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Comment by lifeisstillgood | Hacker News Reader

A rushed ten minute consult annoys us all, but How often is my medical condition going to be something that say paying the doctor to take 45 mins would not uncover.

Most of us have diseases that are horses not zebra - and you have a strong financial incentive to encourage hypochondriacs to keep hearing zebra.

If my condition has Gregory House stumped, sure ill pay you but otherwise that lump on your skin is a cyst not a tumour and that shortness of breath is lack of fitness not a heart failure.

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There are a good deal of misdiagnoses that cause more months of suffering, especially with diseases like Crohn's disease. Maybe a service like this could prevent that with the help of a more accurate up front diagnosis. Diseases aren't as rare as people tend to think (~1.5 million with a digestive disease in the U.S. alone).

That said, here are a couple things which make me skeptical about this:

1) They make claims involving rounded numbers without sources, such as "50% of second opinions contradict the original diagnosis." That's a red flag for me. Would be nice for me to see some sources for claims like that on a site wishing to sell medical research services.

2) Several of the medical researchers do not have a background in anything medical. In fact, one of the senior health researchers' area of expertise includes herbal medicine and Naturopathy (which is a bit anti-vaccination: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naturopathy). I would not be happy If I got suggested any alternative medicine remedies for my disease at the cost of $5,000.

Some things that are labeled "alternative medicine" have actual studies, with decent sample sizes and good methodologies, showing that they work. These things are worth paying attention to. The rest don't meet our standards and get ignored.

Most things with evidence are readily accepted in modern medicine. Is there an alternative medicine treatment with good evidence that is nevertheless rejected by modern medicine that you can think of as an example?

Foxglove for heart disease. FDA approved and doctors don't recommend it enough.

Foxglove is a really silly idea as a herbal medicine because it is available in a quantified purified form from the pharmacy called digoxin and you will minimise the change of running out of the very narrow therapeutic window that digoxin is both efficacious and non-toxic within.

Side effects of digitalis (the active component) toxicity include but are not limited to DEATH

Saying take foxglove instead of digitalis is kind of like saying take willow bark instead of aspirin, but potentially MUCH MORE DANGEROUS.

If what you mean to say is 'we shiuldnt give profits to the pharmaceutical-medical-industrial complex because I believe it is acting against my best interests' then go ahead and say so; however if thr best example of an 'alternative' medicine being efficacious or safer is foxglove you are woefully underinformed

As the saying goes, alternative medicine that works becomes medicine. That is digoxin

The FDA recognizes foxglove as a toxin, not a treatment [1]. You don't want to consume foxglove because, like virtually all herbal supplements, the doses of the active ingredient can vary wildly.

So, we have its derivative, digoxin, available as a prescription medication. And many people do take it. It's helpful for some symptoms of heart failure. One thing it doesn't do, quite notably, is reduce mortality. Anyway, this is an available, commonly prescribed treatment

Not to belabor the point, but I was hoping to hear about alternative medicines that are not accepted but have evidence supporting them.

[1] = http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/plantox/detail.cfm?id=...

According to our research, more than 3% of the American population reports their health to be "good" or "excellent", and spends more than $40,000 annually on medical care. Our service won't be useful for every sniffle (unless you're Bill Gates), but there's a huge amount of opportunity for products in the medical field.

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