This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 at 10:41 pm and is filed under Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Parity of proof - do doctors who preach GF have to meet a higher criterion?
Wednesday, December 19, 2007 posted by
comments (2)
The thing that really bugs me about that Biagi article (which I called “dangerous” in a previous post) is that it somehow counts as real research in a “peer-reviewed journal,” a piece of work that somehow marches Science along. It documents ONE PATIENT! How exactly does one person count as a statistical sample?
And yet Dr. Lewey wrote in his article, “However, since we are both clinically based and are reporting our single gastroenterologist experiences, and we are now known to have a bias that non-celiac gluten sensitivity exists…,” he can’t get his data published. You’d think one or two doctors presenting data on scores of patients would trump four doctors presenting one isolated case.
In fact, Dr. Lewey went even further in Gluten sensitivity, a gastroenterologist’s personal journey down the rabbit hole, when he stated:
Within the medical community, there seems to be an irrational resistance to a more widespread recommendation for gluten avoidance.
He is not the only one who feels this way - Dr. Rodney Ford, in Gluten causes brain disease! also refers to “an underlying unwillingness for doctors to consider food allergy as a possibility.” [Dr. Ford: it could have something to do with the exclamation marks. I can accept that gluten is a neurotoxin. But "Gluten causes brain disease!" sounds like something I'd see waiting in the checkout line at the supermarket. It doesn't build credibility. Sorry, but I couldn't even bring myself to quote the article without that disclaimer.]
Hyperbole aside, the man makes a good point. There does seem to be a general unwillingness among traditional doctors to consider food intolerances. Why is that? It all seems so blindingly obvious once you make the connection, why don’t more people see it?
{Note to World: It’s been a hectic past few days and this isn’t nearly so finished as I hoped it would be. But I thought I’d at least get it posted and get any possible discussion started, and I’m sure we’ll come back to this issue again. And again.}
December 19th, 2007 at 11:36 pm
I know it is me to blame that you are out of time because you are taking the time to bake gingerbread cookies for my children instead, so they can make gingerbread houses with the other children at school. Thank you and merry christmas.
Ulla B.
December 20th, 2007 at 7:49 am
Ulla, I love you, silly. That’s our JOB, to make the gingerbread house pieces for you. That’s what it’s all about. This website thing, this blog, is just the icing on the cake, so to speak.
Anyway, have fun tomorrow doing the houses! They shipped yesterday so you should get them today. And happy holidays!