A woman who once practiced a form of alternative medicine is now taking a bold stance against it

STAT
Megan Thielking, STAT
October 21, 2016

A tomato plant is seen in among planter boxes on  the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
Thomson Reuters
Britt Hermes once considered herself a doctor. Now, she's an apostate.

Hermes spent three years practicing naturopathy, a broad-reaching form of alternative medicine that focuses on "natural" care, including herbal remedies,acupuncture, and the discredited practice of homeopathy. But unease about a colleague's ethics led her to look more closely at her profession - and what she found alarmed her.

So for the past two years, Hermes has been waging a scathing fight against naturopathy on social media, in science blogs, and on her own website, Naturopathic Diaries, which just won a "best blog of the year" award from a scientific skepticism magazine in the United Kingdom. She has not pulled punches.

Hermes has said naturopaths use a "cornucopia of pseudoscientific methods." She posts articles with the blunt headlines like "Naturopathic pediatrics is not safe," "Naturopaths need to back off autism," and "Naturopathic medicine has too much quackery." And she's circulating an online petition to stop states from recognizing naturopaths as primary care physicians. Her message: "Naturopaths are not doctors."

"I'm trying to contextualize and call out the false and exaggerated claims," she said. "They want to be able to do everything an MD wants to do - but they also want to practice essentially witchcraft."

Hermes's activism comes at a time when the roughly 4,400 licensed naturopaths in the US are organizing and pushing for more legitimacy.

In May, more than 100 aspiring and practicing naturopaths descended on Capitol Hill to rally support for a federal pilot program that would allow them to be reimbursed by Medicare for some patients. They're also lobbying for expanded authority to diagnose and treat patients in a handful of states, including Massachusetts and Michigan.

Those lobbying efforts are funded in part by vitamin companies that want to see the profession grow. Many naturopaths tout dietary supplements, herbal remedies, and vitamin infusions for healing.

The American Association of Naturopathic Physicians declined to comment. But some of Hermes's former colleagues have attacked her for what they see as a misleading attack on the profession.

Mainstream doctors say Hermes is a powerful voice in taking on alternative medicine for one clear reason - she knows it from the inside out.

"Naturopaths dislike me, but they loathe Britt because she's a traitor," said Dr. David Gorksi, the managing editor of Science-Based Medicine, who has also spoken out against the naturopathic industry.

"They really, really, really hate her."

From itchy skin to a $200,000 degree in naturopathy
Hermes, who's now 32, spent her high school days plagued by terrible psoriasis, a skin condition marked by itchy, red patches. She started taking cod liver oil and changed her diet to see if either would help, which she thought they did.

"I became sort of obsessed with the idea of being able to treat it without prescription medicines," she said.

That sparked a deep desire in Hermes: She wanted to hit an ideal state of health without needing to rely on conventional medicine. She went on to enroll at Bastyr University, an alternative medicine school based in Washington state. It's one of a half-dozen naturopathic and alternative medicine universities in the United States.

At Bastyr, Hermes took classes with names that would seem familiar to conventional medical students, like human anatomy and physiology. But she alsostudied botanical medicine, hydrotherapy, and homeopathy, a practice founded on the theory that extremely diluted concentrations of certain compounds can treat disease. Homeopathy has been widely debunked as pseudoscience.

Currently, 17 states and the District of Columbia have laws requiring naturopathic providers to be licensed or registered. They need a degree in naturopathic studies and a passing score on the NPLEX, or the Naturopathic Physicians licensing exam.

Naturopathic students can opt to perform a residency, but there aren't nearly enough spots for the number of students graduating each year, said Jane Guiltinan, the dean of the School of Naturopathic Medicine at Bastyr. So many go right into practice on their own. By contrast, young MDs fresh out of medical school generally spend at least three years in residency, where they work under the supervision of veteran physicians.

Hermes has railed against the Bastyr curriculum as wholly inadequate to train practicing clinicians. She says she never learned about the medical standard of care for most illnesses and had minimal experience working directly with ill patients.

"I know it sounds cynical, but naturopathic medical care is like picking treatments out of a magical hat," she wrote in a blog post on Naturopathic Diaries back in May of 2015.

