A Question of Accountability
A Question of
Accountability
(my ordeal as a patient of Dr. Christiane Northrup MD)
Update! October 21,
2007 - I received another email from another
former patient's mother.
Update! March, 10, 2000 - I just received two
emails from another former patient telling of her
experience
with Dr. N.
By Mary L. Cupp (email me!)
Through the
Speculum
Will
the Real Vitamin A Please Stand Up?
What
Women Do To Women
Women's
Whoppers, Women's' Wiles
The
Maine State Medical Board
Serving Two
Masters
Questions
of Accountability
If
it looks like a duck....it might be a DECOY
The Ultimate
Rape - (HERS Conference in Boston)
Bibliography
Through
the Speculum
This has not been an easy web page for me to write. For one
thing,
the story it tells is deeply personal and painful. In addition to
that, writing an article critical of Dr. Northrup requires that I take
extreme care for legal reasons. I have worked hard to fully
document
my claims and give sufficient detail to show the logic of the problem
at
hand. It has been difficult to know what to put in or leave
out.
How much do I need to spell out for my reader's comprehension?
How
long are their attention spans? I have struggled with these
questions
during my writing and editing. And I don't have any definitive
answers.
The following is the best I can do to tell my experience. That
experience
goes directly counter to the marketed media image that Dr. Northrup has
promoted of herself. I want women to be aware of the medical and
legal realities behind the slick promoted image and I want to warn them
about a medical system that does not serve their interests.
I became aware of Dr. Northrup in 1982 when I was living in
Portland,
ME and consulted with a
nutritionist named Phyllis concerning my endometriosis and other
gynecological
problems. The arrangement was by barter, as I had little money at
the time. I agreed to do a vegetable poster for her to use when
doing
presentations in exchange for advice. We met at a macrobiotic
restaurant,
run by a mutual friend who was an excellent cook. “This is the
place
to go.”, she exclaimed. She made some suggestions for
supplements,
recommended that I look into the macrobiotic diet, and mentioned Dr.
Northrup
as a nutritionally oriented physician. She commented, “I know Dr.
Northrup would take you off all dairy products. I don't totally
agree,
but do limit them.” The following year I read an interview
in "East/West Journal" in which Dr. Northrup spoke of treating
endometriosis,
fibroid tumors, and heavy periods etc. (all conditions that I was
suffering
from) with diet and vitamins. In the article she recommended a
lowfat,
vegetarian diet. I had been lacto-ovo vegetarian for years, yet
she
recommended avoiding dairy products. The article included
two
case histories of women who avoided hysterectomies through diet.
One of them was titled "Escape from Hysterectomy".
I had attended a number of meetings of the Endometriosis
Association
and had listened to women tell their horror stories, describing their
"side
effects" (read primary effects) from medications and multiple
surgeries.
I had already had one surgery and didn't want another. None of
the
women reported getting well from these treatments. I wanted to
try
a more holistic approach but I didn't know much about holistic medicine
or treatments. I wanted guidance through the maze of alternative
health modalities that is sometimes very daunting for the
uninitiated.
I was somewhat afraid to strike out into the world of alternative
medicine,
not knowing who the good people were and who were the “quacks”, and not
knowing what the different treatments were about.
When I heard that Dr. Northrup had opened a holistic clinic
called "Women
to Women" I decided to try it. I arranged a consultation in June
of 1986. She recommended a strict vegetarian diet, eliminating
all
(she underlined “all”on the prescription pad) dairy foods and eggs, and
substituting soy milk for dairy milk in recipes. I
commenced
the diet. I remember thinking to myself, "Well, you can't hurt
anyone
with a good diet." Little did I know.
Initially, the diet did help to alleviate my pain and I felt
better
for awhile. But after a few weeks I felt less and less healthy
and
I found it difficult to stay away from dairy food. I
thereupon
sought out a nutritionist named Vicki. Vicki approved of the
recommended
diet, but permitted butter and low fat yogurt. Additionally, she
gave me long lists of supplements to take. Taking so many pills,
I felt like a force-fed chicken being stuffed with pellets.
Although
I added dairy food back into my diet, I was not eating nearly as much
as
before. At the end of two years my health had deteriorated
markedly
until I had severe abdominal pain and abnormal bleeding between
periods.
I went back to my regular gynecologist and was put on Provera™, a
progesterone
drug.
When I went back to see Vicki but she didn't have a clue as to
what
the problem was, so she simply gave me a general list of
supplements.
This was the only time she included vitamin A in her list. She
had
previously counseled me to get vitamin A from carrots and other
vegetables.
By this point the bleeding had stopped but I was still in a
great deal
of pain. I went back to “Women to Women” hoping that Dr.
Northrup
would trouble shoot the diet and find out what was causing my
problems.
After an intake visit with the nurse practitioner, I was sent to an
iridologist/nutritionist
named Ellen. She suggested that I use concentrated food
supplements,
such as bee pollen and chlorella, rather than vitamin pills. I
had
stopped taking all pills except for B vitamins, vitamin C and a daily
multivitamin
pill. Over the following year I developed severe anemia.
When
I saw Dr. Northrup some time afterwards I had just been put on heavy
iron
supplementation by my chiropractor.
The iron caused my blood to rebound and I was feeling much
better but
as soon as I got my period I started to hemorrhage badly and was placed
on Norlutate™, another progesterone drug. Once started the
bleeding
would not stop. I had taken iron before in the past and had
noticed
that it caused me to bleed more heavily but I didn't know why and it
had
never been this severe or long lasting. This bleeding just
wouldn't
stop. I had to take two or more pills daily or my life would be
put
at risk. I could not stop the drug for even a couple of days
without
it resulting in a hemorrhage. Yet I desperately wanted to keep my
uterus.
None the less, Dr. Northrup's initial recommendation was a
hysterectomy,
the very surgery I had come to her to avoid. I refused. I
had
come for the holistic healing that she claimed to do, and if she didn't
know how to help me, I would go to other holistic healers.
However,
I did continue to see Dr. Northrup to get my prescription. I was
totally chained to the drug. I do not believe in taking drugs,
but
in this situation I was forced to go against every instinct regarding
them.
I somehow held together enough so that when the bleeding
settled down
I was able to go on a pilgrimage searching for alternative cures.
I felt strongly that any conventional doctor would have little to offer
at this point but surgery. Yet I profoundly felt that surgery was
wrong, and that there had to be a reason for the bleeding and I wanted
to correct the cause. I knew next to nothing about holistic
medicine,
but slowly I started working my way up the learning curve. I
read,
took classes, went to workshops and followed leads given by other
healers.
For the next four years (1989 - 1993) I lived through a hell
in which
I battled against abnormal bleeding while dependent on the prescription
that Dr. Northrup dispensed. My life was caught up in a struggle
to keep my blood count out of danger and to seek out alternative
cures.
