Visiting Professor Patrick Holford has his own dedicated chapter in Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science: Chapter 9; pp 161-80. Both HolfordWatch and Holford Myths have commented that the CV which Holford submitted to the University of Teesside is riddled with a remarkable number of errors, several of which involve implausible timelines. Today, an outraged reader has submitted more evidence of confusion about Holford’s understanding of time as well as the evidence-base for chromium supplementation to “to stabilise blood sugar levels”. (more…)
Entries categorized as ‘Ben Goldacre’
Does Patrick Holford Lack Generosity of Spirit As Well As Scholarly Accuracy?
November 20, 2008 · 6 Comments
Categories: Ben Goldacre · Holford · patrick holford · supplements
Tagged: Bad Science, Ben Goldacre, blood sugar, BPSDB, chromium, diabetes, glycaemia, Manual of Dietetic Practice, patrick holford, supplements
Ben Goldacre: Upcoming Programme on Incapacity Benefit 10.11.08
November 9, 2008 · 1 Comment
Ben Goldacre of Bad Science is continuing his series of contributions to Radio 4: Incapacitated.
As the government unveil a tough new benefits system for the sick, Dr Ben Goldacre explores the parlous state of the incapacity benefits system, an eight billion pound legacy created by party politics and unthinking medics.
Ben discovers that, after being on incapacity benefit for more than two years, you are statistically more likely to die or retire than ever find work again. He asks how this can have been allowed to happen and considers whether the new government plans will help.
Of course, Ben Goldacre would far rather that as small a number of people as possible learn about the programme in time to listen to it but some of us are naturally cat out of bag about this sort of thing. This may well be the most controversial programme he broadcasts this year as it is a social, political, economic and medical issue.
Incapacitated will be available on Iplayer after it has been broadcast on 10 November at 8 PM.
Categories: Ben Goldacre
Tagged: Bad Science, Ben Goldacre, Incapacity Benefit, R4
Patrick Holford Visited All the Major Nutritional Research Centres in the United States: or so he claimed in 1985
October 5, 2008 · 23 Comments
Visiting Professor Patrick Holford has his own dedicated chapter in Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science: Chapter 9; pp 161-80. Both HolfordWatch and Holford Myths have commented that the CV which Holford submitted to the University of Teesside is riddled with a remarkable number of errors. Chronological errors undercut some of Holford’s implicit claims to have pursued supervised study in mental health and nutrition before starting to treat ‘mental health patients’ as an independent nutritional therapist. Goldacre elaborates on these inconsistencies and errors with some new information about Holford’s first job after graduation. (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · patrick holford
Tagged: patrick holford, Bad Science, Ben Goldacre, CV, nutritionist, BPSDB, Vitamin Vitality, Pfeiffer, Hoffer, Higher Nature, vitamin pill salesman
The Durham Fish Oil Zombie Rises Again
September 25, 2008 · 15 Comments
Dr Ben Goldacre of badscience.net has posted a summary of the Durham Fish Oil Trials Initiative and the latest update to the saga in which Durham Council has released the data showing spectacularly successful outcomes. Except, it hasn’t. Enquiring minds want to know if the data are being held over to be released with a fanfare at the Food for the Brain conference and the session where Dr Madeleine Portwood is scheduled to announce the outcome of the trials initiative. (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · Food for the brain · children
Tagged: omega 3, Ben Goldacre, school, children, fish oil, durham, durham trial, essential fatty acids, BPSDB, Durham Fish Oil Initiative, Madeleine Portwood
Post #350: “If you think I have been overly critical, I would invite you to notice that they win”
September 21, 2008 · 19 Comments
This is our 350th post on HolfordWatch. Over the course of these posts, we have found a number of inaccuracies in Holford’s self-presentation and many serious errors in his work. These errors overwhelmingly remain uncorrected or inadequately corrected, and Holford has failed to respond to almost all of the issues raised (what responses we have had from Holford are not at all convincing). However, we would like to take this opportunity to congratulate Patrick Holford: despite embarrassingly poor-quality work, an inaccurate CV and very public demolitions of his research, Patrick Holford has achieved a great deal in his career, in academia and in the media.
While we have been running this blog, Holford managed to sell his Health Products for Life business to Biocare (owned by Neutrahealth, who 30% owned by Elder Pharmaceuticals) for £464,000, and currently works as Head of Science and Education at Biocare. We have ethical quibbles about taking money from the pharmaceutical industry - we don’t do it - but careers in this industry are competitive, and Holford should be congratulated for getting so much money from Biocare (and thus, indirectly, from Elder Pharmaceuticals).
