#1275

The facts are;

Alliance For Natural Health

InĂ­cio NotĂ­cias Quackbuster, Stephen Barrett, MD, loses appeal and leaves home town

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Quackbuster, Stephen Barrett, MD, loses appeal and leaves home town

Date: 18 January 2008

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28

Self proclaimed Quackbuster, Stephen Barrett, MD, recently handed
crushing defeats by chiropractor Tedd Koren and Ilena Rosenthal, has
announced he is leaving his home town and operating base in
Allentown, Pennsylvania.

Following is an excerpt from a press release sent by Betty Martini dated 23rd June 2007:

On June 11th, 2007, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania affirmed a

lower court dismissal of Barretts defamation suite against Dr. Koren.

Barretts case was so lacking in merit the judge blocked it from going

to the jury. Barrett simply had no case against Dr. Koren. This

followed another stunning defeat last month in California. There an

appeals court ordered Barrett and crony Terry Polevoy, MD to post

bonds of more than $400,000.00 after they lost a defamation case

against Illena Rosenthal virtually identical to the Koren case.

Perhaps the fact that lawyers and judges in Allentown are catching on

to his intimidation schemes explains why Barrett is moving to Chapel

Hill, North Carolina. Barrett can run but he cant hide. Chapel Hill

collection attorneys are already being asked to locate his assets to

pay his unmet legal obligations. Assets of other Quackwatch, Inc.,

principals might also be sought.

Who Is Steven Barrett, What Are Quackbusters?

Steven Barrett is an unlicensed Pennsylvania psychiatrist, who,

though he failed his psychiatric boards and has been criticized for

his lack of expertise by several courts,

#1276

Alliance for Natural Health is founded by Robert Verkerk who is a big homeopathy guy who said RCTs shouldn’t be used for assessing homeopathy.

Sounds like you’re citing a false claim from a poor source with ad hominem. Barrett gets all kinds of personal attacks much like a lightning rod.

Here’s why the claim doesn’t even make sense:

Barrett actually never failed the certification exam. The fact is when he completed his psychiatric residency at Temple University in the 1960s, board certification was actually not a requirement at the time and this was commonplace.

From official PA listings, his medical license is listed as “active-retired” (he retired from practice in 1993) and he has been in good standing with no disciplinary actions found for his license. He also is a peer reviewer for JAMA here:

“Alternative medicine” is a large market that has very high profit margins, larger average CAGR than Big Pharma, and is expected to be almost half a trillion dollars market cap soon.

I suggest you beware “Big Alternative Medicine” even more so than “Big Pharma” - the profit motive is even larger.

2 Likes
#1278

Because Barret is a loser doesn’t make homeopathy any more credible.
Scientific studies have failed to find any effects of homeopathy treatment over a placebo.

If you can produce any scientific clinical studies in reputable scientific publications that refute this, please do so.

I also note that your user profile doesn’t exist or is hidden. Why is that?

1 Like
#1279

Back to the topic:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4098908/

From this study, “ We observed the greatest benefit of rapamycin treatment in improving age related cardiac health , with lesser effects on other tissues.”
“ Overall, these findings suggest that rapamycin improves the aging heart’s function through a reduction in age related sterile inflammation “

The study also found an increase in fasting glucose that was transient in nature.

5 Likes
#1280

Seems pretty well qualified - I would trust his opinion over homeopathy practitioners any day:

#1282

Blockquote

Seems to me that many people can potentially lower LDL from say 100-130 to 70-90 with say 12-15g 100% psyllium husk

Blockquote

This was absolutely true in my case. Dropped my LDL from 168 down to as low as 74 through diet/exercise and using psyllium husk

2 Likes
#1283

I used to take it at the end of the day with water and it did not have much effect. How do you take it? With meals?

#1284

Although “666” may be the “mark of the beast”, I think the holistic point of view is one that should be considered, and I think most people do.

My previous doctor of 20 years was a traditionally trained internist who branched into alternative medicine when he found the limits to traditional medicine were frustrating his attempts to be helpful. He occasionally ordered a homeopathic for me, said they often don’t work, but when they do, they work amazingly well. I had no faith in them, frankly, because the logic didn’t make sense to me. No homeopathic ever worked for me. He was open minded and willing to go with his gut but also kept up with the latest best evidence as well as standard practice, and was an early subscriber to rapamycin.

I also concur that I know of no controlled studies published that support homeopathy as being effective and would like to see any such evidence if it exists.

As far as a hidden profile, I guess people have their reasons. Its sometimes easy enough to discover the name of a hidden profile and previous handle with a little sleuthing on Age Reversal Forum.