Because the drug beat back the symptom, I was having trouble reading my
own body in order to know whether the holistic treatment that I was
pursuing
was helping or not.
The more Dr. Northrup pushed for a hysterectomy, the more I
refused.
She did however permit me to try holistic remedies and encouraged a
number
of them. But I was troubled by the fact that she didn't take the
lead in the holistic aspects of treatment. She was so
noncommittal.
During this time she was President of the American Holistic
Medical
Association and I felt that I should be getting more help, but
instead
she was very non directive. I began to wonder if that was just a
purely administrative position that did not include her knowing
anything
about holistic care. I was trying to make sense of her
behavior.
I told her that, for me, surgery would be a "violation" and I insisted
on being able to look for holistic cures.
Although if I asked about some therapy (say herbs) she would
agree to
my pursuing it and perhaps give a referral, she never did any holistic
treatment herself or did any nutritional checking. Some of the
things
she encouraged were macrobiotic diet, castor oil packs, aura
healing,
cranial massage, herbs, acupuncture, homeopathy, psychic
kinesiology
(I call it this because I don't have a better term for it), and (what
else)
psychotherapy. But she did not initiate any of these
treatments.
At one point she oversaw injections of vitamins C, B complex, Calcium,
and Magnesium, at the direction of a naturopath.
Something didn't feel right. If I would ask her
about her
experience with the macrobiotic diet and other women, she would simply
reply that every case was different and that she had never seen a case
like mine. And she continued to urge a hysterectomy. And I
continued to refuse. I consulted with over 30 healers of various
kinds, and tried all sorts of nutritional supplements and holistic
treatments.
To make a very long story short, nothing helped. During this time
I was completely dependent on the drug Norlutate™ to keep body and soul
together, and upon Dr. Northrup to dispense it. I simply could
not
walk away from the situation.
Many people have asked me why I didn't simply go to another
doctor.
The reason is that I didn't feel that a conventional doctor would have
anything to offer at this point but drugs and surgery and I wanted a
holistic
solution. I wanted to find and correct the cause of the problem, not
merely
turn off the symptom. Still I needed the prescription drug in
order
to hang together and buy the time to search. My options really
were
narrowed by my dependence on the drug.
At one point Dr. Northrup put me on a drug called Synarel™
which was
intended to stop the bodies production of estrogen in order to stop the
bleeding. However, instead of causing the bleeding to stop, it
set
off a wild hemorrhage that I barely made it through. What Dr.
Northrup
had
failed to warn was that, initially, instead of suppressing the
estrogen,
the drug causes it to surge. Although I called in three times
in distress, I was given third party messages each time. It was a
total fiasco. In the medical records she claimed that she had
"underestimated
the estrogen surge" and failed to adequately respond as they "had some
new staffing people". (i.e. blame the new girl)
Something else that bothered me was Dr. Northrup's reaction
when I went
to see Dr. Virginia (Ginny) Shapiro who did nutritional muscle
testing.
She reacted with panic and almost broke off relations. When I
mentioned
Ginny, the pupils of her eyes suddenly dilated and she exclaimed,
"Ginny!
I feel fear!". I was confused and unnerved by her reaction.
I had been truly delighted to find someone interested in doing
nutritional
and metabolic testing, as Dr. Northrup had not done any. I
mentioned
that Ginny had found high levels of mercury in my body, clearly not a
psychological
(i.e. mind-body) problem. Her response was, "But it's really the
same thing, you know quantum physics."
After about four years of this ordeal the company that made
the Norlutate™
discontinued it. I had been given a different prescription,
Methergine™
to help in cases of heavy bleeding. (I later discovered that this
drug is chemically related to LSD. It is customarily used to contract
the
uterus after childbirth so I have questions about it's use for this
kind
of bleeding.) By June (1993) I had little Norlutate™ left, so I
decided
to try it. However I got into trouble and almost bled to
death.
I went to the emergency room with a blood count of 5.3 (normal
is 11-15).
I could barely stand up. Dr. Northrup was called. She said,
"That's it, that's it, you're having a hysterectomy first thing
tomorrow
morning! I'm going to do as I was taught (i.e. in medical
school).
This time I'm taking charge!" She told me that she would no
longer
be my doctor if I refused to submit to the surgery. Although I
was
given four units of blood (which for me added fear to the trauma), I
was
not given anything to stop the bleeding. Under these conditions I
saw no way out and I was too exhausted and vulnerable to fight back,
so,
under duress, I signed the release. Yet even then, I was still
literally
begging Christiane to leave my uterus in and remove only the fibroid
tumors.
(the medical records note that I was "reluctant to go to
surgery")
I recall her saying, "Well, you know you've tried everything."
Everything?!?
Will
the Real Vitamin A Please Stand Up?
"The essence of psychological warfare is
to
confuse the meaning of words
and to infiltrate the mind with
conflicting
concepts."-
Steven Jacobson
About six months after the surgery (Dec., 1993), I came upon a
newsletter
called "Second Opinion" by Dr. William Campbell Douglass M.D.,
which carried a column on alternative treatments. It discussed
menorrhagia
and cited a study in the 1977 South African Medical Journal using
vitamin A in its treatment. It cited a 92.5% cure rate. It
also mentioned that this treatment is used at Johannesburg General
Hospital
in
South Africa and has a documented 92% cure rate over a ten-year
period.
I had the vitamin muscle tested and I have never gotten such a positive
response. I subsequently took vitamin A in very high doses
(100,000
IU per day) for about two months. This produced a dramatic
improvement
in my general health and reversed a number of long-standing secondary
symptoms.
My gastrointestinal problems cleared and I also lost my abnormal
cravings
for ice. Also my fingernails improved and the skin on my lips,
which
had been cracked and dry to the point of bleeding, became soft and
healthy
looking again.
I was puzzled by this as I had been taking a number of
multiple vitamin
preparations, eating lots of green and yellow vegetables and
drinking
carrot juice. I had seen numerous nutritional professionals. Yet
not one of them picked up on the fact that I needed vitamin A!
I researched the vitamin, piecing together information from
different
sources and was able to uncover the underlying problem. Suddenly
the mystery of my illness became simple and transparent!
What I found out was that there are two forms of vitamin
A. One
of these, beta carotene, found in vegetables, is not true vitamin A but
a precursor which must be converted by an enzyme in the presence of
thyroxin,
the thyroid hormone, if it is to be utilized as vitamin A by the
body.
I had been somewhat aware of the two forms, however most writing on
nutrition,
and the nutritionists with whom I had consulted, all recommended
carotene
as the preferred form in which to take the vitamin. What was
emphasized
is the fact that carotene can never be toxic in any amount, therefore
it
is considered safer.
Additionally, the two forms are often treated as if they were
interchangeable.