Dean Guiltinan disputes her assessment. "The curriculum at Bastyr is quite rigorous," she said. "I have full confidence that our graduates can enter primary care."

A patient's struggle with infertility
Hermes had that confidence, too. At least at first.

She graduated from Bastyr in 2011 and completed a one-year residency in family medicine and pediatrics at an alternative medicine clinic. (She was licensed under her maiden name, Britt Deegan).

She saw herself as a primary care doctor for patients who didn't want to seek conventional medical care - and she had no hesitation treating them. She provided checkups for kids and consulted with sick cancer patients.

"I had become so comfortable with the speech and the rhetoric that I considered myself a doctor," she said. "It wasn't difficult to convince anyone I knew what I was doing."

One of her patients, Emilie Bishop, was suffering from endometriosis - a painful disorder in which tissues normally inside the uterus grow outside it. She'd been struggling to get pregnant for months when her obstetrician referred her to a naturopathic clinic. Bishop had tried all manner of traditional medical therapies, including surgery to address the endometriosis, but it hadn't helped. She figured she didn't have anything to lose.

"Naturopathy can sound crazy, but it was no less crazy than anyone else's approaches," said Bishop, now 32.

She found her way to Hermes, who started her on a handful of supplements and a vegan diet. Their first appointment turned into an hour-and-a-half long conversation.

"It was really refreshing to have someone who really listened to how the problems were affecting me and my body," Bishop said.

But there wasn't any difference in her pain, and Bishop still struggled to get pregnant. As the months went on, Bishop grew wary of the recommendations Hermes made. Bishop points to one email she received from Hermes laying out plans to get her ovulating normally again to boost her chances of getting pregnant.

"She started playing fertility doctor, and she wasn't listening to what I wanted or what I needed," Bishop said. "I felt like she was out of her depth."

Hermes now realizes that she was - but at the time, she said, she genuinely believed in what she'd been taught.

"I trusted the naturopaths more than the scientists," she said.

Bishop tried other naturopaths but felt that they blamed her when their treatments failed. "I heard, 'You didn't do it long enough, you didn't do it well enough, you need to try harder,'" she said.

In the end, she did become pregnant and had a son. He was still little when she stumbled over the Naturopathic Diaries blog. She pored over every post Hermes had written.

"It was just so freeing to me to hear that it was all crap," Bishop said. "It wasn't that I wasn't doing the treatment well enough or that I wasn't trying hard enough. It was that I was using treatments that weren't likely to help no matter what I did."

Bishop reached out to Hermes and asked if she could write a guest post on the blog; Hermes obliged.

"I bear no ill will toward her. I bear a lot of ill will toward the naturopathic profession," Bishop said.

Soon enough, so would Hermes.

A distressing discovery leads to a quick exit
She'd been practicing in Arizona for about two years when she said she discovered her supervisor had been importing a non-FDA approved drug called Ukrain from Austria to treat cancer patients. Hermes found out on a Friday in May of 2014.

On Monday, she quit.

Hermes reported her supervisor, Michael Uzick, to the state board governing naturopathy. She wasn't just upset by his decision to treat cancer patients with an unapproved, potentially risky drug, she said. She was upset by how he responded when she confronted him.

"He said he knew he was walking the ethical and legal line, but that most naturopaths do this," Hermes said.

She also spoke with a mentor in the field, who told her that she was making too big of a deal out of the situation. Hermes couldn't shake her anger at the casual responses from colleagues she'd once respected.

Uzick was reprimanded by the board that governs naturopathic doctors in Arizona. He did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

But when he talked to Hermes, "He accused me of wanting to take down the entire naturopathic profession," she said.

She took that as a challenge.

After she'd quit her job, Hermes found herself in a serious bind. She couldn't get a job in the medical field or teaching medical science in academia with a naturopathic degree. She had spent more than $200,000 and four years on an education she felt she could no longer use.

"I literally needed to start over. I was terrified," Hermes said. She packed up her bags and moved with her husband to Germany for his work. There, she decided to go back to school to study science - again. Hermes is now in a master's program at the University of Kiel, studying the mammalian microbiome.

