US MEDICAL JOURNAL DENOUNCES ``ALTERNATIVE'' METHODS

BOSTON (Reuters) - The influential New England Journal of Medicine
urged scientists to stop giving fast-growing alternative medicine a
``free ride,'' saying its remedies were unproven, unregulated and
sometimes dangerous.

The promoters of such treatments usually offer testimonials to back up
their claims and are reluctant to conduct tests to show if the
therapies actually work, the editors said.

``But assertions, speculation and testimonials do not constitute
evidence,'' Journal Executive Editor Marcia Angell and Editor-in-Chief
Jerome Kassirer wrote in Thursday's edition of the weekly medical journal.

``It is time for the scientific community to stop giving alternative
medicine a free ride. There cannot be two kinds of medicine --
conventional and alternative. There is only medicine that has been
adequately tested and medicine that has not, medicine that works and
medicine that may or may not work,'' they said.

Their editorial appeared in the journal, one of the United States'
most prestigious medical periodicals, as a growing number of doctors
are dabbling in such treatments, in part to attract patients
disenchanted with conventional medicine.

As many as a third of cancer patients in developed countries use
alternative treatments, such as diet and food supplements, Chinese
medicine, herbs and homeopathy, in addition to standard treatment.

U.S. government researchers have recognized this interest, opening the
Office of Alternative Medicine at the National Institutes of Health
and starting research into which alternative therapies might work.

One source of concern by the New England Journal editors was the lack
of government control over the safety or purity of ''dietary
supplements'' promoted to cure disease. Most of the Food and Drug
Administration's authority in that area was stripped away by Congress
in 1994 under pressure from multibillion-dollar supplement industry.

The journal also included studies and letters suggesting why stronger
regulation is needed.

Researchers from New Jersey examined one man with prostate cancer who
developed breast tenderness and a loss of sex drive after taking an
herbal preparation sold as PC-SPES -- PC stands for prostate cancer
and SPES is Latin for hope.

Tests by the New Jersey group showed that PC-SPES acted like the
female hormone estrogen, reducing the amount of the male hormone
testosterone.

Although herbal products and other ``health foods'' cannot make
medical claims, Angell and Kassirer cited PC-SPES as an example of the
``double-speak'' to promote a substance as a drug without being
regulated like a drug.

Some people are becoming so enamored of ``alternative'' therapies,
they are choosing them over proven treatments, according to four
doctors from Alberta Children's Hospital in Calgary.

The doctors reported the case of a boy with Hodgkin's disease who
rejected chemotherapy and radiation in favor of an herbal treatment.
The treatment failed, the tumor worsened and the boy asked for the
standard treatment.

At the same hospital, the parents of a 9-year-old girl whose brain
tumor had been removed insisted on treating her with shark cartilage
instead of chemotherapy and radiation, for which the cure rate is at
least 50 percent. Four months later, the tumor reappeared and the girl
died.

In another journal article, researchers found several dietary
supplements contaminated by Digitalis lanata, which can cause the
heart to beat irregularly. Nobody noticed the problem for two years.

A third letter to the Journal described how researchers found hidden
drugs or deadly heavy metals in 32 percent of the 260 Asian patent
medicines they analyzed.

``The remaining products cannot be assumed to be safe and free of

toxic ingredients, in view of their batch-to-batch inconsistency,''
wrote Richard Ko of the California Department of Health Services.

^REUTERS@

Checked-by: Rich O'Grady