Most multiple vitamin supplements currently on the market substitute
beta
carotene, unit for unit, for vitamin A and many do not label clearly
that
the switch has been made. . I had taken a number of
supplements
where this was the case. In fact, such misleading labeling on the
part of vitamin manufacturers is one of the reasons I didn't catch onto
the problem. For example, one of the supplements I took noted
vitamin
A 10,000 IU..........RDA 200%. However if you look at the fine
print
on the side of the label it states "vitamin A carrot
concentrate".
Another supplement said, Vitamin A......5,000 IU, but at the bottom of
the label it said, "vegetarian formula". Now "carrot concentrate"
or "vegetarian formula" means that the supplement uses beta carotene in
place of vitamin A, therefore, in order to derive vitamin A, one must
convert
it in the body. If we assume the currently believed optimal
conversion rate of about one sixth then 10,000 IU of carotene equals
1,666
IU of vitamin A. (As the saying goes, the devil is in the
detail.)
This is only equal to only 33% of the daily RDA of 5000 IU instead of
the
200% stated on the label. This small detail is entirely
omitted
from the labeling. This sleight of hand is tantamount to
using
fraudulent weights and measures. It is as dishonest as when a
person
who pulls up to the pump is charged for 10 gallons of gas when in fact
only 1.666 gallons went into the tank. Yet searching the shelves
at the health food store, I found this practice to be almost
universal.
In fact, I later learned that the FDA allows food manufacturers to
label
units of beta carotene as vitamin A
Another small detail which is omitted from the vitamin label
is that
certain medical conditions such as diabetes and low thyroid in
particular,
may block conversion altogether. Thus a seemingly healthy
vegetarian
diet may be dangerously low in vitamin A for persons in these
categories
because of their inability to utilize carotene sources of the
vitamin.
Serious malnutrition may result if pre formed vitamin A is not
taken.
The deficiency of vitamin A is extremely hard on the thyroid and the
pituitary
- organs central to women's health. Low thyroid, which is often
sub
clinical, (Meaning that the thyroid tests are not sensitive to pick it
up.) is extremely common in women with gynecological problems,
especially
dysfunctional uterine bleeding. Although my test results were
normal,
my symptoms showed a classic profile for a low thyroid.)
Dysfunctional
bleeding is a leading (if not the leading) cause of
hysterectomies.
I came to realize that, as a vegetarian, I had depleted my body level
of
vitamin A by not understanding this problem.
In addition to this I noted that certain foods frequently used
by vegetarians
fall into a category called goitrogens (from goiter) which tend to
suppress
thyroid activity further. This group includes otherwise good
foods
such as broccoli, kale, millet, and most notably soy. (Recall that Dr.
Northrup recommended soy milk to replace dairy.) I discovered
that
infants on soy formula and s consuming soy isoflavones often
develop
goiter and hypothyroidism. In one study, women consuming soy
isoflavones
developed disruptions of the menstrual cycle for up to three months
after
the soy was discontinued. Closer to home, one of my girlfriends
told
me that she had developed menstrual problems when she started eating a
lot of tofu.
( Note: Northrup is currently promoting the Revival soy
drink that
contains
160 mg isoflavones per serving! (45 mg per day caused
endocrine
disruption
in American women after just one month)
I also came to understand that taking iron for anemia, without taking
vitamin
A concurrently, could trigger hemorrhaging. This is because iron
and vitamin A work synergistically in building blood. Taking iron
alone lowers vitamin A levels if vitamin A is not supplemented at the
same
time. This is exactly the sequence that triggered my
hemorrhage.
(When I checked a the local health food store I could not find one
blood
building supplement for women which contained vitamin A, although many
contained other synergistic nutrients such as vitamin B 12.) What
is necessary, when this happens, is to take pre formed vitamin A in
very
high doses - just the opposite of what I had been taught. High
does
are indicated and therapeutic in these circumstances because the bodily
stores of the vitamin have become depleted, requiring large doses to
return
the body to a state of health.
From this research it became clear to me that the vegetarian
diet that
Dr. Northrup had recommended could be extremely dangerous for some
women
(especially those with low thyroid) if not adequately supplemented with
pre formed vitamin A. I realized that over time it could deplete
the body stores of the fat soluble vitamins, leading to severe
malnutrition.
I came to strongly suspected that it may have been a significant
contributing
factor in my bleeding. What was especially tragic about this is
that
this problem is so easy and inexpensive to correct with proper
supplements.
I realized that each of the nutritionists that I had seen had fallen
into
the trap of confusing carotene with vitamin A, thus passing on the
confusion
to their clients.
To make matters worse, by reviewing Dr. Northrup's past
writings, I
became aware that she was one of the major sources through which these
dietary ideas (vegetarian, macrobiotic type of diet for women's health
problems and bleeding) had been placed into public
circulation.
Her high profile as a doctor and her sterling credentials, gave her the
aura of credibility that would bring her ideas to be uncritically
accepted,
not only by members of the public, but also by many nutritional
professionals
across the nation. I suspected that this might be one reason that
no matter where else I turned among holistic healers I was given the
same
(wrong) nutritional advice.
I therefore felt that Christiane needed to be advised of this
potential
danger inherent in her dietary recommendations. In February
of that year (1994) I wrote her a letter notifying her that I had found
the nutritional basis for my illness and asking her for a meeting to
share
the information. Her response was to write a (Dear John) letter
terminating
her relationship with me.
What
Women Do To Women
I was deeply hurt and confused by this response on her
part.
I had expected her to be interested in what I had found, given her
stated
interest in nutrition. I couldn't understand why she would refuse
a chance to learn something that might help other patients avoid the
trauma
that I had been through. I wrote two conciliatory letters
attempting
to re-establish communication, telling her that I had not intended to
blame
her but merely wanted to share information. Soon after, in April,
I was sent an official termination letter from “Women to Women”.
In the letter I was told that I could get a list of physicians from
Maine
Medical Center. I was not so much as given the courtesy of a
referral.
Her reaction struck me as very strange, and I felt an increasing sense
of confusion and foreboding. It was as if someone had socked me
in
the solar plexus. I never did get the chance to share the
information
that I had found.
That summer (1994), Dr. Northrup's book, Women's
Bodies, Women's
Wisdom, was published. However, before I took a look at
it,
I ran across another book, Dr. Wright's Guide to Healing With
Nutrition,
(©1984)
by Dr. Jonathan Wright. When I opened it, my knees went
weak.
I was shocked to find that Dr. Wright had an entire chapter on the use
of vitamin A for menorrhagia and claimed to get a better than 90%
success
rate, mirroring the success rate reported in South Africa. He
emphasized
that, "Most of the talk of vitamin A toxicity is overdone, more
propaganda
than accurate information.". And he cited
the
study in the South African Medical Journal to support his
recommendations.
I knew that Dr. Northrup was a close colleague of Dr. Wright and was
quite
aware of the therapies that he used. If Dr. Wright had this
information,
there was no way she could not have been familiar with it. Why
didn't
she mention it to me. At least I should have had a chance to try
it. At this point I knew I'd better take a look at her book.
