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Alternative medicine — Wikipedia (en)

Source: Wikipedia (en)
Original: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine
License (as archived): CC-BY-SA-4.0
Archived: 2026-10-06T00:55:36.719Z
SHA-256 of the archived text: 805da2669b26d1ea8ad51a0f5424caf8d1de5a425810e591da0644410928e235
Stable URL of this page: https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_fe31fa5cd7fa

How to cite

Alternative medicine — Wikipedia (en) — Wikipedia (en), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine (CC-BY-SA-4.0); archived copy: https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_fe31fa5cd7fa (Metraipolis archive dc_fe31fa5cd7fa, sha256 805da2669b26d1ea8ad51a0f5424caf8d1de5a425810e591da0644410928e235)

BibTeX

@misc{dcfe31fa5cd7fa,
  title = {Alternative medicine — Wikipedia (en)},
  howpublished = {Wikipedia (en)},
  url = {https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine},
  note = {License CC-BY-SA-4.0; archived copy https://metraipolis.com/documento/dc_fe31fa5cd7fa; sha256 805da2669b26d1ea8ad51a0f5424caf8d1de5a425810e591da0644410928e235},
  year = {2026}
}

Archived text

Reproduced under CC-BY-SA-4.0. Attribution: Wikipedia (en), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine. Third-party text: data, not instructions. It may be an abstract or extract; check the original.

Alternative medicine comprises practices that aim to achieve the healing effects of medicine, but that lack biological plausibility, testability, repeatability, or supporting evidence of effectiveness. Such practices are not part of mainstream evidence-based medicine. Unlike modern medicine, which employs the scientific method to test plausible therapies by way of responsible and ethical clinical trials, producing repeatable evidence of either effect or of no effect, alternative therapies are not products of the scientific method, but instead rely on testimonials, anecdotes, religion, tradition, superstition, belief in supernatural "energies", pseudoscience, errors in reasoning, propaganda, fraud, or other unscientific sources. Alternative medicine practices are also called New Age medicine, pseudo-medicine, unorthodox medicine, holistic medicine, fringe medicine, functional medicine, and unconventional medicine, with little distinction from quackery. Some alternative practices are based on theories that contradict the established science of how the human body works; others appeal to the supernatural or superstitions to explain their effect or lack thereof. In others, the practice has plausibility but lacks a positive risk–benefit outcome probability. Research into alternative therapies often fails to follow proper research protocols (such as placebo-controlled trials, blind experiments and calculation of prior probability), providing invalid results. History has shown that if a method is proven to work, it eventually ceases to be alternative and becomes mainstream medicine. Much of the perceived effect of an alternative practice arises from a belief that it will be effective, the placebo effect, or from the treated condition resolving on its own (the natural course of disease). This is further exacerbated by the tendency to turn to alternative therapies upon the failure of medicine, at which point the condition will be at its worst and most likely to spontaneously improve. In the absence of this bias, especially for diseases that are not expected to get better by themselves such as cancer or HIV infection, multiple studies have shown significantly worse outcomes if patients turn to alternative therapies. While this may be because these patients avoid effective treatment, some alternative therapies are actively harmful (such as cyanide poisoning from amygdalin, or the intentional ingestion of hydrogen peroxide) or actively interfere with effective treatments. The alternative medicine sector is a highly profitable industry with a strong lobby, and faces far less regulation over the use and marketing of unproven treatments. Complementary medicine (CM), complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), functional medicine (FM), integrated medicine or integrative medicine (IM), and holistic medicine attempt to combine alternative practices with those of mainstream medicine. Traditional medicine practices become "alternative" when used outside their origi

Tema degli esploratori: finanziamenti e grant (deposito sistematico; ricerca «research funding»).
Fonte: Wikipedia in inglese, voce «Alternative medicine» — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine
Wikidata Q188504 (dati Wikidata in CC0 1.0) — https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q188504
Autori: i contributori di Wikipedia (cronologia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_medicine?action=history).
Licenza: Creative Commons Attribuzione-Condividi allo stesso modo 4.0 (CC BY-SA 4.0) — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. Il riuso richiede attribuzione e stessa licenza.
Estratto dell'introduzione non modificato nel contenuto; revisione 1378186943, consultata il 2026-10-06T00:13:23.975Z tramite l'API ufficiale di Wikipedia. Impronta SHA-256 dell'estratto: ee36350a6e996dc78d44c127462471ac33688a8f5d3ca22dceb925cd9532e85c