with input from his board of advisors, and help from numerous volunteers. The Quackwatch website was started in 1997, and though it has won numerous awards, it is not free from criticism and controversy.

Mission and scope

Quackwatch reports that its activities include the following:

investigating questionable claims, answering inquiries about products and services, advising quackery victims, distributing reliable publications, debunking pseudoscientific claims, reporting illegal marketing, improving the quality of health information on the internet, assisting or generating consumer-protection lawsuits, and attacking misleading advertising on the internet.

The website contains essays on what it deems to be misleading or fraudulent health-related therapies and enterprises, loosely termed "quackery". The essays are not, and do not claim to be, peer-reviewed scientific papers, but are mainly critical descriptions of treatments, commercial products, and health providers, mainly written by Barrett and his board of advisors for the non-specialist consumer. The essays generally explain in detail the reasons Barrett considers them fraudulent, misleading, or ineffective. They usually include references and links to sources used, as well as to sources for further study. Quackwatch is especially critical of those therapies that it considers potentially dangerous.

The site contains information about specific people who perform, market, and advocate what Quackwatch considers to be dubious therapies, in many cases providing details of convictions for past marketing fraud. The website also presents lists of sources, individuals, and groups which Quackwatch considers questionable and non-recommended, sometimes without explanation or justification. Among those mentioned critically are Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling (for recommending "mega-dose" vitamin C treatment of cancer), and integrative medicine proponent Andrew Weil.

About the site

Quackwatch engages the services of 150+ scientific and technical advisors, who author articles and help to "evaluate web sites, answer health-related questions, review books, help prepare articles, and engage in other projects that foster the spread of accurate information on the Internet." As of 2003, 67 medical advisors, 12 dental advisors, 13 mental health advisors, 16 nutrition and food science advisors, 3 podiatry advisors, 8 veterinary advisors, and 33 "other scientific and technical advisors" were listed.

Quackwatch has no salaried employees and "...operates with minimal expense, funded mainly by small individual donations, commissons from sales on other sites to which we refer, sponsored links, and profits from the sale of publications. If its income falls below what is needed for the research, the rest comes out of my pocket... The total cost of operating Quackwatch's many [22 sites] Web sites is approximately $7,000 per year."

The site is part of a network of related sites, such as Homeowatch (on homeopathy), Credential Watch (devoted to exposing degree mills), Chirobase (specifically devoted to chiropractic, cosponsored by the National Council Against Health Fraud and Victims of Chiropractic), and others, each devoted to specific topics.

Notability

Quackwatch has received numerous awards and honors, as well as being mentioned, referenced, and quoted favorably in the media and various journals:

• In 1998, JAMA named Quackwatch one of nine "select sites that provide reliable health information and resources."

• In 1999, U.S. News & World Report listed Quackwatch as one of three medical sites in their "Best of the Web".

• In its "Best of the Web Directory - Health" category, Forbes online magazine listed Quackwatch among 25 sites and provided this review:

"Dr. Stephen Barrett, a psychiatrist, seeks to expose unproven medical treatments and possible unsafe practices through his homegrown but well-organized site. Mostly attacking alternative medicines, homeopathy and chiropractors, the tone here can be rather harsh. However, the lists of sources of health advice to avoid, including books, specific doctors and organizations, are great for the uninformed. Barrett received an FDA Commissioner's Special Citation Award for fighting nutrition quackery in 1984. BEST: Frequently updated, but also archives of relevant articles that date back at least four years. WORST: Lists some specific doctors and organizations without explaining the reason for their selection."

Quackwatch has also been cited or mentioned by journalists in reports on therapeutic touch, Vitamin O, Almon Glenn Braswell, dietary supplements (especially when sold by health care providers), Robert Barefoot's coral calcium claims, Noni juice, shark cartilage, infomercials, and the Mexican clinic where Coretta Scott King died.