When I opened the book, my fears were confirmed. Dr.
Northrup specifically recommended up to 100,000 IU per day of vitamin A
for up to three months in her section on menorrhagia (p.141- 143 -
first
edition), citing the reference in the 1977 South African Medical
Journal.
She was also aware of the thyroid connection to bleeding (from medical
school) and claimed to do prolactin hormone testing in cases of
bleeding.
Yet she had never even mentioned any of these connections to me during
the entire four years that I was bleeding! (Recall that she did
recommend
other, unrelated treatments, and supervised the injection of other
vitamins
-C, B, Calcium and Magnesium. Yet she specifically omitted
vitamin
A in every case!) Not only that, but she also mentioned (p.
456, 1st ed.) the importance of vitamin A for the health of the
intestinal
tract, although in this instance she claims “beta carotene is converted
in the body into vitamin A”. ( My second most debilitating symptom
involved
the lining of the intestinal track and this symptom cleared
dramatically
on vitamin A.) However, she had never mentioned vitamin A to me
in
any form. I was devastated. And from that point of
devastation
I watched as she rose to national fame with all of the media attention
the book received.
Women's
Whoppers,
Women's Wiles
External actions
show internal
secrets - Legal Maxim, Bouvier's Law Dictionary
I went back and reviewed the medical records and questions
began to
form in my mind at every turn. Why, for example, did she
repeatedly
fail to pick up on numerous clues scattered throughout the records that
I needed vitamin A? And why did she encourage me to look in every
other conceivable direction? (I got quite a tour of holistic
medicine!)
For example, when under the care of nutritionist Vicki, I
started to
bleed the first time, I was given vitamin A inadvertently (along with a
laundry list of other supplements ). The bleeding stopped shortly
after. I did not draw the connection at that time because there
were
so many other variables and I was still confused about vitamin A/beta
carotene.
However, this sequence of events was recorded in my medical records at
the outset. Why didn't Dr. Northrup draw the connection that
was
written right under her nose? And why did she go so far as to
as to supervise injections of other vitamins (but omit vitamin
A)?
When I started to hemorrhage for the second time, although normally
vegetarian,
I began to eat liver (the richest food source of vitamin A). She
mentioned the importance of iron, but not vitamin A. She then
oversaw
my going to the Kushi Institute for a strict (healing mode as opposed
to
standard) macrobiotic diet (no more liver!). At one point
in
my treatment I started to take small amounts of cod liver oil in tablet
form for vitamin D. I noted that I seemed to be doing better. Dr.
Northrup noted that in the medical records but failed to point out to
me
that it might be the vitamin A that was helping. (Note that I
was taking far too low a dose to get a truly therapeutic
response.
I had been warned not to take large doses of vitamin A because of the
danger
of “toxicity”, so it never would have occurred to me to take a large
dose.
None-the-less, I was able to lower the dose of my medication after an
extended
period of time.) Additionally, she greatly encouraged unrelated
treatments
such as cranial massage (what does that have to do with the price of
eggs?),
that was recommended by another healer, but failed to do any further
nutritional
or endocrine testing.
When, on my own initiative, I went to see Dr. Virginia Shapiro
(who
did nutritional muscle testing) Dr. Northrup reacted with
shock
and almost broke off relations. Why? What was she afraid
of?
(Unfortunately Ginny tested me on beta carotene rather than vitamin A,
and missed the connection. She did, however, discover that soy
was
causing a problem for me. Her colleague, Dr. Vreeland, in
Vermont,
also made the same mistake when he tested me on beta carotene instead
of
vitamin A. However, both Ginny and Dr. Vreeland did pick up
on the thyroid problem by using muscle testing.)
There were other disturbing anomalies throughout. I now
realized,
from the information that I had amassed, that the extreme vegetarian
diet
recommended by Dr. Northrup could lead to serious malnutrition in
susceptible
(i.e. low thyroid) patients. You almost couldn't design a
diet
more likely to cause problems in this group. These, as a
group,
were
the very patients who were most susceptible to unneeded surgery on the
reproductive organs. This raised the question of why had Dr.
Northrup failed to respond more appropriately. The medical
records
even notes "question of nutrient lack, but follows a good diet."
Why didn't she do some more checking, especially concerning the
nutrient
most indicated? Why didn't she do a lab test for vitamin A
levels?
It was clear that she knew about the vitamin A connection from the
South
African study. So did she understand
the
pitfalls of the diet that she had recommended?
Although I did not know the answer to this, it occurred to me
that the
knowledge of both medicine and nutrition is a powerful
combination.
Not only could it confer to one who masters it tremendous power to heal
but also tremendous power to harm. Harm that crossed over the
boundaries
of mainstream, standard medical care, into holistic/nutritional care,
could
slip by those charged with oversight because it went beyond the medical
paradigms, training and beliefs held by such persons. I had also
come to realize that nutritional advice that might seem very reasonable
to those of lesser sophistication might be recognized as potentially
harmful
by those of greater sophistication and knowledge. In short,
nutritional
medicine is not totally benign.
As to how much Dr. Northrup had known at the time, I was
unsure, but
troubled by the question. What did she know? And when did she
know
it? Therefore I endeavored to investigate what sources of
information
she might have been familiar with. I started by looking to Dr.
Wright’s
book because I knew she was familiar with Dr. Wright. I found that
under
his chapter on the thyroid he recommends the work of
Dr. Stephen Langer
and
Dr.
Broda Barnes along with a warning about the inadequacy of standard
thyroid test. I looked up these two doctors.
Dr. Langer’s book titled Solved: the Riddle of
Illness,
turned out to be one of the best sources I have found to date
concerning
the question of carotene conversion and vitamin A. He devotes an
entire chapter on nutrition for thyroid illness which emphasizes the
danger
of extreme vegetarian diets and the problem of carotene conversion and
vitamin A deficiency.
Dr. Langer has this to say;
"I see too many risks in the Spartan vegetarian
diet.....carotene,
the vitamin A precursor is not easily translated into vitamin A....In
hypothyroids and diabetics, this ability is nearly completely
blocked." (p.31)
"Certain facts of life about nutrition and thyroid have
been know
for the past twenty or thirty years. Yet the
have never
seen print in
anything but medical publications..." (p.33)
Looking up Dr. Barnes, I found that he emphasized the inadequacy of
medical
blood test for low thyroid and gave great emphasis to the problem of
unnecessary
surgeries on the reproductive organs resulting from uncorrected thyroid
problems.
Dr. Barnes says;
"I want to emphasize, at the risk of seeming to be
repetitious,
that
undetected and untreated thyroid deficiency can lead to
needless
surgery on the reproductive organs." (p.131)
Dr. Northrup was very familiar with Dr. Wright's work. In fact,
Dr.
Wright has served as a kind of mentor for her in the area of
nutritional
medicine. Was she also familiar with these writers mentioned by
Dr.
Wright? I could only guess.
