#2853: Bruce Fong

Bruce Fong is an insane quack and the medical director of the Sierra Integrative Medical Center in Reno, Nevada, most famous for being the guy who administered nonsense treatments to Chuck Norris’s wife Gena when she and Chuck convinced themselves that she suffered from gadolinum poisoning – gadolinum being a contrast agent commonly used for MRI scans that has in recent years been championed, contrary to available evidence, as a cause of a slew of vague and unspecific symptoms that has given rise to a whole cottage industry of alternative providers (quacks) who advertise and claim to treat it by various nonsense detoxification treatments, acupuncture, hyperbaric oxygen chambers and whatever the individual quack decides is most convenient or profitable (medically, the choice of treatment probably doesn’t matter since none of them are likely to work even if gadolinum toxicity were a correct diagnosis, which is at best unclear (and vastly unlikely) given that the diagnostic tests are garbage).

 

Bruce Fong, however, is the kind of person who is willing to diagnose you, treat you and bill you for whatever you think (or he can entice you into thinking) you suffer from, regardless of whether you actually suffer from it or whether his treatments have the faintest chance of addressing it even if you did – even the Norrises emphasize that he “quickly was able to confirm our theory”, because of course he was. According to his bio, Fong was “introduced to natural medicine and homeopathic medicine as a young child and continues with that tradition today”, specializing in “immune related diseases, including special treatment plans which combine the best options from a broad array of homeopathic, internal, Chinese and traditional medicine”. Indeed, he is, according to himself, “focused on solving root causes, not treating symptoms or masking issues falsely with compounded prescriptions”. Yes, he’s a quack, and he offers the whole gamut of quackery, from chelation therapy and homeopathy to lymphatic massage and “detox” footbaths. (The Norrises, by the way, also employed the services of one Alfred Johnson, another quack who promotes e.g. homeopathy and breast thermography).

 

And the Sierra Integrative Medical Center is not a place to seek out if you are actually suffering from anything. Note for instance how they approach patients with MS: “[p]atients at SIMC, even those with the same ‘diagnoses’ are treated differently. For example, a patient may have a ‘diagnosis’ of Multiple Sclerosis. The cause(s) of this disease can vary from viral infections, bacterial infections, from hyper sensitivities to vaccinations, Toxoplasmosis or ParvoVirus from ones pets [nope] or even Lyme Disease from a tick bite.” Yes, their characterizations of the causes of MS are idiotically wrong, but note the quotation marks: The Sierra Institute doesn’t even really recognize the diagnosis! So much for ‘integrating’ conventional and pseudoscientific ideas about medicine – or for the willingness to identify root causes. Note, too, the reference to ‘vaccine hypersensitivity’: yes, the Sierra Center is anti-vaccine as well (and no: vaccines do not cause MS). And if someone claims your MS symptoms were the result of Lyme Disease, they would be talking about chronic Lyme disease, which is a fake diagnosis, but one for which quacks have developed a number of meaningless and fraudulent tests so it’s an easy scheme to make money off of if you have no concern for your victim’s well-being.

 

And to treat the conditions they identify Sierra offers treatment programs “assembled from various disciplines of the healing arts including but not limited to homeopathy, natural and biological medicines, behavioral medicine, nutritional therapies, orthomolecular integration and neurotherapy.” Yes, there are detox treatments and homeopathy. And what evidence does Sierra have to conclude that their nonsense works? Testimonials, of course. Hey, they even got Chuck Norris’s endorsement, and who wouldn’t take medical advice from Chuck Norris?

 

Diagnosis: Yes, we are sure that Fong genuinely thinks he helps. But at this level of insane quackery, stupidity is indistinguishable from malice. Bruce Fong is evil.

 

Hat-tip: Respectful Insolence