Criticism

A website review entitled "Watching the Watchdogs at Quackwatch" by Joel M. Kauffman, Ph.D., Professor Emeritus of the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry at University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, was published in the Journal of Scientific Exploration (JSE). Kauffman is also the author of Malignant Medical Myths: Why Medical Treatment Causes 200,000 Deaths in the USA each Year and How to Protect Yourself. His website review in JSE examined eight Quackwatch articles for factuality, fairness and scientific currency; Kauffman claimed the articles were "contaminated with incomplete data, obsolete data, technical errors, unsupported opinions, and/or innuendo" and cited the peer-reviewed literature in support of his conclusions. Kauffman wrote that:

"Hostility to all alternatives was expected and observed from the website, but not repetition of groundless dogma from mainstream medicine...It remains a mystery how they [Quackwatch] and I have interpreted the same body of medical science and reached such divergent conclusions.....It is very probable that many...vistors to the website have been misled by the trappings of scientific objectivity...At least 3 of the activities in the Mission Statement...have been shown to be flawed as actually executed...Medical practitioners such as Robert Atkins, Elmer Cranton and Stanislaw Burzynski, whom I demonstrated are not quacks, were attacked with the energy one would hope to be focused on real quacks. The use of this website is not recommended. It could be deleterious to your health. "

Other critics

There are several more critics of the Quackwatch website. Many of the critics are also critical of Stephen Barrett, the owner and founder of the website:

• Alternative medicine proponent Burton Goldberg wrote: "In the paradox of 'quackbusting,' the quackbusters say they're protecting public health, but in fact, they're abandoning the public to their own suffering to protect the financial interests of conventional medicine, which has no interest in or ability to produce benefits for these conditions. The 'quackbusters' say they're serving the public, but the truth is they're grossly disserving patients." and "As alternative medicine continues to grow more popular-an estimated 42% of Americans now use it-the "quackbusters" are growing more clamorous in their denunciations of our field. They have to be-they're almost a minority view."

• Ray Sahelian B.Sc (nutrition), M.D. and Board certified in Family Medicine, is the author of health related books, including Natural Sex Boosters, an expert in nutrition and a proponent of supplements, asks: "Why has Stephen Barrett, M.D. focused most of his attention on the nutritional industry and has hardly spent time pointing out the billions of dollars wasted each year by consumers on certain prescription and non-prescription pharmaceutical drugs?" and " Another point I would like to make regarding Quackwatch is that Dr. Barrett often, if not the majority of the time, seems to point out the negative outcome of studies with supplements (you can sense his glee and relish when he points out these negative outcomes), and rarely mentions the benefits they provide."

• Dr. Elmer M. Cranton, author of Textbook on EDTA Chelation Therapy, has responded to criticism of chelation therapy by Quackwatch, stating: "There exist a small number of self-styled medical thought-police who call themselves 'quack busters'. They even have their own website, QuackWatch. This organization has the mission of attacking alternative and emerging medical therapies in favor of the existing medical monopoly." He further stated :"I will answer below, point by point, a critical article on the Quackwatch website by Dr. Saul Green entitled Chelation Therapy: Unproven Claims and Unsound Theories, in which Dr. Green attempts to discredit EDTA chelation using half-truths, speculation, and false statements."

• Dr. Gerhard N. Schrauzer has responded to a Quackwatch article written by James Pontolillo that criticizes Dr. Joel D. Wallach: "The present account shows that Dr. Wallach's academic record is unassailable, and that his opinions and views are generally well substantiated. If he startles some of his critics this may be because developments in his area of expertise are not generally known or ignored by the largely drug oriented conventional medicine."

• Peter Barry Chowka, journalist and a former adviser to the National Institutes of Health's Office of Alternative Medicine, has said that Barrett "seems to be putting down trying to be objective." He went on to state that "Quackwatch.com is consistently provocative and entertaining and occasionally informative,.....But I personally think he's running against the tide of history. But that's his problem, not ours."

• Timothy Patrick ( Tim ) Bolen, webmaster of Quackpot Watch, a website that challenges Barrett and some of the views presented on Quackwatch. Barrett has responded to Bolen, saying "Bolen and his wife Jan do business as JuriMed, an entity whose stated purpose is to assist "alternative" health practitioners faced with regulatory action, criminal prosecution, or other matters that threaten their financial well-being and/or license to practice." Tim Bolen states on one of his websites: "JuriMed - Public Relations & Research Group's business card says "Strategies for Government Besieged Health Professionals." Bolen describes himself as "a consumer advocate and the nemesis of the now failing 'quackbuster' operation."

See also

• Alternative medicine
• Consumer protection
• Evidence-based medicine
• Medical ethics
• National Council Against Health Fraud
• Pseudoscience
• Scientific skepticism
• Skepticism
• Stephen Barrett

External links

• Quackwatch.org - Official website

• Quackpot Watch - Tim Bolen (critical)