Top cancer hospitals across the country treat their patients' PAIN with "woo."

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92. I try and offer a reasoned response and this is what I get...

There are countless individuals who claim to have gotten no relief through acupuncture, and countless individuals who claim they have gotten help. But they are all just individual anecdotes and there is no way to use any of them as generalized evidence one way or the other. Only well-controlled acupuncture/sham comparative studies can do that. And, for me, the jury is still out on whether acupuncture offers anything but a placebo effect. I wish that more good studies could be funded, as there is enough intriguing data to warrant them.

Why should you just assume we didn't fully research the practitioner we found? She was in fact trained in Asia, and had been practicing for decades. The conventional, Western, OB/GYN practice my wife went to recommended her, as they had success stories from their patients, and we went into the experience with great optimism and hope (although if it is really effective, the patient's mindset shouldn't make a difference), as my wife was really suffering and didn't want to use heavy-duty painkillers while pregnant.

Why should you take offense if someone doesn't take your single positive experience as proof of the efficacy of acupuncture? No offense was intended. I made it very clear that I keep an open mind about acupuncture, despite our experience, because any one experience, positive or negative, doesn't prove much of anything.