I went back to Dr. Northrup's earlier writings. She had
also had
an article in EWJ that came out in Dec. of 1981.
I
had not seen the article at the time it came out but I was able to get
an old copy through interlibrary loan. I was stunned at what I
found.
At
the beginning of the article Dr. Northrup claimed that her father, a
dentist,
was a follower of Dr. Weston A. Price. In this article she
claimed
familiarity with Dr. Prices’ work and seemed to use it as justification
for what was to follow. Although this detail would
have
meant nothing to me back in the early 1980's it now stuck out like a
sore
thumb. I had since learned about the work of Dr. Price from my
research.
I had learned about Dr. Prices’ meticulous, cross-cultural research
into
human dietary patterns and good health. At the center of Dr.
Prices’
findings was the importance of animal source, fat soluble vitamins in
human
nutrition. If Dr. Northrup were truly familiar with the work of
Dr.
Price then she should have been well advised as to the danger that her
recommended diet could deplete these nutrients. Yet despite this
fact, she promoted the same low-fat, vegetarian diet that she had
promoted
in the later article and to her patients. And she
specifically
promoted this diet for the problem of excess bleeding.
This information raised some very troubling questions.
Not only
did she clearly know the vitamin A and thyroid connection to uterine
bleeding,
but she was very close to sources that could inform her as to why her
recommended
diet could deplete this very indicated nutrient in her most vulnerable
patients. Furthermore she clearly had the medical and nutritional
background to interpret this information.
Even if she had not understood the problems inherent in her
diet, the
most troubling question remained. Why did she fail to give
her
patients the benefit of the advice she was about to publish concerning
vitamin A as the nutritional treatment of choice for excess
bleeding?
Why did she ignore the scientific evidence, with documented results, as
well as numerous clues in the medical records? Why did she fail
to
do appropriate nutritional testing? And failing that, why did she
encourage just about everything else so matter how irrelevant to the
problem
at hand? It seemed quite ironic to me that the actual
consequence
of her recommendations was either to get me into more trouble or merely
send me on a wild goose chase. Considering that she went on to
become
a world famous holistic healer and a specialist in women's illnesses,
all
this raised serious and troublesome questions.
At that point I realized that I needed to get a legal
opinion.
Nonetheless, I was quite skeptical about the law when it came to issues
concerning vitamins. I spoke with several lawyers but, as I
feared,
I was told that there was no way that I could make a case in an
American
court based on vitamins and a South African Medical Study. One
lawyer
specifically told me that although vitamin A might be routine in South
Africa for cases of menorrhagia, it is not generally used in American
mainstream
medicine, therefore it would be impossible to base a case upon it. Furthermore,
although the law does recognize the right of a patient to '"informed
consent"
of alternative treatments, the designation "alternative", in this
context,
refers to allopathic or conventional alternatives. It does
not
cover holistic, non standard alternatives.
This reading of the law has serious
consequences.
When a doctor holds him/herself out as offering a holistic service,
this
advertisement attracts patients who desire to avoid allopathically
indicated
surgery. The doctor, on the other hand, has no legal
obligation
to inform the patient of holistic treatments which might truly
prevent
the surgery. Needless to say, failure to prevent such
surgeries
may be lucrative for a doctor who is also a surgeon, creating for the
doctor
the temptation not to mention the holistic treatment. In other
words,
the doctor can have it both ways and play both sides against the middle.
A second lawyer stated:
"I think your position is well taken with respect to Dr.
Northrup's
unusual status. She holds herself out as a holistic
healer
and
therefore probably should have exhausted all of the holistic
remedies (including vitamin A therapy) before moving on to
surgery. However I think it would be virtually
impossible
to obtain
a qualified expert testimony that it is more likely than not
that
you
would have avoided your surgery had vitamin therapy been
initiated."
He told me that many cases of severe bleeding are refractory to any
treatment
but
surgery. I responded by asking if vitamin A had been tried
in these cases. He replied,
"My understanding is that vitamin A therapy is not the
standard
care
for this problem."
Again I was up against circular logic. If you haven't tried the
treatment,
how do you know it wouldn't work? Further protecting the doctor
were
emergency surgery laws and a very short statute of limitations - three
years in Maine. (Note, in medicine the statute of limitation is
not
only a filing deadline but covers what evidence can be brought
up.
My ordeal lasted over 6 years since my initial visit and one more year
had elapsed before the book was published, which didn't leave anything
but the last act.) I was also told that
the
loss of a uterus in a woman my age (46) would not be considered
sufficient
harm to constitute damages in the view of the court (!) (Tell that to
any
woman who has had a hysterectomy! What a joke!).
The doctor had the benefit of every loophole.
The only legal “hook”that the lawyer could come up with was
“failure
to treat” (i.e. from an allopathic perspective). In my case the
statute
of limitations was far too short to capture even this, but even if it
had
been long enough I would not have been happy with this angle.
To pursue a case based on the “failure to treat” would have made it
appear
to the public that yet another holistic healer was being raked through
the coals for failing to follow standard protocols, when the real issue
was the failure to prescribe vitamin A as therapy.
Truth would have been subject to distortion by the necessity of framing
the issue in terms that the dominant medical paradigm and the courts
could
understand and process. The
confusion that resulted could have easily been exploited by the doctor
who could have then posed as a martyr to the cause of holistic
care.
In other words, as a result of the distortion resulting from having to
operate across paradigms, the doctor could have it both ways.(!)
I realized that the law would not give me any means to hold
the doctor
accountable and I didn't know what to do. Yet I was determined
not
to be a silent victim. So I did all that I could see to do at
that
point. I confronted the doctor in a letter. Her response
was
to take out a restraining order. To fast forward and make a long
story short, she tried to take me to court to prevent me from attending
her public talks. However, instead of going to court, I was
able, after several tries, to persuade her to come to mediation.
The mediation took place on November 1, 1994. (Witnessed
by attorney
Kim Matthews) During the course of it I asked her why she had
failed
to follow her own book, and failing that, why had she encouraged just
about
everything else? She answered that she had only cited the
reference
on vitamin A and the South African study to make her book
complete.
She said that she knew that Dr. Wright used
it,
but
that she "never found that it worked".
I also asked her why she hadn't just sent me to a good naturopathic
physician
at the outset. (Note that when I first went to her I didn't even
know what a naturopath was.) Her answer was,“But
there was none in town.”
These answers presented a problem.
In
her book she says vitamin A "often works well" (p. 143, first
ed.).
Also she had referred me to a herbalist in PA, so why couldn't
she
have sent me to an out-of-town naturopath? I found her
answers
to be quite underwhelming. In spite of these
explanations,
she turned right around and repeated the same advice the following year
(1995) when she launched a national health newsletter for women.
In a supplement titled "Heal Your Symptoms Naturally", under
the
heading "Heal Fibroids without Surgery" she states,
"Take 50,000 - 100,000 IU of vitamin A daily for three
months.
