This conflict is being played out of late in the arena of anti-aging medicine, a clinical specialty that has flourished in its twenty-two year long history, garnering the support of more than 100,000 physicians and scientists worldwide who practice or research life enhancing, life extending interventions today. Prof. Dr. Imre Zs.-Nagy, of the University of Debrecen Medical and Health Science Center (Hungary), and founder of the Archives of Gerontology and Geriatrics (published by Elsevier), observes1 that: “In my role as a basic and clinical scientist, I have had an opportunity to witness more than four decades of advances and declines in the arena of preventive medical care … there has been little else as dramatic, important, beneficial, and significant as the anti-aging medical movement.”
Continual vigilance is necessary to countermand those whose financial and professional successes depend on repeated, calculated attempts to discredit the science and substance of anti-aging medicine.
Remarks2 Tanjung Subrata, MD, of Udayana University School of Medicine (Indonesia):
“Anyone who does not believe in evil is not paying attention to the recent affairs of the past twenty years. We are living in a time of unprecedented tribulation and changes at-large – and in healthcare, in particular. All that is necessary for evil to prevail is for men of good will to do nothing. In this modern age of zero tolerance for alternatives to establishment medicine, and the willingness of our governmental officials to resort to police state tactics to suppress innovative schools of thought, progress in medicine halts and dies.”
A4M POSITION
The American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M), its numerous worldwide affiliated scientific and medical societies, and befriended organizations, supports the judicious application of modern and advanced medical technologies to address the changes in chemical, hormonal, physical, and nutritional needs that occurs with aging. Such repletion includes the restoration of hormones to an optimal physiological state when deficiency is determined by objective assessment.
Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is an essential and extensively documented protocol for clinical intervention in the disorders of aging. HRT maintains an unblemished safety and efficacy profile that has been documented by 20 years of clinical application. Yet, a perfect storm of misguided media combined with biased parties whose livelihoods hinge on disparaging the anti-aging medical movement has grossly compromised access to HRT, placing the lives of hundreds of thousands of patients worldwide in potential jeopardy.
Experienced anti-aging physicians have been prescribing HRT for more than 20 years. PubMed contains more than 20,000 peer-reviewed studies of HRT, of which a preponderance document the life-enhancing and/or life extending benefits of HRT in aging adults. See Appendix A “Literature Review“ which presents a selection of such studies that represent the objective evidence that supports the A4M position.
THE ANTI-AGING MEDICAL MOVEMENT
The goal of anti-aging medicine is not to merely prolong the total years of an individual's life, but to ensure that those years are enjoyed in a productive and vital fashion. As established in 1991 by the physicians of the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M), the field of anti-aging medicine was established as a direct extension to the science of elite sports medicine of the 1980s. Just as sports medicine aims to keep the athlete’s body functioning at its optimum level, anti-aging medicine seeks to keep the human physiology performing at its peak. In other words, the similar principle, of extending and maximizing the healthy human lifespan, is at the core of both anti-aging medicine and sports medicine.
The Official Definition of “Anti-Aging Medicine”
The clinical specialty of anti-aging medicine was established in 1991 by the physicians of the A4M, and thus is defined as follows:
Anti-aging medicine is a clinical specialty is founded on the application of advanced scientific and medical technologies for the early detection, prevention, treatment, and reversal of age-related dysfunction, disorders, and diseases. It is a healthcare model promoting innovative science and research to prolong the healthy lifespan in humans. As such, anti-aging medicine is based on principles of sound and responsible medical care that are consistent with those applied in other preventive health specialties. The phrase "anti-aging," as such, relates to the application of advanced biomedical technologies focused on the early detection, prevention, and treatment of aging-related disease.
The clinical specialty of anti-aging medicine utilizes diagnostic protocols that are supported by scientific evidence to arrive at an objective assessment upon which effective treatment is assigned. Physicians who dispense anti-aging medical care are concerned with the restoration of optimal functioning of the human body’s systems, organs, tissues, and cells.
Attempting to rebrand what it cannot deny, those in positions of power in academic, political, and regulatory arenas are Inventing new catch phrases including "longevity medicine," "successful aging," "healthy aging," and the like, in an effort to dilute and absorb the A4M's original definition of anti-aging medicine. To implement this campaign, we suspect that these individuals have pejoratively solicited major media outlets to denigrate the A4M, its officers, and its members.
Anti-aging medicine is, in essence, a euphemism for early detection and advanced preventative medicine. It is a healthcare model that emphasizes personalized, patient-focused, high-quality metabolic-specific medical care.
Critics with A Dark Agenda (Political Elites)
Scientifically based and well documented in leading medical journals, anti-aging medicine is among the fastest growing medical specialties throughout the world. As an innovative model for advanced preventive healthcare that cannot be denied, individuals with their own political and financial agendas have disparaged anti-aging medicine in attempts to restore monopolistic control over the field of aging intervention. Critics of the science of anti-aging medicine most commonly hail from academia: as such, these naysayers many times have little or no medical training in aging intervention, and may be non-clinicians.
Perhaps the most inconceivable reality is that at the very highest levels of academia, government, and science, truth and objective scientific method are not at all sacred to the political elites. We in clinical medicine via our training, discipline, and conditioning naively believe and act in the public interest, for the good of our patients’ health, and by professional standards of medical ethics. The (elite) medical establishment operates contrary to this position, reports investigative reporter Tim Bolen (www.bolenreport.com), who for 30 years has amassed data and evidence exposing a calculated effort to deride innovative medical therapeutics. Mr. Bolen observes3 that:
“Without a doubt, a stealthy control group – a cabal, if you will, in status-quo medicine exists. Approved by Big Pharma, parts of academia, and segments of the government, this group exerts its control in many different ways. I have uncovered information showing anonymous, and not-so-anonymous, funding of groups, loosely describing themselves as “Quackbusters or Skeptics” whose only purpose is to attack cutting-edge health care offerings. Those groups, in turn, train, and fund sub-groups. Data suggests that the “Quackbusters or Skeptics” donated over $1 Million US to Wikipedia to purchase control over pages with medical content. More, the Skeptic training camps teach their recruits how to operate together to control that same Wikipedia and Search Engines. Further, these covert groups drive media on issues particularly pertaining to alternative healthcare, in an effort to limit coverage of innovative discoveries and to vilify therapies that are not part of AMA/FDA/Big Pharma establishment medicine healthcare.
There are TWO main "skeptic" organizations - the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) and the Center For Inquiry (CFI). Both are well funded from secret sources.
JREF reported, in 2010, a total income of $999,971.00 and a Total Asset claim of $1,736,101.
The Center For Inquiry,