Alternative medicine

Citation

(2009), "Alternative medicine", Nutrition & Food Science, Vol. 39 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/nfs.2009.01739aab.009

Alternative medicine

Article Type: Food facts From: Nutrition & Food Science, Volume 39, Issue 1

Research into alternative medicine has received a major blow in the US, where a large-scale clinical trial reportedly the largest-ever alternative medicine trial in the country’s history has been dramatically suspended following fears over the therapy’s safety and effectiveness. The study, which involved more than 120 medical centres and doctors’ surgeries in the US and Canada, aimed to look at whether chelation therapy the use of a man-made amino acid called EDTA helps reduce the risk of heart disease. EDTA, claims some experts, binds with calcium in the arteries and helps remove it from the body (the build-up of calcium in the arteries may lead to the arteries becoming hardened, which increases the risk of cardiovascular problems).

Run by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine at the National Institutes of Health, the trial recruited more than 1,500 heart attack survivors. However, two of the volunteers are reported to have died, while some of the researchers working on the study have been found to have disciplinary or criminal records, and asked to quit.

Critics of the study have also suggested that volunteers have been misled over claims for the safety and effectiveness of chelation therapy, while others have singled out problems with the trial’s “inadequate” consent form.