Studies
have shown that this can decrease bleeding"
I later went back to some of Christiane's earlier published interviews
and discovered even more troubling passages. For example,
in
her December, 1981 interview in East/West Journal Magazine
she says,
"..There's a Western prejudice against information coming
out of
other countries. This prejudice is particularly strong in
American
medicine; we don't accept anything that comes out of the South
African Journal of whatever, because it's not American."
This quote suggests that she was quite aware of the difficulty a
patient
might have using this study as evidence in an American court. In
this same article she also asserts,
"Yes, I feel it's almost immoral
to withhold this information, and
this is a conflict I run into all the time. What if a
woman
walks into my office with a problem that may be treatable with
diet.
There's always a part of me that wants to say, "Mrs. Jones, before you
take this medication, let me just tell you about this."
Note the weasel wording of the above quote. The words
"there's
always a part of me that wants to say...." implies that she doesn't
actually
reveal the information.
Additionally, in an October, 1983 EWJ interview she
says,
"We talked about this at the Board of Trustees meeting
of
the
American Holistic Medical Association. .....One of our
members
pointed out that the data for
prevention and
for the nutritional
approach is actually all there in the
medical
literature, but if you
haven't had the experience of healing through a "non-
scientific"
approach you probably won't believe
it works.
I believe that what
we call "unscientific" is actually scientific- we're just not
sophisticated enough to study it at the right level."
Note that her defense for failing to recommend vitamin A in the light
of
her recommendation of it in her book was that it "didn't work".
In her book (p 151, 1st edition) she writes:
"Even today, if a woman has a reproductive illness but wants
to
keep her uterus even though she has no interest in
childbearing,
her medical team often views her as overly emotional or sentimental, a
bit superstitious, and not well educated about that organ. The
general
patriarchal tone of this medical training is that if such a woman were
more sophisticated, she would know that the uterus is useless to her
except
for childbearing."
The irony of these statements was not lost
on me.
She claims that it is "almost immoral" to withhold nutritional
information
and she poses herself as a critic of the very medical system that was
now
letting her off the hook. She laments the fact that nutritional
studies,
and studies in foreign medical journals, are not taken seriously.
Yet she escapes accountability at the hands of a patient for these very
same reasons.
Then to add insult to injury, she gave an interview in the July
1995
"Vegetarian Times" in which she made allusions to me, claiming that
I had been "abusive" to her and the staff.
"We came back and understood the way we were
interacting
with people that set us up first as rescuers and then as victims.
We began to weed out people who were abusive to us or our staff.
For example, we treated a woman for several years who had repeated
episodes
of very heavy uterine bleeding associated with fibroids. Each
time
she called in or came in with heavy bleeding and anemia, she refused
almost
every treatment my colleagues or I offered her-
especially
if the treatment involved anything she considered conventional, such as
drugs and surgery. But when her herbal or dietary regimens didn't
work, she'd accuse us of not knowing what we were doing and become very
angry.
Meanwhile her blood count
remained dangerously
low while my colleagues and I walked on eggshells trying to steer a
course
between her wishes and safe medical practice. Her emergency phone
calls at night and on weekends continued until we told her that we
could
no longer participate in her medical care."
Notice how she blames the patient and exonerates herself.
She claims that herbal and dietary regimens “didn't work” and
castigates
the patient for refusing conventional treatment, while she fails to
mention
her own withholding of directly relevant nutritional information that
she
possessed during this time. Furthermore,
with
regard to holistic vs. conventional care she regards as irrelevant the
fact of her own self promotion as a holistic healer who treats women's
health problems with diet and vitamins, a claim that had recruited the
patient. She fails to distinguish the fact that she
only let the patient go after, not before, the surgery.
To put the icing on the cake, the following September (1995),
she was
featured in an article in a holistic nutrition magazine,
"Delicious",
titled "How to Avoid a Hysterectomy."
The
Maine State Medical Board
I tried contacting the American Holistic
Medical
Association, of which she is a former president, and the American Board
of Holistic Medicine. In both cases, I was told that they offered
no channels of complaint, nor any means to review the conduct of their
members. I was also told that if I did try to speak with anyone
that
I would not be under the protection of legal privilege and thus might
be
sued for anything that I said.
I was told to go to my state medical board. I did not feel
very hopeful about this but decided to try. I wrote a detailed
and
carefully footnoted account of the medical and nutritional aspects of
my
case with references to entries in the medical records. I
collected
medical and nutritional source material as well as published articles
documenting
her public statements. This careful research took a great deal of
time and money on my part as I also hired a lawyer to help me be more
objective.
Dr. Northrup's response was barely two pages long, with only
about a
half a page devoted to medical questions. I was not permitted to
have a copy. However Assistant Director, Bill McPeck did meet
with
my attorney and me, and permitted us to read it. During this
meeting
my attorney queried the assistant director saying, "She's promoting
herself
as an expert in the holistic treatment of women's illnesses.
Aren't
there certain things that she is expected to know?" To this
McPeck
responded, "But the Board doesn't know
anything
about nutrition."
In her response Dr. Northrup gave lame excuses for her failure
to follow
her own forthcoming published recommendations. Despite this, her
strategy worked. The Board dismissed my complaint at their
initial
screening meeting which I was not permitted to attend. I was
never
given the opportunity to have a hearing. In the minutes my
complaint
was put down as a simple "misunderstanding" despite the fact that, for
me, my ordeal has been the most devastating physical, emotional, and
financial
crisis of my life!
(The reason I don't cite more specifics of her response is
that
I still don't have a copy of the document. When I requested a
copy,
the medical board refused to release it without Dr. Northrup's
permission.
Of course she refused. When I later inquired, I was told that the
records would be kept in a private stash overseen by the Board.
Unlike
the Archives of the State of Maine, this was a file that was not
covered
under the Freedom of Information Act and is discarded after five years
so there is no permanent record of a complaint. I was told that
although
the Attorney General had later made a ruling that a copy of
doctor's
reply's must be given to complainants, my complaint had been filed
before
the ruling so I was not permitted to have a copy. )
My most basic complaint was a lack of truth in advertising and a
failure
to truly deliver the kind of medicine that she claims to
deliver.
The evidence for this was her failure to follow the recommendations
later
set forth in her own book and newsletter and her failure to give bona
fide
holistic care as she understood it, evidenced by those publications,
before
resorting to surgery. Unfortunately the board felt that she had
adequately
delivered on her claim to be a holistic doctor because she had
recommended
some
forms of holistic care .
They made no distinction
between one holistic treatment and another. (Would they consider
all kinds of surgeries to be interchangeable?) I suppose their
decision
was inevitable. Even with the best will in the world (which I
doubt
they had) lacking an adequate paradigm to encompass holistic
treatments,
and an understanding of those treatments, the meaning of the treatments
involved would be lost on them.
