Edzard Ernst

Dieses Sachbuch klärt über die dunkle Seite der österreichischen Medizingeschichte während des Nationalsozialismus auf. Es skizziert die Biografien von beteiligten Ärzten und Ärztinnen, deren Vergehen und Konsequenzen nach 1945. Es dokumentiert die medizinischen Gräueltaten des Nationalsozialismus, und deren verheerende Auswirkungen auf die betroffenen Menschen, und zieht wichtige Lehren für die moderne Medizinethik und den Schutz von Menschenrechten. Zu dem Thema Ärzte im „Dritten Reich“ sind bereits zahlreiche Bücher verfasst worden. Das vorliegende Buch fokussiert sich erstmals auf österreichische Mediziner und Medizinerinnen.

There have been many books about the doctors of the Third Reich and their atrocities. Most of these books neglect the contribution of women in the medical profession. In this book, they are the focus of attention. The first section of the book explains the background of the Third Reich in general and medicine during this period in particular. It addresses the situation of female doctors and why there were relatively few of them. It goes on to detail the forms of transgression that occurred under Nazi rule—involuntary sterilization, euthanasia, and mass murder of Jews and other groups considered undesirable. The second part of the book is a collection of 38 alphabetically arranged biographies of individual female doctors who participated in these activities. It reports on the actions they took and what happened to them after the war. The final chapter draws some conclusions, which can be briefly summarized as follows: 1) the female doctors' role remains under-researched, 2) generally speaking, female doctors were also guilty, but their transgressions generally less gruesome than those of their male colleagues, 3) many of the deeds of female doctors are nevertheless shocking.

This book focuses on the individuals who invented specific forms of alternative medicine. Examples are Hahnemann (homeopathy), Still (osteopathy), Schulz (autogenic training). In total, about 40 such personalities are included in the book. They have all led unusual lives, and the book explores their journey towards their inventions. Certain characteristics seem to emerge: · They are all male! · Many originated from Europe · Most of them are white · Many gave their name to the therapy · Many inventions are relatively recent · Many inventors are not doctors · Most inventors claim to have found a panacea · Many adhere to vitalistic ideas · Almost all of the inventors are fully convinced of their invention · Inventions are often based on personal experience · The inventions tend to be implausible even by the standards of their time The book explores all these themes and, where appropriate, contrasts them with the corresponding situation in conventional medicine.

Seit 1939 gibt es in Deutschland Heilpraktiker. Heute sehen ihn immer mehr Konsumenten als eine echte Alternative zur konventionellen Medizin. Doch was steckt wirklich hinter diesem Beruf? Edzard Ernst geht dieser Frage auf den Grund. Er erläutert die Geschichte, Befugnisse, Methoden und Therapieansätze der Heilpraktiker. Sein Ziel ist es, dem Verbraucher durch klar verständliche, evidenzbasierte Analysen einen Zugang zur Thematik zu ermöglichen, Missverständnisse auszuräumen, und kritisches Denken zu fördern. Die Gefahren, die er dabei aufdeckt, stellen die dringliche Frage nach der Sinnhaftigkeit des Heilpraktiker-Berufs in den Raum. Der Faktencheck zum aktuellen Gesundheitsdisput.

Alternative medicine (AM) is popular; about 40% of the US general population have used alternative treatment in the past year, and in Germany this figure is around 70%. The global market is expected to reach nearly US $ 200 billion by 2025, with most of these funds coming directly out of consumers’ pockets. Consumers are bombarded with misleading and false information on AM and therefore prone to making wrong, unwise, or dangerous therapeutic decisions, endangering their health and wasting their money. This book is a reference text aimed at guiding consumers through the maze of AM. This second edition includes over 50 additional treatments as well as updates on many others.

Cancer victims are bombarded with misleading information about alternative medicine. Many such treatments try to sell false hope at inflated prices, and many promise a cure without side-effects. This book explains why alternative cancer cures are a fallacious concept. However, it also outlines the important role of alternative medicine in supporting cancer patients and improving their quality of life.

Cancer victims are bombarded with misleading information about alternative medicine. Many such treatments try to sell false hope at inflated prices, and many promise a cure without side-effects. This book explains why alternative cancer cures are a fallacious concept. However, it also outlines the important role of alternative medicine in supporting cancer patients and improving their quality of life.

