title: Alternative therapies for asthma: are patients at risk?
abstract: Asthma patients often try some form of alternative medicine. This article questions whether this is good or bad. Systematic reviews fail to demonstrate that the treatments in question are demonstrably effective. Other data raise considerable concern over the safety of some forms of alternative medicine. Thus the risk-benefit balance fails to be positive. Patients are often mislead to believe otherwise and physicians should inform their asthma patients responsibly about the value of alternative medicine.
authors.affiliation: Department of Complementary Medicine, Peninsula Medical School, Exeter, UK. Edzard.Ernst@pms.ac.uk
authors.forename: Edzard
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ernst
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Posadzki
mesh_terms: D001249:Asthma / Q000628:therapy*; D000529:Complementary Therapies / Q000009:adverse effects*; D019317:Evidence-Based Medicine; D006801:Humans; D010817:Physician-Patient Relations; D018570:Risk Assessment