After her second day of molecular biology class in the new program, Hermes went home and cried. She'd thought she had learned the basics at Bastyr, but now she realized the coursework hadn't been nearly as rigorous as she'd thought. She was surprised she had to work to understand the concepts. Her previous studies had been a breeze.

"I remember studying for my classes while sunbathing by the pool," she said.

That frustration and anger sparked Hermes to start her blog, Naturopathic Diaries. She spends about 30 hours a month on it and other forms of media.

Dr. David Palma, a radiation oncologist at the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research, said he uses Naturopathic Diaries as a resource when talking with patients who want to seek alternative care.

He doesn't have a problem with them reaching out to alternative practitioners to complement their traditional medical care. But he has seen catastrophic consequences when a patient rejects a traditional therapy with a high cure rate and instead pursues an "all-natural" treatment.

"For us, as doctors, it's heartbreaking. But it's absolutely within a patient's rights as a long as that patient is well-informed," Palma said.

That's where work like Naturopathic Diaries comes in, he said.

Under assault from former colleagues
There's been an onslaught of criticism - some of it vitriolic - since Hermes began blogging about naturopathy as a former insider. The comments on her site say it all.

"[You] became very bitter to the field of Naturopathic Medicine due to the fact that you were not a good doctor period … You need to pray to God and he will lead you to what you were called to do on this earth, but it clearly was not to be a Naturopathic Doctor," one commenter writes.

Another commenter called Hermes and her guest authors "witch-hunters."

And an especially determined critic has set up a website to pick apart Hermes's petition to stop naturopaths from getting licensed.

That site, and many supporters of naturopathy, point to a handful of randomized studies that suggest it can have some benefit.

A 2009 study published in PLOS One, for example, looked at 75 patients with moderate to severe anxiety. They were treated with either a standard psychotherapy intervention that included deep-breathing techniques or a naturopathic treatment that included dietary counseling, deep-breathing techniques, multivitamins, and an herbal medicine called ashwagandha.

Both groups saw significant improvements in anxiety - but the naturopathic patients also reported more improvement in ancillary quality of life measures. The study did not, however, single out the individual effects of each treatment component to figure out what, if anything, gave the naturopathy recipients that added boost.

Another study cited by naturopaths looked at 207 patients with cardiovascular disease. Some patients received care from just their family physician, while others received care from both their family doctors and naturopaths who provided health and nutrition counseling or dietary supplementation.

Those in the naturopathic group had a 3 percent reduction in cardiovascular disease risk after a decade. But the study's authors point out that they didn't receive naturopathic care alone, but naturopathy plus conventional care. It's also possible that the difference came from the extra time they spent in consultation with a clinician - and that they would have gotten similar benefit from appointments with any type of health care professional, not just naturopaths.

Both those trials, and others cited by naturopathy advocates, are also small - larger, more robust studies would be needed to prove that naturopathic care is safe and effective for treating certain conditions.

Gorski said the attacks on Hermes aren't just about her work in naturopathy. They're about her as a person, too.

"What I have come to appreciate, perhaps because I'm a middle-aged white guy, is just how much [online] abuse, sexual and misogynistic abuse … that women put up with," he said. "And of course she's perfect for that."

Hermes tries not to take those attacks to heart - but that doesn't mean she's not listening.

"I am open to these critiques and consider them carefully," she said. "But none have yet [presented] a compelling argument that I have mischaracterized naturopathic medicine."

So she's not backing down. Nor is she slowing down. For now, she's focused on building a career in molecular biology. She sees herself staying in the lab - and out of the exam room - and hopes to improve the lives of patients through her research.

Hermes said she doesn't have any desire to seek out naturopathic care anymore, but she recently got a lesson from her doctor about how stress might be affecting her health. Her iron levels were low and she needed to eat more meat, the doctor said.

"Here was this MD providing me what naturopaths would call naturopathic care. But the aspects that do work are not unique to naturopathy," Hermes said.