Alternative Medizin ist populär: etwa 70% der deutschen Bevölkerung hat im vergangenen Jahr mindestens eine Art von alternativer Behandlung angewendet. Doch was bringen Antioxidantien, Aloe Vera, Kinesiologie und Reiki eigentlich? Kann man an der Zunge oder der Iris erkennen, ob es den inneren Organen gut geht? Welche Erfolge können Geistheilung, autogenes Training oder Hypnotherapie vorweisen? Es gibt vielschichtige Gründe für die große Beliebtheit dieser Methoden - Fehlinformationen sollten dabei eigentlich keine Rolle spielen. Leider prasseln auf Anwender und Hilfesuchende eine Menge an Fehlinformationen ein. Diese sind ausschlaggebend dafür, dass falsche, unkluge oder sogar gefährliche therapeutische Entscheidungen getroffen werden.Dieses Buch hilft dem Leser, sich im Labyrinth der alternativen Medizin zurechtzufinden. Neben wesentlichen Hintergrundinformationen zu alternativer Medizin wie dem Placebo-Effekt, wissenschaftliche Nachweismethoden und gesellschaftlichen Pro- und Contra Argumenten, führt das Buch durch 150 alternative therapeutische und diagnostische Methoden und beurteilt sie unter anderem hinsichtlich Wirksamkeit, Kosten und Gefahrenpotential. Das Buch richtet sich an Leser, die ein Interesse an ihrer Gesundheit haben, daher auch mit der Alternativmedizin liebäugeln und eine evidenzbasierte Analyse suchen. Der Autor Edzard Ernst erforscht seit 25 Jahren alle Aspekte der alternativen Medizin. Er und sein Team haben weit über 1000 von Fachkollegen begutachtete Arbeiten und viele Bücher zu diesem Thema veröffentlicht, darunter More Harm than Good? The Moral Maze of Complementary and Alternative Medicine (2018) und Homöopathie - Die Fakten [unverdünnt] (2016) bei Springer. Seine Arbeit wurde mit mehr als einem Dutzend Preisen ausgezeichnet, darunter dem John-Maddox-Preis 2016. Er ging 2012 in den Ruhestand und ist emeritierter Professor derUniversität Exeter und spielt dauerhaft eine aktive Rolle in der öffentlichen Debatte über alternative Medizin.

Of all forms of alternative medicine, chiropractic is the one that is most generally accepted. In the UK, for instance, chiropractors are regulated by statute and even have their own ‘Royal College of Chiropractic’. In the US, chiropractic’s country of origin, most chiropractors carry the title ‘doctor’ and many consumers believe they are medically trained. Despite this high level of acceptance, chiropractic is wide open to criticism. The claims and assumptions made by chiropractors are far from evidence based. Chiropractic manipulations are of doubtful effectiveness and have regularly been associated with severe adverse effects, including multiple fatalities. The advice issued by chiropractors to patients and consumers is often less than responsible. The behaviour of chiropractors and their organisations is frequently less than professional. This book presents and discusses recent evidence in and around chiropractic in a factual and unemotional manner. It amounts to an evidence-based critique of this profession and discloses the often dangerously misleading information published for the lay audience. It thereby contributes to advancing public health and critical thinking.

So-called alternative medicine (SCAM*) is largely useless; very few SCAMs demonstrably generate more good than harm. Yet, SCAM is popular and has grown into a huge business. Spending on SCAM in Australia (2016) was estimated to be AUS$3.9bn, in the UK (2008) £4.5bn, and in the US (2012) US $30.2bn. Why is something that is expensive and useless nevertheless popular? One answer is that consumers are constantly being misled about SCAM. Consequently, many of us have come to believe things that are quite simply not true. Currently, over 50,000,000 websites promote SCAM, and consumers are being bombarded with information not just via the internet, but also via newspapers, magazines, books and many other sources.This situation has the potential of separating us from our cash or even of damaging our health. There is little that protects us from greedy SCAM-entrepreneurs and over-enthusiastic SCAM-therapists. Therefore, we ought to protect ourselves.This book offers this protection for anyone who is willing to reconsider their own beliefs. It discloses the errors and lies that misled you into believing things about SCAM that are untrue. It analyses the many falsehoods used in the promotion of SCAM, explains the erroneous thinking behind them, and presents the scientific evidence in easily understandable terms. In a way, Ernst's new book amounts to a course in critical thinking, a skill that should prove to be helpful far beyond the realm of healthcare.*Ernst’s previous book was entitled SCAM: So-Called Alternative Medicine.