Being
traditional allopathic doctors, they had no basis for evaluating a
doctor's
treatment from a holistic, or nutritional, perspective and more
importantly
no interest whatsoever in defending a patients right to honest holistic
care.
Serving Two
Masters
This outcome illustrates the essence of the problem. It has
become
fashionable in medical circles today to refer to holistic medicine as
"complementary"
medicine. This is a weasel word. One must ask,
Complementary
to what? Surgery? Stated this way it is considered to be a
nonessential or supplemental addition to standard medical care.
In
this view, standard care remains the gold standard. From this
perspective
a doctor might be considered holistic if he or she offers auxiliary
holistic
treatments. When considering my situation, there was certainly
nothing
"wrong" with the treatments Dr. Northrup encouraged when they are
viewed
as merely supportive (and not specific) treatments. The
only problem was that all of them failed to address the underlying
nutritional
deficiency. Pursuing them amounted to being sent on a wild goose
chase. Using this the definition of holistic care the doctor
could
meet the letter of the law defining a claim to be holistic, while
assuring
that the treatment would fail to heal and lead to inevitable and
profitable
(for the doctor) surgery.
Yet true holistic care is not merely a
matter
of adding scattershot, nonspecific treatments to a menu of
therapies.
And nutritional science may be rightfully or wrongfully applied.
When questions concerning the bona fide application of alternative
treatment
cannot be addressed through legal means from the (holistic) perspective
in which they were offered, a doctor who understands how both forms of
medicine work may play both sides against the middle. They can
have
it both ways, ensuring greater profits for themselves at the patient's
expense, while slipping through the legal system unscathed.
Returning to my medical question, months after the medical
board's decision,
while surfing the Internet, I found the following entry of a Q&A
with
Dr. Northrup on the Powersurge Internet conference.
This exchange took place while
I was awaiting an answer from the board.
(From the Power Surge Conference, January 13, 1997.
http://www.dearest.com/northrup.htm)
"Mbarr227: 51, have fibroids, heavy periods
every 2 weeks,
don't want hysterectomy, anemic, no flashes. ...What to do?"
"Northrup MD: Try
vitamin A 10,000
I.U. per day along with B complex 50 Mg. per day and vitamin E
200
I.U. per day. ga"
Recall that in her response to the board Dr, Northrup excused her
failure
to use vitamin A for bleeding with fibroids, yet in this document it is
her first choice of treatment for this condition. The case
was still pending when she posted this answer on the Internet. By
giving this online answer while her case was still pending, she in
effect
is thumbing her nose both at the board and the patient.
Clearly she was aware that the board would not take vitamins seriously.
I tried with this new information, to have the Board revisit the case
but,
predictably, my request was turned down. Although the Board does
have statutory jurisdiction over questions of truth in advertising,
fraud
and deceit, as well as purely medical questions, they view these issues
from a purely allopathic perspective. One might make a case of
fraud
when a doctor gives alternative treatments in lieu of standard
ones.
One cannot make such a case when a doctor fails to give bona fide
holistic
care in lieu of standard care.
From what I later heard, when the question of the
inappropriateness
of the doctor's course of holistic treatment was raised, the Board
replied
that the doctor was merely accommodating the patient's wishes. ( i.e.
for
holistic medicine) In other words, the Board blamed
the patient for the doctors lack of reasonable holistic care.
In doing so they totally disregarded the fact that the patient had gone
to the doctor in the first place because of her public claim to be an
expert
in holistic medicine.
Sometime later I spoke with Ruth McNiff, the Assistant
Attorney General
for the Board of Medicine and queried her about the decision. The
conversation was substantially as follows:
Me, "Considering the fact that your own
Assistant
Director, Bill McPeck and the Boards Investigator, Kevin Cookson, both
feel that this case raises very serious issues that need to be
addressed,
why would not the Board move forward in looking into this case?"
McNiff, "But Bill and Kevin are
not the
doctors. The doctors on the Board read your complaint and decided
that there was no incompetence."
Me, "I never claimed
incompetence.
I was raising issues related to the board's statutory jurisdiction over
lack of truth in advertising, fraud and deceit. I felt that
because
Dr. Northrup withheld key nutritional information and failed to follow
her own later published advice for my condition, that she had failed to
honor, in good faith, her clear and unambiguous public claim to be a
holistic
doctor who tries to avoid excess surgery."
McNiff, "But to the Board, "fraud"
means medical
(i.e. allopathic) fraud. There is no
standard
of holistic care, therefore there can be no claim of fraud because
there
is no standard to base it upon. It doesn't matter how the doctor
presents him/herself in the media. The only way that a patient
could
establish, for legal purposes, that a doctor failed to deliver, would
be
if the patient and the doctor had entered into a written contract
before
commencing treatment. Then you might have some avenue through
breach
of contract."
McNiff went on to say that because holistic medicine is
so new, there
has not been time to do the necessary research to develop a set of
standards.
Until that is done there can be no legal standard of care to hold a
holistic
doctor to.
This argument might sound reasonable to some people, but I felt
that lack of research wasn't the real issue. It is true that
there
are many areas of holistic medicine that need more research (just as
there
are areas of allopathic medicine that need research). Knowledge
is
ongoing. But even today there already exists plenty of good
research
already and credible scientific studies in areas such as
nutrition.
Much of it is published in medical journals. Why not use the
information
we already have?
In this regard, recall Dr. Northrup's comments in the October
1983
EWJ:
"We talked about this at the Board of Trustees meeting of
the American Holistic Medical Association. .....One of our members
pointed
out that the data for prevention and for the
nutritional
approach is actually all there in the medical literature, but if you
haven't
had the experience of healing through a "non- scientific" approach you
probably won't believe it works."
(Recall that the excuse she gave for her
failure
to recommend vitamin A was that it "didn't work".
How
that woman can talk out of two sides of her mouth!)
Questions of
Accountability
Certainly, in my own case, the Board discounted or
ignored
all the scientific data and documentation that I provided. So I
don't
believe that the need for research is the real problem. In my
view
the real problem is philosophical and political. The medical
establishment
will not credit data that goes against it's own perspective and vested
interests. Change isn't going to come from doctors but from
patients.
Lawsuits by patients might seem to be a way to raise these
issues, but
in order for malpractice law to evolve, cases must be able to get a
toehold
in court. Yet this is the very process that is being
stymied.
Because of the domination of the AMA over medical standards, lawyers
are
reluctant to take cases that challenge that system. Therefore in
order to get into court a patient must be willing to underwrite the
whole
shebang out of pocket. Very few patients can do that. I was
told that it would cost me over $150,000 to bring a suit. I know
I don't have that kind of money to spare, especially after my medical
expenses
have drained my resources. From there, once a suit is filed
it may be difficult to get evidence admitted which goes contrary to the
practices of mainstream medicine. (The recent "Daubert" ruling
concerning the admissibility of evidence further compounds this problem
by setting an even more inflexible standard of evidence!) If
patients are unable to raise an issue through a public venue ( i.e. a
court)
their interests remain invisible.
