The Electropoise was a fake medical instrument patented [1] and sold in the United States of America by Hercules Sanche, who also invented and sold other fake instruments which were later termed as "electroquackery" [2] and included such devices as the "Oxydonor" which were claimed to remedy a range of ailments. [3]
The instruments were widely advertised in popular magazines [4] and the company, Electrolibration, opened numerous offices far from their headquarters in Birmingham, Alabama including New York and London. The President of Electropoise, John N. Webb, admitting that he was not a man of science stated that his hands were full handling the business. [5] It was sold for about twenty-five dollars. Other successors like Oxydonor were sold at ten to thirty dollars. [6] Even during its heyday, a period when electricity was viewed with awe, some physicians called attention to the nature of the fraud but their efforts had little impact on the advertisement and sale. A letter to the editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association in 1897 by a physician named George N. Kreider states that "One of the most glaring frauds of this decade has been an appliance known as 'Electropoise,' advertised in Harper's Monthly and other leading publications" and promoted by a W.H. De Puy, editor of the New York Christian Advocate. [7] [8]
N.C. Morse, a physician, tried investigating the instrument and wrote: "I have had it sawed into sections and alas, like the goose that laid the golden egg of fable fame, there is nothing in the carcass!" Another physician named Harding wrote in 1930 that the pricing of such devices helped in selling the remedy which may have had a placebo effect. The advertisement was clever in claiming that it enhanced the body's natural healing ability. The Electropoise, it claimed:
... is a thermal instrument with an electrical force simulating the nervous current, and evidently acting through trophic nerves. When the polarizer is placed in cold water or upon ice, and the plate attached to wrist or ankle or over other parts of the body as may be required, the warmth of the body upon the plate at once brings this thermal influence into action. The effects are a generally distributed and accelerated circulation, with stimulated nutritive function in every tissue. The respiration deepened and more oxygen absorbed. The secretions of stomach, liver, and all the digestive organs are increased...
Elsewhere it claimed:
...a little instrument which enables the system to take on oxygen freely from the atmosphere. This addition of nature's own tonic increases vitality, tones up the nervous system, purifies the blood, and by expelling the morbid matter and diseased tissues restores the body to its normal condition - health
Skeptics pointed out the fraudulent logic used in claims and endorsements of its curative effect stating that it was dangerous use of post hoc ergo propter hoc as the logic. [9] [10]
Sanche was careful in that he never claimed that his device would cure diseases like tuberculosis. Others like E.L. Moses, inventor of Oxypathor, would go to jail for 18 months in 1915 for making false curative claims. [11] The company was not without competition. A device called the Oxygenor was marketed by a rival and Sanche went to court. The court claimed that there was not enough evidence for the value of his invention and therefore that it could not be protected. Justice Shiras and the other judges declared that his theory of "diaduction" (a term he coined) was a mere pretense to allow him to obtain a patent. [6] In Britain the Richardson Electro-Galvanic Belt of Ludgate Hill and the Magneto-Electric Battery Company were competing with Electropoise. [5]
Quackery, often synonymous with health fraud, is the promotion of fraudulent or ignorant medical practices. A quack is a "fraudulent or ignorant pretender to medical skill" or "a person who pretends, professionally or publicly, to have skill, knowledge, qualification or credentials they do not possess; a charlatan or snake oil salesman". The term quack is a clipped form of the archaic term quacksalver, derived from Dutch: kwakzalver a "hawker of salve" or rather somebody who boasted about their salves, more commonly known as ointments. In the Middle Ages the term quack meant "shouting". The quacksalvers sold their wares at markets by shouting to gain attention.
The American Medical Association (AMA) is an American professional association and lobbying group of physicians and medical students. Founded in 1847, it is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Membership was 271,660 in 2022.
A patent medicine is a non-prescription medicine or medicinal preparation that is typically protected and advertised by a trademark and trade name, and claimed to be effective against minor disorders and symptoms, as opposed to a prescription drug that could be obtained only through a pharmacist, usually with a doctor's prescription, and whose composition was openly disclosed. Many over-the-counter medicines were once ethical drugs obtainable only by prescription, and thus are not patent medicines.
A charlatan is a person practicing quackery or a similar confidence trick in order to obtain money, power, fame, or other advantages through pretense or deception. One example of a charlatan appears in the Canterbury Tales story "The Pardoner's Tale," with the Pardoner who tricks sinners into buying fake religious relics. Synonyms for charlatan include shyster, quack, or faker. Quack is a reference to quackery or the practice of dubious medicine, including the sale of snake oil, or a person who does not have medical training who purports to provide medical services.
A panacea is any supposed remedy that is claimed to cure all diseases and prolong life indefinitely. Named after the Greek goddess of universal remedy Panacea, it was in the past sought by alchemists in connection with the elixir of life and the philosopher's stone, a mythical substance that would enable the transmutation of common metals into gold. Through the 18th and 19th centuries, many "patent medicines" were claimed to be panaceas, and they became very big business. The term "panacea" is used in a negative way to describe the overuse of any one solution to solve many different problems, especially in medicine. The word has acquired connotations of snake oil and quackery.