1 Like
#1285

If you read the court documents carefully - the reason why the appeal on Barrett was successful was that he was found not to be an “expert on homeopathy” to be a judge of homeopathy so to speak. That’s a common legal strategy that works just as well for chiropractors.

You are welcome to explain how homeopathy’s fundamental “law of infinitesimals” does not violate Avogrado’s constant and the laws of Physics.

1 Like
#1287

I would typically take psyllium first thing in the morning with water. Worked really for me, also was watching diet more closely (low meat, no dairy) and exercising. At one point I took a little Amla as well which may have contributed

1 Like
#1288

The trial methodology was to take ~5g with meals, assuming 3 meals a day.

2 Likes
#1289

Know of any longitudinal data via HOMA-IR/QUICKI? I’d be quite curious since I’d presume rapamycin and anemia correlation may make A1c a bit difficult as a marker from some recent experience.

Personally, I found my reticulocyte index at the low-normal range (which is inappropriate for mild anemia) despite low-normal iron & low ferritin/TSAT, Hgb/Hematocrit lower than nl, and moderately elevated hs-CRP at 5 with some arthralgia in the wrist/fingers/toes/heels (arthalgias seem to be a common side effect on the sirolimus FDA label). CRP last time several months ago was 0.2. HbA1c went up to near the diabetic range despite low fasting glucose wnl, so I’m going to recheck the discordance with fasting insulin to compare with my CGM data. Gonna retest hs-CRP in a few weeks.

May be confounded with possible iron-deficiency anemia from H pylori (an extremely common stomach bug for lay audience that has a lot of complex immunology behind it) infection with gastritis and moderate epigastric pain (positive urea breath test then confirmed with endoscopy and eradicated with quadruple therapy), no ulcers, and Rheumatoid factor positive (H pylori causing false positive?) turned negative (retested a few weeks later after eradication) with all other serologies ie anti-CCP negative (I’m HLA B27 negative as well with negative hand X-ray findings but low-normal C4, slightly lowered C3). I have more than sufficient iron, Vitamin B12 and folate intake. Gonna back off rapa for now - too much going on - prefer to see the apparent hematopoietic suppression (interferon gamma or parvo related?) back off first despite H pylori eradication - maybe it could be a transient parvo but the ddx is pretty long…

1 Like
#1290

I didn’t think a podcast with a bodybuilder would be so interesting. Here Peter Attia is speaking with Layne Norton who has a PhD in nutrition. Lots of interesting things, but when he asks what are the three things you’ve changed your mind about in recent years, #1 on his list was LDL cholesterol.

It’s an interesting discussion. He now believes that anyone that is not concerned about high LDL does not understand independent risk variables. They talk about LDL deniers in social media. Peter says that that is one of the most dangerous things out there. Layne is a big proponent of eating meat, but he rather elegantly debunks the carnivore diet. It is worth watching, no matter where you stand on the dietary spectrum.

2 Likes
#1291

Most of it would make sense from a slow bleeding H. pylori gastritis, though the retic count is puzzling.
Doubt that the RF+ means much.
Also difficult to fit rapamycin into the equation.

1 Like
#1292

Its difficult to comment without quantities and units. Remember an international audience also has different units.

#1293

Yep the paradoxical retic count is the weirdest part, so I’m wondering if it’s rapa or something else (chronic parvo?). No ulcers from EGD though - I’ll update if I figure out anything new from heme/onc but pretest prob seems unlikely

#1294

Relevant to discussion, appears that there’s a new causal player in town, even validated by Mendelian randomization studies. I haven’t done any digging to see what compound(s) might lower suPAR, but it would be great if it doesn’t require a new injectable biologic medication. Maybe there’s some inhibition from dietary components and/or rapamycin.

5 Likes
#1295

What is this test for “bleeding H. pylori gastritis” called?
“A small stool sample is collected and sent to a lab. In 2 or 3 days, the test will show if you have any abnormal bacteria”.

Never mind! It is called unsurprisingly enough; “H. Pylori Test” :sweat_smile:

1 Like
#1296

Easier to get a breath test actually.

#1297

Glycine to reduce heart attack risk:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4859380/

It has been estimated that most people have a glycine deficit of about 10 grams per day from diet alone, and this would require supplementation.
Several mechanisms have been proposed to explain the inverse relationship of glycine and cardiovascular events, especially in those with elevated LDL and ApoB levels.

  1. Inhibition of macrophage foam cell generation.

  2. Reduction of endothelial inflammation.

  3. Promotes cholesterol efflux out of the endothelium.

This last point is especially relevant since rapamycin also promotes cholesterol efflux, but it’s possible that this action is impaired in the presence of low serum glycine levels. It may be a good synergy with rapamycin for the prevention of cardiac events at a dose of at least 10 grams per day.

6 Likes