Friday, April 10, 2009

Homeopathy versus conventional medicine and patient satisfaction

From BioMed Central Complementary and Alternative Medicine:

Results: A total of 6778 adult patients received the questionnaire and 126 responded(46.1%). Statistically significant differences were found with respect to health status (higher percentage of chronic and severe conditions in the homeopathic group), perception of side effects (higher percentage of reported side effects in the conventional group) and patient satisfaction (higher percentage of satisfied patients in the homeopathic group).

Conclusion:
Overall patient satisfaction was significantly higher in homeopathic than in conventional care. Homeopathic treatments were perceived as a low-risk therapy with two to three times fewer side effects than conventional care.

On examination of the body of the paper, these differences can only be attributed to differences in side effects.

Take home message: water has fewer side effects than real medicine.

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