"I walked out of that appointment much happier than I should have been."

http://www.businessinsider.com/britt-hermes-taking-on-naturopathy-2016-10?amp

Treating Naturopaths Like They’re Medical Doctors

KATE LUNAU
Vice
April 27, 2016

Prayers for Ezekiel/Facebook

On April 26, David and Collet Stephan, the Alberta couple who treated their sick toddler with horseradish and onion smoothies for two weeks, were found guilty of failing to provide the necessaries of life to their 18-month-old son, a sentence that carries up to five years in jail. Ezekiel died of meningitis in 2012.

It’s a tragic story, even more so because nobody doubts that David and Collet Stephan loved their son. Instead, they seem to have misguidedly believed that alternative therapies, including an echinacea tincture they bought at a naturopath’s office, would help him get better. The boy eventually stopped breathing, and they phoned 911. He later died in hospital. (The parents testified that they thought Ezekiel had the flu, although a family friend and nurse had suggested he may have meningitis.)

Doctors, government, and the alternative medicine industry all have a duty to do better here. Horseradish and echinacea are no substitute for conventional, science-based medicine. Patients across Canada need better access to family doctors, and they need to know—without a doubt—when it’s time to seek one out, and forego the naturopath.

“I hope this sends a strong message about the nature of [alternative] services,” Tim Caulfield, Canada Research Chair in Health Law and Policy at the University of Alberta, who has been following the case, told Motherboard on Monday, shortly after the verdict. “And I hope it causes policymakers throughout Canada to rethink how they’re positioning these therapies in our healthcare system.”

Alternative therapies, including naturopaths’ services, are popular. It’s easy to see why: in Canada, which suffers from a longstandingdoctor shortage, it can be difficult—if not impossible—to get a family doctor. Even when you do have one, that doctor is often rushed. By contrast, naturopaths sit with their patients for half an hour or longer, going over every little detail of their health. One of their most valuable services is “lifestyle counselling,” simple diet and exercise advice, that doctors often don’t have the time to do.

Naturopaths have been given the right to self-regulate in many parts of Canada, like Alberta, which gives them a veneer of professionalism. But the general public should be clear on this: plenty of their most popular services still have little or no science behind them. In a 2011 survey in Alberta, Caulfield found that homeopathy, detoxification, and hydrotherapy were among the most popular and advertised treatments offered by Alberta’s naturopaths. “There is no scientific evidence to support those services at all,” he said.

Detoxing, for one, has been debunked over and over again. But people keep paying for it.

The growing creep to pseudoscience, and a distrust of conventional medicine, is something we all need to address—Canada’s doctors and policymakers included. A step in the right direction was former Health Minister Rona Ambrose’s announcement, in 2015, that “nosodes” (homeopathic treatments) would be labelled clearly to show they are not vaccines. The College of Naturopaths of Ontario is in line with this advice.

But there’s clearly still some confusion around alternative therapies. In November, another trial begins in Alberta, into the death of 7-year-old Ryan Lovett, whose mother treated his illness with “holistic” treatments. The Canadian Press found several cases dating back to the 1960s.

Since I first wrote about Ezekiel Stephan, I’ve heard from many naturopaths who point out that they’re licensed professionals, working to protect their patients. I don’t doubt that’s true. But what needs to be made absolutely clear is that such treatments are not an alternative to conventional, science-based medicine. Naturopaths have an important role in this.

The Alberta naturopath whose office provided Ezekiel’s parents with the tincture is nowunder investigation. As for David and Collet Stephan, observers seem to doubt that they’ll be sentenced to a full five years in jail.

“Alternative practitioners shouldn’t be your go-to primary care physician,” Caulfield said. If an adult want to pay for a detox or some other alternative treatment, that’s one thing. “We shouldn’t be testing out our ideologies around healthcare on our children.”


http://motherboard.vice.com/read/we-need-to-stop-treating-naturopaths-like-theyre-medical-doctors-alberta

'Like a religion': Researchers explain why some believe in natural healing

BILL GRAVELAND
The Globe and Mail
CALGARY — The Canadian Press
April 26, 2016

 

Experts say it’s faith in all things natural combined with a distrust of science and possibly authority that leads some to bypass the medical system — even to the point where they put themselves or their children at risk.

