Opposing Naturopathy: Medical Privileges Should Be For Medical Doctors

Naturopathy is a form of pseudoscientific “complementary and alternative medicine” (CAM). In the United States, naturopathy is one of the most institutionalized forms of CAM.

Naturopathic education is permeated with pseudoscientific theories, including the discredited idea that the human body possesses natural healing powers which can be unlocked to cure diseases without surgical or pharmaceutical intervention.

Typically, naturopathy combines routine medical practices with a wide variety of unproven or disproven treatments, some of which are dangerous. In North America, major naturopathic colleges require students to study discredited modalities such as homeopathy and energy healing. Many naturopaths deny the safety and efficacy of modern vaccines, sometimes recommending pseudoscientific “nosodes” as an alternative method of immunization.

Although naturopaths often market themselves as a viable alternative to medically trained physicians, they receive far less training and education overall. For all of these reasons, naturopathy jeopardizes patient health, and wastes patient time and money. In summary,

• Naturopathic practice is based on misinformation, which robs patients of the ability to give informed consent to medical treatment.
• Naturopathy wastes patients’ money on ineffective, discredited treatments.
• Naturopathy waste patients’ time, unnecessarily extending their pain and suffering.
• In wasting patients’ time, naturopathy causes patients to forgo effective medical care, allowing diseases to progress and worsen and complicating effective medical treatment.
• Naturopaths sometimes use treatments and therapies which are not only ineffective, but harmful as well.

Although naturopathy is based on pseudoscience, it claims to provide medical care. The authority to regulate medical practices mostly belongs to state governments. Therefore, the rules and regulations governing naturopathic practice are a state-by-state patchwork that is constantly changing.

Below, we describe two elements of naturopath regulation: credentialing and scope of practice.

Most states restrict the practice of certain trades to individuals who have obtained an official credential affirming their professional qualifications. The most common forms of credentialing are certification and licensure. Certificates are generally issued by a private organization with the state’s recognition, while licenses are issued by the government itself.

The naturopath lobby generally seeks to obtain licensing privileges wherever possible, for two reasons: first, in the eyes of the public, a state license usually conveys more legitimacy than a certificate issued by a private organization. Second, states tend to permit a wider scope of practice for individuals who meet standards set by the state than they do for individuals who meet the standards of a non-governmental organization.

Each state maintains a list of practices that medical practitioners are authorized to engage in. This is known as “scope of practice.” In some states, practicing naturopathy is not legally permitted.

At the opposite extreme, some states provide naturopaths with broad authority to engage in practices normally reserved for medical doctors and even medical specialists, including diagnosing serious illnesses, prescribing controlled medications, performing surgeries, administering drugs by injection, ordering and performing sophisticated diagnostic tests, and referring patients for specialty care.

Between these extremes, many states allow naturopathic practitioners to perform some but not all of these practices.

In recent years many states have expanded licensure and/or scope of practice for naturopaths. The national association representing naturopaths, the American Association of Naturopathic Physicians (AANP), has announced its intention to obtain licensing privileges for naturopaths in all 50 states by the year 2025.

In January 2020, the American Academy of Family Physicians published an updated state-by-state chart of naturopathy laws. Find out what your state permits naturopaths to do here:

To take one such example, in 2021, the Wisconsin state legislature considered two separate bills that would allow naturopaths more free reign to practice their profession. First, S.B. 532 / A.B. 529 would license naturopathic providers as primary care physicians in the state of Wisconsin. An article by Jann Bellamy in Science-Based Medicine broke down the problems with this legislation. Second, S.B. 98 / A.B. 86 would provide naturopaths with exemptions from prosecution for unlicensed practice. Again, Jann Bellamy’s insightful analysis in a separate article for Science-Based Medicine is helpful here.

Another state legislature, this one in Massachusetts, considered S.B. 1380 / A.B. 2343. This bill would broadly allow the practice of “complementary and alternative health care,” including naturopathy, with very limited exceptions such as holding oneself out as a licensed health care provider and performing medical surgery.

These and similar bills will bear close watching. 

Speak out on pending legislation where you live: