Placebo Effect

By R. BARKER BAUSELL

Why we need less research on alternative medicine, not more

In 1993 The New England Journal of Medicine published the results of a survey, conducted by David M. Eisenberg and his colleagues, estimating that tens of millions of Americans were frequenting an astonishing variety of bizarre, pseudomedical practitioners. Five years later, The Journal of the American Medical Association published a follow-up survey by the same group, concluding that visits to alternative practitioners were