Dr. Brian Goldman (@nightshiftmd), host of a great CBC radio show called White Coat Black Art that dares to pull back the curtain on the hidden world of medical practice, seems to be the latest victim of integrative medicine (IM). This IM movement has been gaining traction with Western physicians and medical institutions: many North American hospitals now include complementary and alternative treatments alongside evidence-based medicine. The world-famous Mayo Clinic in Rochester has done it; our own Jewish General Hospital has done it as well.

In a recent mini-podcast for the CBC show, Dr. Goldman was being interviewed on Dr. David Gorski and Dr. Steven Novella’s paper in Trends in Molecular Medicine entitled “Clinical trials of integrative medicine: testing whether magic works?”.  While he seemed to agree with the authors that treatments like homeopathy and Reiki have no plausible mechanism and have not been shown to work, my “hmm”…