Alternative medicine (AM) is hugely popular; about 40% of the US general population have used at least one type of alternative treatment in the past year, and in Germany this figure is around 70%. The money spent on AM is considerable: the global market is expected to reach nearly US $ 200 billion by 2025, with most of these funds coming directly out of consumers’ pockets. The reasons for this popularity are complex, but misinformation is certainly a prominent factor. The media seem to have an insatiable appetite for the subject and often report uncritically on it. Misinformation about AM on the Internet (currently about 50 million websites are focused on AM) is much more the rule than the exception. Consumers are thus being bombarded with misinformation on AM, and they are ill-protected from such misinformation and therefore prone to making wrong, unwise or dangerous therapeutic decisions, endangering their health and wasting their money. This book is a reference text aimed at guiding consumers through the maze of AM. The concept of the book is straightforward. It has two main parts. The first, short section provides essential background on AM, explaining in simple terms what is (and what is not) good, reliable evidence, and addressing other relevant issues like, for instance, the placebo response, informed consent, integrative medicine, etc. The second and main part consists of 150 short chapters, topically grouped and each dedicated to one single alternative therapeutic or diagnostic method. In each of them, seven critical points are raised. These points relate to issues that are important for consumers’ decisions whether it is worth trying the method in question. Restricting the discussion to just seven points means that issues must be prioritized to those themes which are most relevant in the context of each given modality.

So-called alternative medicine (SCAM) is popular and therefore important, no matter whether we love or loathe it. Consequently, an impressive number of books about SCAM are already available. Most of them, however, are woefully uncritical, overtly promotional and dangerously misleading.Not so this one!This book was written by someone who received SCAM as a patient, practised SCAM as a doctor, and researched SCAM as a scientist. It provides an insider's perspective by covering aspects of SCAM which most other books avoid, and by questioning the many tacitly accepted assumptions and wild extrapolations that underpin SCAM. The text is factual, occasionally dosed with a touch of humour or satire. The aim is not only to inform but also to entertain.It is written principally for members of the general public who have an interest in healthcare and are tired of the promotional counter-knowledge produced by SCAM enthusiasts. It is an exercise in critical thinking that might prevent you from wasting your money on (or endangering your health with) bogus treatments.

This book reveals the numerous ways in which moral, ethical and legal principles are being violated by those who provide, recommend or sell ‘complementary and alternative medicine’ (CAM). The book analyses both academic literature and internet sources that promote CAM. Additionally the book presents a number of brief scenarios, both hypothetical and real-life, about individuals who use CAM or who fall prey to ethically dubious CAM practitioners. The events and conundrums described in these scenarios could happen to almost anyone. Professor emeritus of complementary medicine Edzard Ernst together with bioethicist Kevin Smith provide a thorough and authoritative ethical analysis of a range of CAM modalities, including acupuncture, chiropractic, herbalism, and homeopathy. This book could and should interest all medical professionals who have contact to complementary medicine and will be an invaluable reference for patients deliberating which course of treatment to adopt.

This book traces the genesis, principles and practice of homeopathy, and discusses the reasons for its enduring popularity. Two hundred years ago, medicine had little to offer except blood letting and the administration of violent purgatives – practices which shortened the course of illness by hastening the death of the patient. Largely in reaction to what he correctly saw as the brutality and ineffectiveness of the medicine of his day, the eighteenth century German physician Samuel Hahnemann developed a system of therapeutics that he termed homeopathy. Ironically, while modern medicine has changed beyond recognition, homeopathy, with its roots in alchemy and metaphysics, continues to be practiced precisely as it was in Hahnemann’s day. Readers of this book will enjoy the story of homeopathy and its almost magical attraction, whilst learning much from the authors' rational and scientific discussion of the biological, chemical and psychological questions that this treatment raises.

This is the story of my life as a doctor and a scientist. Despite a youthful ambition to become a jazz musician, I eventually studied medicine and became a medical research scientist, taking up appointments in Germany, Austria and finally in England. My reverence for the pursuit of truth through the application of scientific methods, coupled with a growing interest in the history of medicine during the Nazi era, did not always endear me to my professional colleagues. At the time I was appointed to the world's first chair in alternative medicine, this was an area of health care that had never been studied systematically, and was almost entirely dominated by outspokenly evangelic promoters and enthusiasts — among them, famously, HRH Prince Charles — many of whom exhibited an overtly hostile, anti-scientific attitude towards the objective study of their favoured therapies. Clashes were inevitable, but the sheer ferocity with which advocates of alternative medicine would go in order to protect their field from scrutiny came as a profound surprise. This memoir provides a unique insight into the cutthroat politics of academic life and offers a sobering reflection on the damage already done by pseudoscience in the field of medicine.

Whether you are an ardent believer in alternative medicine, a skeptic, or are simply baffled by the range of services and opinions, this groundbreaking analysis lays to rest doubts and contradictions with authority, integrity, and clarity. Over thirty of the most popular treatments including acupuncture, homeopathy, aromatherapy, reflexology, chiropractic, and herbal medicines are examined for their benefits and potential dangers. What works and what doesn t? Who can you trust, and who is ripping you off? In its scrutiny of alternative and complementary cures, this book also strives to reassert the primacy of the scientific method as a means for determining public health practice and policy."