In fact, I even tried to get the local newspapers to report on the
board's refusal to take my case, but to no avail. The response I
got was that they would not report anything unless it could get into
court
or be reviewed by the board. The problem was like a snake biting
its tail. Due to the secrecy surrounding medical records, so long
as patients cannot get a voice in the public arena in matters
concerning
a doctor's failure to deliver on holistic claims, patients who have
common
experiences cannot know about each other or about each others
experiences.
So the current reality is that a medical
doctor
can make any holistic claim to promote themselves and ingratiate
themselves
to the public, knowing that their only real accountability is to
conventional,
standard care just like any other. To
add to this problem, there is an inherent, structural conflict of
interest
involved when a doctor who is also a surgeon and stands to profit by
doing
surgery, claims to use holistic means to avoid surgery. Without
accountability
for how they practice holistic care, the temptation is great for such
doctors
to act for their own benefit rather than that of the patient.
To add even more insult to injury, most patients haven't got a
clue
as to where they really stand legally. Their inevitable ignorance
on this matter can be exploited. Consider the following
response
by Dr. Northrup in her interview in the July 1995 "Vegetarian Times".
Veggie Times, "But some doctors may be
concerned
that they'll be sued for malpractice.....Does using this approach (i.e.
holistic) mean that in some cases a patient must actually say to the
doctor
that she absolves the doctor of any malpractice liability?
"Northrup, "Yes. Sometimes she has to have
the courage
to do this."
Here Dr. Northrup suggests that a woman ought to be more concerned
about
her doctor's jeopardy than she is about her own. In the light of
my own experience, such talk reminds me of a slithering forked tongued
reptile.
If it
looks
like a duck and it quacks like a duck.........it might be a DECOY!
So the question of accountability remains. Since my
experience
Dr. Northrup has become a national celebrity who is promoted as an
expert
in women's health and is widely influential. On her book
jacket
she claims that the clinic she founded, "Women to Women", is an
"acclaimed
holistic health center". None the less as a patient I have been
denied
the means to hold her accountable to deliver. And my experience
has
been all but silenced. Yet under current malpractice
arrangements,
accountability under such circumstances is not possible. I
believe
that the reason that it is not possible needs public examination.
In order to function properly, an accountability system requires
a consistent
paradigm. When a doctor crosses from one medical paradigm to
another,
many egregious actions can slip past the overseers. One could
draw
an analogy here with the situation of the bank robber who crosses from
one jurisdiction to another in order to avoid prosecution.
Likewise,
a doctor who crosses from one medical paradigm to another may be able
to
get away with things that they could not get away with if they remained
within the bounds of a single medical point of view. Although
questions
of nutrition still remain within the paradigm of the scientific method,
much of the science involved has not been given credence by mainstream
medicine because it does not fit into the allopathic medical model and
it is not profitable for the medical industry. Yet the public is
clamoring for change. And medicine is in trouble if it cannot
meet
that pressure.
For a doctor to pose to the public as a holistic doctor without
the
legal pressure to deliver preserves the current system. I believe
that this is the reason that Dr. Northrup has been so well rewarded and
given unlimited access to the media. Her role, in my view, is to
divert the path of women who are waking up to the cold realities of the
medical system and heading for the exits. Posing as a holistic
healer
tends to confuse questions of vested interest and the legal realities
of
a medical system that is dangerous for women's health.
I have been noticing lately an even greater tendency for doctors
to
encompass even more paradigm spanning combinations. This brings
us
to the heart of the problem. When you put such a diverse
menagerie
of treatment modes and perspectives such as standard medicine, holistic
medicine, mind/body medicine, and psychic viewing (Dr. Northrup now
shares
a space with a "medical intuitive" -read psychic) all under the same
roof,
not to mention the same hat, you are going to have problems of
boundaries.
Boundary problems are caused by the protean crossing back and forth
across
paradigms. Like chameleons they change color to take advantage of
any situation they find themselves in. This results in an
inability
of accountability structures to handle issues raised by such
crossovers.
The Ultimate
Rape
This part is still under construction please check back.
Bibliography
Web sites
http://www.westonaprice.org/vitamins/vitaminasaga.html
http://www.westonaprice.org/caustic_comments/summer2002.html
http://www.soyonlineservice.co.nz/
http://www.hersfoundation.com/
Publications
Barnes M.D., Broda O., Hypothyroidism; The Unsuspected Illness,
(New York, Harper & Row, ©1976
"Hey Doc What About....?" Supplement to Dr. William Campbell
Douglass's
"Second Opinion", December © 1993.
"Soy Isoflavones: Panacea or Poison?",
Mike Fitzpatrick
PhD, MNZIC, article reprinted in Health and Healing Wisdom, the Journal
of the Price Pottenger Nutrition Foundation, Volume 22, Number 3.
I.W. Jennings M.R.C.V.S., Vitamins in Endocrine Metabolism,
(Springfield, Charles C. Thomas, © 1970)
Langer, Pavel, and Monte A. Greer, Antithyroid Substances and
Naturally Occurring Goitrogens, (S.Karger AG, Basel, New
York,
© 1977).
Langer M.D., Stephen E., and James F. Scheer, Solved: The
Riddle
of Illness, (New Canaan, Keats Pub., © 1984.)
D.M. Lithgow & Politzer, "Vitamin A in the Treatment of
Menorrhagia",
South African Medical Journal. l. 51, 1977.
Northrup M.D., Christiane, Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom,
(New York, Bantam,© 1994).
"The Dynamic Approach of Christiane Northrup, Mother and M.D."
East/West
Journal Dec. 1981.
"Heal Your Symptoms Naturally", supplement to "Dr. Christiane
Northrup's
Health Wisdom for Women", © 1995.
Price, Weston A. D.D.S., F.A.C.D. Nutrition and Physical
Degeneration,
(A Comparison of Primitive an Modern Diets and Their Effects).
(New Canaan, Keats Pub. 50th Anniversary Edition, © 1989)
Wright M.D.,Jonathan V., Dr. Wrights's Guide to Healing With
Nutrition,
(New Canaan, Rodale, © 1984)
Tragedy and Hype The Third International Soy Symposium, Nexus
Magazine,
Volume 7, Number 3 (April-May 2000).
http://www.nexusmagazine.com/soydangers.html
For a further discussion of the work of Dr. Price, the
Price/Pottinger
Foundation and vegetarian
/macrobiotic diets and vitamin A see also:
Fallon, Sally, with Mary G. Enig Ph.D. and Pat Connolly, Nourishing
Traditions, (San Diego, ProMotion Publishing, ©
1995).
Roger G. Windsor ed., "SPECTRUM, The Holistic News Magazine"
"Breaking
Free of Dietary Dogma" Interview with Sally Fallon,
John David Mann ed., "Solstice", "The Wise Woman Diet", by Tonia Porter
Hugus, June 1990.
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