How a secret CAM 'therapy' turned to disaster and made this GP's blood boil

A retired council worker, whom I’ll call Jack*, presented to me complaining about his poor urinary stream.

He lived alone and exercised his old cattle dog twice a day. The dog was becoming impatient with the length of time it took Jack to empty his bladder while they walked in the woods.

The 70-year-old was otherwise fit although his gait was severely limited by bilateral osteoarthritis of his hips.

We performed the appropriate investigations, and established he had benign prostatic hypertrophy and bilateral, frozen hip joints.

He was normotensive and