“It’s like a religion to them,” says Tim Caulfield, research director of the University of Alberta’s Health Law and Science Policy Group. He has written the books “The Cure for Everything! Untangling the Twisted Messages about Health, Fitness and Happiness” and “Is Gwyneth Paltrow Wrong About Everything?”

Why this Canadian author is going after Gwyneth Paltrow's health advice (CP Video)

“Studies have shown that some people are more likely to believe these kinds of things. They’re more likely to believe in the supernatural. They’re more likely to be religious and they’re more likely to buy the entire package of complementary and alternative practices.”

A trial in Lethbridge, Alta., has shone a light upon the reliance on natural medicine and the question of when medical attention should be sought for a sick child.

David and Collet Stephan were found guilty of failing to provide the necessaries of life after treating their 19-month-old sick son, Ezekiel, with smoothies containing hot peppers, onions and horseradish.

Court heard how the boy swung between illness and recovery for days in March 2012 before a family friend and nurse suggested the child could be suffering from viral meningitis and should see a doctor.

The mother opted to visit a naturopath instead. By that time, the toddler was so stiff he couldn’t sit in his car seat. Later that day, Ezekiel stopped breathing and was rushed to hospital. The medical examiner ruled he died of bacterial meningitis.

University of Calgary bioethicist Juliet Guichon says it’s not uncommon for parents to discount medical advice.

“There’s an element of irrationality in the rejection of physician advice. If physicians are telling people things they don’t want to hear, then it’s hard for the patient and the family to accept what they’re being told,” Guichon says. “I wonder if it’s a distrust of people in authority generally.”

The Canadian Association of Naturopathic Doctors says naturopathic medicine aims to stimulate the body’s own healing power to fight underlying causes of disease. Its members are required to identify when health issues are beyond their “scope of practice” and to refer patients to physicians or other health-care professionals.

Beverly Huang, president of the College of Naturopathic Doctors of Alberta, says there are about 250 registered naturopathic doctors in the province. Their goal is to try to prevent disease.

“Our doctors are required to understand their limitations of their practice and, as such, when the situation arises where a naturopathic doctor recognizes the patient care is beyond their scope of practice, or beyond their limitations, that they would refer to an appropriate health-care provider,” Huang said. “Our mandate is to ensure doctors are practising safely and competently in our province.”

Caulfield is concerned a growing portion of the public is embracing pseudo-science or what he calls “quackademics.”

Websites promise natural cures for everything from attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder to mental illness to cancer. They urge people not to underestimate the powers of Mother Nature.

Caulfield says individuals can not only find information that backs their own personal beliefs online, but entire cyber communities that agree with them.

“When you start insulting and say there’s no evidence to support homeopathy, there’s no evidence to support these kind of whole remedies — you’re not just insulting the practice — you’re insulting the individual. It becomes part of their belief system.”

Caulfield says it isn’t easy to get people to change.

“When people are faith-based, which so many of these practitioners really are and so many people that use this, they can’t change their mind, because then they’re losing part of their identity package.

“They’re losing part of who they are.”

Caulfield wants a national dialogue about what he calls pseudo-science.

“It’s almost like there’s this strange, pseudo-science correctiveness ... that stops us from talking honestly about what these guys provide.”

With files from Chris Purdy in Edmonton

====

Here are some questions and answers on naturopathic medicine:

What is naturopathy?

The Canadian Association of Naturopathic Doctors says naturopathic medicine aims to stimulate the body’s own healing power to fight underlying causes of disease. Treatment of people of all ages with various health issues can include diet and lifestyle advice, botanical medicine, hydrotherapy, homeopathy, traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture. Costs vary and are not covered by health care.

How are naturopathic doctors regulated?

They are licensed or regulated in five provinces — Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia — although they can practise elsewhere. The five provinces have colleges and associations that set standards and handle complaints. There are about 2,300 trained naturopathic doctors in all of Canada.

How does one become a naturopathic doctor?

There are two accredited schools in Canada that provide four-year programs for those who already have an undergraduate degree. Students must complete 1,200 hours of clinical training before passing board exams. They must carry malpractice insurance.

Do naturopaths refer patients to medical doctors?

