Oprah Winfrey’s medical guru recently came under fire for promoting alternative treatments.
Mehmet Oz, a cardiothoracic surgeon, was accused of quackery by his outspoken peers. According to MSNBC, Oz encouraged viewers of the popular daytime show to “cure what ails them” by trying out “energy medicine”.
Stephen Barrett, a vice-president of the National Council Against Health Fraud, told a US tabloid, “One part of Dr Oz is highly rational and scientific, but I think he’s also loaded with near-delusional ideas and gives some very bad advice. The bottom line for me is that he does more harm than good for American health.”
MSNBC reports that Oz’s promotion of Reiki, which his wife teaches, has particularly come under fire. Mary Ann Malloy, a cardiologist, told the National Enquirer: “Dr Oz promotes unproven approaches such as Reiki and Therapeutic Touch, and to support them he cherry-picks studies that are positive and ignores the negative ones.”
Not all physicians, however, were opposed. Ernie Bodai said: “I like what Dr Oz is doing and I agree with it. If a patient wants these kinds of complementary treatments, I think a doctor is right to utilise them – as long as they are used as an addition to standard medical treatments rather than a replacement.”