Following the initial finding by the incomparable Judge Eady in Simon Singh's libel case, one would think that British chiropractors would be feeling pretty good about life. Yet, like the creepy crawlies of lore, some British chiropractors are finding the bright glare of scrutiny a bit much. A letter from the McTimoney Chiropractic Association was apparently sent its members on 8 June 2009. The letter was made public by an apparently disgruntled chiropractor on 9 June 2009.
Here is the letter:
Date: 8 June 2009 09:12:18 BDT
Subject: FURTHER URGENT ACTION REQUIRED!
Dear Member
If
you are reading this, we assume you have also read the urgent email we
sent you last Friday. If you did not read it, READ IT VERY CAREFULLY
NOW and - this is most important – ACT ON IT. This is not
scaremongering. We judge this to be a real threat to you and your
practice.Because of what we consider to be a witch hunt against chiropractors, we are now issuing the following advice:
The
target of the campaigners is now any claims for treatment that cannot
be substantiated with chiropractic research. The safest thing for
everyone to do is as follows.
- If you have a website, take it down NOW.
When
you have done that, please let us know preferably by email or by phone.
This will save our valuable time chasing you to see whether it has been
done.
- REMOVE all the blue MCA patient
information leaflets, or any patient information leaflets of your own
that state you treat whiplash, colic or other childhood problems in
your clinic or at any other site where they might be displayed with
your contact details on them. DO NOT USE them until further notice. The
MCA are working on an interim replacement leaflet which will be sent to
you shortly.
- If you have not done so
already, enter your name followed by the word ‘chiropractor’ into a
search engine such as Google (e.g. Joe Bloggs chiropractor) and you
will be able to ascertain what information about you is in the public
domain e.g. where you might be listed using the Doctor title or where
you might be linked with a website which might implicate you. We have
found that even if you do not have a website yourself you may still
have been linked inadvertently to a website listing you or your
services.CHECK ALL ENTRIES CAREFULLY AND IF IN DOUBT, CONTACT THE RELEVANT PROVIDER TO REMOVE YOUR INFORMATION.
CHECK OUR PREVIOUS EMAILS FOR SPECIFIC ADVICE AND KEY WORDS TO AVOID.
KEEP A LOG OF YOUR ACTIONS.
- If
you use business cards or other stationery using the ‘doctor’ title and
it does not clearly state that you are a doctor of chiropractic or that
you are not a registered medical practitioner, STOP USING THEM
immediately.5. Be wary of ‘mystery shopper’ phone
calls and ‘drop ins’ to your practice, especially if they start asking
about your care of children, or whiplash, or your evidence base for
practice.IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THIS ADVICE, YOU MAY BE AT RISK FROM PROSECUTION.
IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW THIS ADVICE, THE MCA MAY NOT BE ABLE TO ASSIST YOU WITH ANY PROCEEDINGS.
Although
this advice may seem extreme or alarmist, its purpose is to protect
you. The campaigners have a target of making a complaint against every
chiropractor in the UK who they perceive to be in breach of the GCC’s
CoP, the Advertising Standards Code and/or Trading Standards. We have
discovered that complaints against more than 500 individual
chiropractors have been sent to the GCC in the last 24 hours.Whatever
you do, do not ignore this email and make yourself one of the victims.
Some of our members have not followed our earlier advice and now have
complaints made against them. We do not want that to happen to you.Even
if you do not have a website, you are still at risk. Our latest
information suggests that this group are now going through Yellow Pages
entries. Be in no doubt, their intention is to scrutinise every single
chiropractor in the UK.The MCA Executive has worked
tirelessly over the last week keeping abreast of development and
contacting at risk members. We have decided that this is our best
course of action to protect you and the Association at this time of
heightened tension. This advice is given to you solely to protect you
from what we believe is a concerted campaign, and does not imply any
wrongdoing on your part or the part of the Association. We believe that
our best course of action is simply to withdraw from the battleground
until this latest wave of targeting is over.Finally, we
strongly suggest you do NOT discuss this with others, especially
patients, Firstly it would not be ethical to burden patients with this,
though if they ask we hope you now have information with which you can
respond.Most importantly, this email and all
correspondence from the MCA is confidential advice to MCA members
alone, and should not be shared with anyone else.Please be
aware that the office phone lines are likely to be busy, so, if you
need our help, please send an email to the office and we will get back
to you as soon as we can.Yours,
Berni Martin
MCA Chair.
Best wishes,
Nicki
The concern expressed here is not that chiropractors might be providing misleading information to patients. It is that groups may be documenting that information in an effort to prosecute chiropractors for making false claims to patients. And whatever you do, chiropractors, do not discuss this with your patients:
Finally, we
strongly suggest you do NOT discuss this with others, especially
patients, Firstly it would not be ethical to burden patients with this
It certainly would not be ethical to burden patients with the realization that you are avoiding being investigated for making false claims. That would be horrible. I'm curious. Ethical to whom?
The letter is no longer available at the McTimoney Association website. Fortunately, this is the 21st century and many chiropractic websites have been archived in case they follow the letter's advice. Well, except for the McTimoney site. It's archive is blocked. According to the website information, the McTimoney Association site was last modified on 8 June 2009, the same day as the letter.
Here is a comparison of the Google preview image (left) and what you get at the site (right).
Please remember to support Simon Singh in his fight against the British Chiropractic Association and the effort to keep libel laws out of scientific debate.
*Letter from The Quackometer.
Evidence suppressed by a party to a case may be taken by the court as evidence of guilty knowledge. It may also be a contempt of court to attempt to conceal evidence supporting claim X whilst assuring the court that no evidence exists in support of claim X. Contempt of court may be punishable by imprisonment, and is in a large part at the judge's discretion.