Holford should also be congratulated for having his application to be a visiting professor at Teesside University approved (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · Food for the brain · Food for the brain foundation · University of Teesside · patrick holford
Tagged: Biocare, Elder Pharmaceuticals, Food for the brain, Neutrahealth, patrick holford, Teesside University, University of Teesside
Ben Goldacre on BBC 1’s One Show
September 8, 2008 · 9 Comments
Ben Goldacre BBC One Show September 8 2008.
Dr Ben Goldacre was on BBC 1’s One Show. Watch out for it on BBC iPlayer for September 8 (from 8:10 to 12:00 or thereabouts if you crave the added wisdom of Len Goodman). [Update, please use the iPlayer link if you can because this tells the BBC that you were interested in the Bad Science segment. For those who can't, or for when it disappears, there is a YouTube.]
In an action-packed segment that serves as a lively precis of his book, Goldacre admonished the media for their poor science coverage and then took the viewer on a rapid tour of the Media Hall of Shame for Science Reporting and Obsession with Miracle Cures. (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · Wakefield · supplements
Tagged: health, Bad Science, Ben Goldacre, autism, MMR, Wakefield, media, journalism, nutritional therapists, nutritionists, BPSDB, Tom Sanders
Ben Goldacre and Placebo (Part 2) Radio 4: Lacking In Cheese or Missing An Eye
August 26, 2008 · 20 Comments
Bad Science’s Dr Ben Goldacre has collaborated with Radio 4 to produce a 2-part exploration of the potent, intriguing power of placebo. Both Part 1 and Part 2 discussed the history, science and theatre of this fascinating phenomenon and it has been notable that the examples spanned from Perkins Tractors, Mesmer and animal magnetism, to work that was published only this year. Placebo has such an extensive and rich history and encompasses so many issues aside from medicine such as social influence and trust that it isn’t practical to present more than a tasting menu of it in 2 half-hour programes. Nonetheless, at the risk of sounding like Brillat-Savarin, it was strangely unsatisfying that neither of the programmes addressed the issue that some researchers argue that the placebo is both over-rated and ineffective and that there is no role for it in medicine, outside the context of a clinical trial. (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · children · placebo
Tagged: ADHD, Ben Goldacre, Bodfish, CAM, children, clinical trials, Cochrane Review, doctor patient relationship, epilepsy, ethics, Gøtzsche, Hickner, homeopathy, Houston, Hróbjartsson, Kirsch, Lewith, Moerman, placebo, R4, Radio 4, Sandler, Shapiro, Sherman, trust, Walter Brown
Professor Frizelle’s Instant Classic: Let’s hear your evidence not your legal muscle
August 8, 2008 · 21 Comments
It isn’t often that you come across a newly-minted phrase that is destined to become a classic but Professor Frank Frizelle has managed it (pdf). In response to a legal letter on behalf of affronted chiropractors he issued this challenge: “let’s hear your evidence not your legal muscle”.
Read all about it at dcscience.net with Professor David Colquhoun who is (of course) entangled in this legal imbroglio: Chiropractors resort to legal intimidation. Dr Ben Goldacre has a strong commentary on this matter: Silence Dissent! (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre
Tagged: Ben Goldacre, BPSDB, chiropractors, criticism, David Colquhoun, Frank Frizelle, Journal of the New Zealand Medical Association, New Zealand Journal of Medicine
More Dore media coverage: Bad Science and the Sun
May 31, 2008 · 3 Comments
A quick post to note some more of the unfolding coverage of Dore UK’s closures. Ben Goldacre uses his Guardian bad science column to point out that, when analysing the coverage of Dore:
it seems the bloggers win on timeliness, accuracy, relevance, effort, ethics, and stupid names. (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · Dore · autism · dyslexia · dyspraxia
Tagged: administration, Administrators, Bad Science, Dore, Dore UK, dyslexia, dyspraxia, Guardian, Kenny Logan, specific learning difficulties, Sun, Wynford Dore
Ben Goldacre Usually Gets The Science Wrong: Patrick Holford Speaks From His Own Reality
April 3, 2008 · 15 Comments
A long time ago, MythBusters tested a scenario that recreated the classic vandalised police car scene from American Graffiti (it involved a chain being passed round the rear axle and being attached to a post). Adam Savage was brought to book by the camera crew for misremembering his predictions of the probability of the axle being ripped out of the car. When Savage was confronted with the video evidence of his errors and his revised estimates of the probability, he famously riposted: “I reject your reality and substitute my own”.
Professor Patrick Holford seems to be pursuing a similar line of defence (JKN as previous version on Holford site has disappeared). (more…)
Categories: Ben Goldacre · Emer Keeling · Holford · MMR · Sarah Jarvis · patrick holford
Tagged: patrick holford, Holford, Ben Goldacre, Sarah Jarvis, scholarship, Emer Keeling, MMR, Piatkus, Jerome Burne