The Canadian Association of Naturopathic Doctors says its members are required to identify when health issues are beyond their “scope of practice” and to refer patients to physicians or other health-care professionals.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/like-a-religion-experts-discuss-naturopath-quackademics/article29757694/

Alberta naturopath faces investigation after parents convicted in toddler's meningitis death

Tom Blackwell 
National Post
April 26, 2016

David Stephan and his wife Collet Stephan

Alberta regulators say they will investigate a local naturopath and her role in the troubling case of a toddler who died of meningitis, after a group of doctors from across Canada urged them to take action.

Capping a six-week trial that put alternative health care generally on the hot seat, a jury convicted Ezekiel Stephan’s parents Tuesday of failing to provide the necessities of life. David and Collet Stephan had treated the 19-month-old with non-medical, natural therapies for days before his March 2012 passing.

The office of naturopath Tracey Tannis sold Ezekiel’s mother an Echinacea tincture hours before the boy was taken to hospital near death, though it is unclear if she actually met the family.

The College of Naturopathic Doctors of Alberta said it would treat the open letter signed by the 43 physicians as a complaint and launch an investigation.

“I will be … gathering information about Dr. Tannis’s involvement in this matter,” said Kristen Tanaka, the college’s complaints director, in a reply to Dr. Michelle Cohen, the Brighton, Ont., family physician who drafted the original letter.

Cohen provided a copy of the college’s response to the National Post.

Her own letter, signed by fellow family doctors, at least one infectious-disease physician and other specialists from Ontario to British Columbia, said the college had a duty to look into Tannis’s role.

“By any objective measure of a healthcare professional licensed to care for children, Dr. Tannis did not meet the standard of care,” the letter charges.

“Albertans … expect that any regulated health professional using the designation ‘Dr.’ would not recommend a treatment for a child without first physically examining them.”

Tannis could not be reached for comment; the college’s registrar, Beverly Huang, said that by law she could not comment on any complaint or ongoing investigation.

Ezekiel’s parents testified they believed that their son had croup or flu and for more than two weeks treated him with hot pepper, garlic, horseradish and other natural remedies. He eventually stopped breathing, and died five days after being hospitalized.

There is conflicting evidence about what Tannis did or did not do in hours before Ezekiel was rushed to hospital by ambulance.

The naturopath testified that a mother called the Lethbridge clinic and indicated her baby might have meningitis and was interested in something to boost his immune system. Tannis told court that she instructed an employee to tell the woman she should take Ezekiel immediately to hospital, and never met them in person.

But Lexie Vataman, the clinic employee, told the jury that a day or two after the phone call, Collet came to the naturopath’s office and spoke to Tannis, who then prescribed the Echinacea tincture.

Collet Stephan said in a statement to police that the naturopath had recommended an Echinacea product called “Blast,” and said Ezekiel was so stiff when she drove him to Tannis’s office, she could not get him into his car seat and had to rest him on a mattress in the back seat.

Cohen said she felt driven to request an investigation because “it just seemed there was a real noticeable silence” from the naturopathic college.

There is no indication the regulator had planned any kind of investigation before receiving the doctors’ letter.

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/alberta-naturopath-faces-investigation-after-parents-convicted-in-toddlers-meningitis-death

Should naturopaths be restricted from treating children after tragic death of Alberta toddler

Sharon Kirkey

National Post

April 4, 2016

 

Nineteen-month-old Ezekiel Stephan
 died in March 2012 of viral meningitis

Before her creeping uneasiness with naturopathic medicine finally drove her from practice, Britt Marie Hermes says she watched colleagues deliver advice that was bad, to dangerously incompetent.

She witnessed missed diagnoses of cancer. She watched naturopaths routinely advise against childhood vaccinations and treat aggressive illnesses with the same “immune boosting” herb Ezekiel Stephan was given while the Alberta toddler was dying from meningitis.

Now, as Ezekiel’s parents stand charged in his death, ethicists and health-policy experts say the case is raising troubling questions about whether naturopaths should be restricted from treating children.

There are provincial bans on indoor tanning beds for minors, as well as bylaws keeping children under 16 out of tattoo parlours “because of possible harm to children,” notes University of Calgary bioethicist and lawyer Juliet Guichon.