Stephen Joel Barrett is an American retired psychiatrist, author, co-founder of the National Council Against Health Fraud (NCAHF), and the webmaster of Quackwatch. He runs a number of websites dealing with quackery and health fraud. He focuses on consumer protection, medical ethics, and scientific skepticism.
Elisha Perkins was a United States physician who created a fraudulent medical device, the Perkins Patent Tractors. Although they were made of steel and brass, Perkins claimed that they were made of unusual metal alloys. Perkins claimed his rods cured inflammation, rheumatism and pain in the head and the face; he applied the points on the aching body part and passed them over the part for about 20 minutes. The device was later the subject of the first placebo research.
Morris Fishbein was an American physician and editor of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) from 1924 to 1950.
Alois P. Swoboda (1873–1938) was an American quack and physical culture mail-order instructor. Swoboda claimed that his exercise system combined with drinking four pints of water a day would cure almost any illness.
Energy medicine is a branch of alternative medicine based on a pseudo-scientific belief that healers can channel "healing energy" into a patient and effect positive results. The field is defined by shared beliefs and practices relating to mysticism and esotericism in the wider alternative medicine sphere rather than any sort of unified terminology, leading to terms such as energy healing or vibrational medicine being used as synonymous or alternative names. In most cases there is no empirically measurable energy involved: the term refers instead to so-called subtle energy. Practitioners may classify the practice as hands-on, hands-off, and distant where the patient and healer are in different locations. Many schools of energy healing exist using many names: for example, biofield energy healing, spiritual healing, contact healing, distant healing, therapeutic touch, Reiki or Qigong.
Siddha medicine is a form of traditional medicine originating in southern India. It is one of the oldest systems of medicine in India.
Radionics—also called electromagnetic therapy (EMT) and the Abrams method—is a form of alternative medicine that claims that disease can be diagnosed and treated by applying electromagnetic radiation (EMR), such as radio waves, to the body from an electrically powered device. It is similar to magnet therapy, which also applies EMR to the body but uses a magnet that generates a static electromagnetic field.
Colon cleansing, also known as colon therapy, colon hydrotherapy, a colonic, or colonic irrigation, encompasses a number of alternative medical therapies claimed to remove toxins from the colon and intestinal tract by removing accumulations of feces. Colon cleansing in this context should not be confused with an enema which introduces fluid into the colon, often under mainstream medical supervision, for a limited number of purposes including severe constipation and medical imaging.
William Frederick Koch (1885–1967) was a U.S. medical doctor and pharmaceutical entrepreneur. In the 1940s he marketed glyoxylide, a drug which he claimed would cure cancer. The claims were never scientifically proved, and he was considered a charlatan by the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Charles Alfred Tyrrell was a promoter of medical devices, most notably an enema appliance. He was also author of tracts promoting the use of his device for colon cleansing as therapy for detoxification pursuant to a theory of auto-intoxication.
The Pulvermacher chain, or in full as it was sold the Pulvermacher hydro-electric chain, was a type of voltaic battery sold in the second half of the 19th century for medical applications. Its chief market was amongst the numerous quack practitioners who were taking advantage of the popularity of the relatively new treatment of electrotherapy, or "electrification" as it was then known. Its unique selling point was its construction of numerous linked cells, rendering it mechanically flexible. A variant intended to be worn wrapped on parts of the body for long periods was known as Pulvermacher's galvanic chain or electric belt.
Swaim's Panacea was an American patent medicine sold by William Swaim (1781–1846) of Philadelphia, starting in approximately 1820, with formulations still being sold into at least the 1920s. It was advertised to cure various diseases including scrofula, mercurial disease, deep-seated syphilis, rheumatism, sores, swellings, etc.
The Ionaco was an electric belt developed by Gaylord Wilshire after his career in politics. It was advertised during the 1920s as a curing device but was dismissed by contemporary medical experts as quackery.
Edwin Frederick Bowers, best known as Edwin F. Bowers was an American alternative medicine proponent. Styling himself as a medical doctor, he is known for pioneering reflexology during the early decades of the twentieth century.
Arthur Joseph Cramp was a medical doctor, researcher, and writer. He served as director of the American Medical Association's (AMA) Propaganda for Reform Department from 1906 to 1936. He was a regular contributor to the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Cramp was "a bitter opponent of proprietary and medicinal abuses." His three volume series on 'Nostrums and Quackery', along with his public lectures to schools, professional groups, and civic organizations across the country, helped bring awareness to the problem of patent medicines or nostrums, by subjecting the claims to scientific analysis. He was critical of the 1906 Pure Food and Drug Act, and advocated stronger regulation of product labeling and advertising. In an article announcing his death, the AMA called him "a pioneer in the fight against quackery and fraud in the healing arts."