Kick Dr. Oz out of Columbia, critics say
Celebrity doctor defends himself against claims of promoting ‘quack treatments’
NEWYORK— Dr. Mehmet Oz is defending himself against10 doctors who’ve accused him of promoting “quack treatments” on his TV show, months after Canadian researchers trashed many of his recommendations.
Oz said in a statement Friday that his show provides “multiple points of view” including his own.
He added that his own views are offered “without conflict of interest.”
Agroup of 10 doctors sent a letter to Columbia University this week urging the university to remove Oz from its faculty. They accused Oz of an “egregious lack of integrity.”
That came after researchers led by Christina Korownyk of the University of Alberta charged medical research either didn’t substantiate — or flat out contradicted — more than half of Oz’s recommendations. Their findings were published in the British Medical Journal in December.
The lead author of the letter to Columbia is Dr. Henry Miller, a senior research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution.
A Columbia spokesman said the school is “committed to the principle of academic freedom.”
Oz is vice-chairman of Columbia’s surgery department and still occasionally teaches. He also performs heart surgery at Columbia’s affiliated hospital.
Called “America’s doctor,” syndicated talk-show host Oz has been popular because of his simple explanations of medical concepts. He somehow makes it fun. And people can’t get enough.
“I haven’t seen a doctor in eight years,” The New Yorker magazine quoted one viewer telling Oz. “I’m scared. You’re the only one I trust.”
But criticism has hammered Oz for months. In June last year, he was
“I give my audience the advice I give my family all the time.” DR. MEHMET OZ
hauled in front of the U.S. Congress, where Sen. Claire McCaskill told him he gave people false hope and criticized his segments as a “recipe for disaster.” Then last month, a study he widely trumpeted lauding coffee bean weight-loss pills was retracted despite Oz’s assertions it could “burn fat fast for anyone who wants to lose weight.”
Oz, for his part, has said more than once he’s only trying to give people all the options out there. He said data shouldn’t stop patients from testing out things like raspberry ketone — a “miracle in a bottle to burn your fat” — even if it’s never been tested on people, according to Slate.
“I recognize that oftentimes they don’t have the scientific muster to present as fact,” Oz said at a U.S. Senate hearing, adding that he “per- sonally believes in the items I talk about in my show. “But, nevertheless, I give my audience the advice I give my family all the time. I give my family these products, specifically the ones you mentioned. I’m comfortable with that part.”
But the Canadian researchers weren’t nearly so comfortable. They selected 40 episodes from 2013, identifying 479 separate medical recommendations. After paging through the relevant medical research, they found evidence only supported 46 per cent of his recommendations, contradicted 15 per cent and wasn’t available for 39 per cent.
The study was not without its limitations, however. The researchers conceded it was difficult to parse “what was said and what was implied.” And some of the recommendations were extremely general — “sneezing into your elbow prevents the spread of germs” — and consequently difficult to find in medical research, let alone substantiate.