Just because medicine isn’t perfect doesn’t make naturopathy a reasonable alternative

“There’s also the consent aspect — that children aren’t mature enough to say no to these outfits,” Guichon said.

The same principles could be applied to naturopathy, she suggested. “If (children) are not mature enough yet to say, ‘Mum, I’m not going to that quack, I need to go to a doctor,’ then there could be an argument for a legal restriction to protect children.”

Nineteen-month-old Ezekiel died in March 2012. His parents, David and Collet Stephan, who operate a nutritional supplements company, have pleaded not guilty to failing to provide their son with the necessities of life.

Court has heard that, in the days leading up to Ezekiel’s death, the couple, thinking Ezekiel had croup, treated the child with natural remedies and homemade smoothies.

After a family friend and nurse told the mother he might have meningitis — an infection that causes inflammation of the layer of tissue that covers the brain — Collet purchased an echinacea tincture called “Blast” from a Lethbridge naturopathic clinic. By then the boy was so sick and stiff he couldn’t sit in his car seat.

The naturopath has testified she was busy with a patient when Collet called ahead of her visit to the clinic, but that she told a staff member to tell the mother to take the boy immediately to hospital. She said she remained by the phone long enough to confirm the message was relayed, and that she was never asked if echinacea would be a good treatment for meningitis.

Under cross-examination, the jury heard the naturopath never told police she had stayed by the phone while the advice was passed on. A worker in her clinic also told investigators she introduced the naturopath to Collet when she arrived at the clinic, and described her as the mother of “the little one with meningitis.”

The trial is scheduled to resume April 11.

University of Alberta health-policy researcher Tim Caulfield says the tragic death is exposing the sharp and dangerous limits of naturopathic medicine.

Caulfield, who has long argued that naturopathy operates in the realm of “pseudoscience,” said he’s “sympathetic to the idea of restricting the kinds of services they can provide kids.”

“We do a lot of things to protect children and, at a minimum, I get very worried when kids are being taken there,” he said.

Alberta licenses naturopaths, as does Ontario and several other provinces, regulation Guichon said gives the field a “cloak of respectability and professionalism” it may or may not deserve.

“But the behaviour in Lethbridge suggests that they’re not professional, because a professional would have called the Director of Child Welfare and said, ‘This parent is unwilling or unable to provide the child necessary medical treatment,’ ” Guichon said.

Grandfather of dead toddler speaks out.

Caulfield said naturopaths are increasingly positioning themselves as “some kind of substitute for a family physician” offering evidence-based treatments, when much of what they advertise, according to his research, has no foundation in science.

“They want to have the best of both worlds,” Caulfield said. “But if you’re going to be a science-based practitioner, you shouldn’t be providing homeopathy, you shouldn’t be providing iridology or high-dose intravenous vitamin injections.”

The College of Naturopathic Doctors of Alberta said it could not comment on matters involving an ongoing criminal trial.

In hindsight, I’m really lucky nobody got hurt

Hermes, who practiced as a licensed naturopath in the U.S. for three years before leaving to pursue a career in biomedical research, said she frequently prescribed herbs for infections she was “fairly certain were viruses.

“In hindsight, I’m really lucky nobody got hurt,” said Hermes, who wrote about Ezekiel’s case in her blog, Naturopathic Diaries.

When parents are “naturalistic fanatics” it can be nearly impossible to convince them to go to the doctor when their child needs real medicine, she said.

“My argument is not, and never has been, that medicine is perfect,” Hermes said. “But just because medicine isn’t perfect doesn’t make naturopathy a reasonable alternative.”

Calgary pediatrician Dr. Ian Mitchell said many people, including parents of young children, have a distrust of conventional medicine “and an almost magical belief that there is some pill or preparation called ‘natural’ that will wipe things away.” 
But he said restricting naturopaths from seeing children would only drive things underground and discourage parents from telling doctors about natural products they might be using that could have “disastrous” interactions with other medicines.

“We want people to be open with us,” he said, which means not condemning or judging parents.

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/should-naturopaths-be-restricted-from-treating-children-in-wake-of-death-of-alberta-toddler