Tag: SAMJ

Mar0520175th March 20171st March 20189Commentsby Marika

Naudé Review: no mistakes, mischief against Noakes? Fat chance!

Posted in LCHF

Prof Tim Noakes. Picture: The Noakes Foundation

By Marika Sboros

“We made no mistakes and no mischief in our study debunking Banting and Prof Tim Noakes,” say South African scientists. They don’t use those exact words. However, that’s the gist of their letter, which the SAMJ has just published. It relates to the Naudé Review in PLoS One in June/July 2014 by Stellenbosch and Cape Town University researchers.

Noakes and British obesity researcher Dr Zoë Harcombe published their analysis of it in the SAMJ in December 2016. They found major errors. Therefore, they concluded, the review findings are “not robust”. That’s scientific speak for wrong. Noakes and Harcombe don’t use the words “scientific fraud” – yet. Instead, they diplomatically ask: “Mistake or mischief?” However, if the errors were not honest mistakes, then mischief is a euphemism. So, are these academics giving “alternative facts” to try to silence Noakes? Why should you (or anyone) believe the Naudé authors when they say there was no monkey business against Noakes? Because they say so?

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Dec0220162nd December 20169th December 201622Commentsby Marika

NOAKES: PROOF THAT SA SCIENTISTS TRIED TO SMEAR HIM?

Posted in LCHF

Tim NoakesBy Marika Sboros

Did researchers at top South African universities make multiple mistakes in a major study deliberately? Was their aim to discredit low-carbohydrate, high-fat (LCHF) diets? And was their real target scientist Prof Tim Noakes? Or are they just human, fallible and in this case, hopelessly error-prone?

A new study in the SAMJ (South African Medical Journal) re-examines a 2014 study by University of Cape Town (UCT) and Stellenbosch University (SU) scientists. It shows that the scientists made many material errors that undermine their conclusions. It raises the question: mistake or mischief? Read on and make up your own mind.

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Aug24201624th August 201620th September 20162Commentsby Marika

Radical! Rebel doctors, data geeks reject ‘rule book’ to beat diabesity

Posted in LCHF

DEATHConventional medical treatment to beat obesity and diabetes clearly isn’t working. Both conditions are pandemic, so much so that doctors now call them diabesity. Conventional ‘wisdom’ about the reasons for diabesity isn’t proving very helpful or very clever.

Now, a radical, ‘rag tag’  group of Canadian and South African doctors and data ‘geeks’ has thrown out the research ‘rule book’ in their small but ground-breaking study just published in the South African Journal of Medicine (SAMJ). They say the staunch faith most doctors still have in classic randomized trials is misplaced. So-called  ‘evidence-based medicine’ that doctors are supposed to rely on isn’t working to treat or beat the diabesity pandemics. 

Their inspiration is Prof John Ioannidis, Professor of Medicine and of Health Research and Policy at Stanford University School of Medicine. Ioannidis says powerful vested interests have “hijacked” evidence-based medicine and made medicine a ‘threat to public health’. The group knows they are up against doctors who are not ready to face some inconvenient truths.  Jerome Burne is an award-winning British journalist who has been specialising in medicine and health for the last 10 years. Here, Burne looks at why these ‘research mavericks’ are ushering in a research revolution and why they will need all the help they can get. It’s a vital read for anyone concerned with health. – Marika Sboros

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Aug0920169th August 201621st October 20162Commentsby Marika

CANADIAN STUDY: LCHF WORKS FOR DIABESITY BUT HERE’S REAL MESSAGE

Posted in LCHF

Photo credit:Photo credit: Wonder woman0731 via Foter.com / CC BY

Obesity and diabetes are so common these days, doctors call them diabesity. A small Canadian study in the SAMJ posits a whole new paradigm to treat diabesity. It’s a path filled with life-saving promise of a ‘cure’ for obesity and diabetes. This study is not so much about diet as terminal flaws in evidence-based medicine.

 In Part 1 of a two-part series, Foodmed.net looks at why this study is so significant. It it, South African and Canadian doctors point to what it means for patients with diabesity. We also look at why medical and dietetic establishments are not receptive to its message and real evidence-based medicine: 

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