Have you ever heard a practitioner of western medicine refer to "modalities" of treatment?

[Orrex]

I've only ever heard the term used by alt-med proponents, and it's invariably used in way that seems intended to boost the apparent cred of whatever "modalities" are being discussed.

For all I know it's possible that the term is used all the time by western med practitioners, but it certainly doesn't seem to have the same buzzword status that it enjoys among purveyors of "alternative" "medicine."

[realisticphish]

1. interesting; though it may just be a replacement for "treatment"

since it doesn't actually treat anything... as long as they want to play ball with the FDA they have to at least pretend they don't claim that

[TZ]

2. No. I can't even imagine that word being said by my Mayo doc

Personally, I find it to be a form of technobabble. Someone who is trying to sound more expert than they are.
Any doctor who is a true scientist would probably not use that term, because of how meaningless it is.

[salvorhardin]

3. It seems to get used sometimes in research papers

I did a search on PubMed for 'treatment modality' and got 413 results, 66 of which were reviews. Here's some of the titles (just taken from the first few results):

• Analysis of nocturia with 24-h urine volume, nocturnal urine volume, nocturnal bladder capacity and length of sleep duration: concept for effective treatment modality.
• Acupuncture as a treatment modality for the management of cancer pain: the state of the science.
• THE IMPACT OF TREATMENT MODALITY ON INFECTION-RELATED HOSPITALIZATION RATES IN PERITONEAL DIALYSIS AND HEMODIALYSIS PATIENTS.
• Autologous stem cell transplantation as treatment modality in a patient with relapsed pancreatoblastoma.
• Dysphagia, stricture, and pneumonia in head and neck cancer patients: does treatment modality matter?
• Somatostatin receptor scintigraphy as a potential diagnostic and treatment modality for thyroid follicular-cell-derived cancers.
• Silver: an age-old treatment modality in modern times.
• Dendritic cell vaccination as a treatment modality for mesothelioma.
• Extensive basal cell carcinoma of the forehead and anterior scalp: use of helical tomotherapy as a radiotherapy treatment modality.
• New treatment modality for maxillary hypoplasia in cleft patients. Protraction facemask with miniplate anchorage.

413 results out of the tens of thousands of journal articles indexed by PubMed is relatively few. I'm sure we could probably at least double that number by searching on different phrases that use the word but that's still not a very large number of results.

So it does look like the term is used, but not very often. It's probably an archaic term that has coopted by alt-med promoters.

[Orrex]

4. Spare me your facts and statistics, you charlatan!

Actually, thank you for crunching the numbers--I wouldn't have thought to look into it that way.

Honestly, I'm pretty sure that I've never heard the term used by a practitioner of western medicine, and I suspect that many of those who might use it today are inclined to do so for the same reason that they might use the word "allopathic."

[salvorhardin]

7. I just did a title search (since I was lazy)

But I went back and did a full body search and got many, many more results. So it's not that uncommon. I'm really thinking Leftish Brit is right and that the alt-med crowd has coopted the word to sound more authoritative and science-y.

[LeftishBrit]

5. I've seen it fairly often in research papers

Research often compares the effectiveness of different 'treatment modalities' for disorders. However, at least AFAIK it's not an expression commonly used in everyday doctor-patient conversations. Maybe the 'altie-med' people who use it are trying to sound more-scientific-than-thou in order to cover the fact that they don't really have good evidence for what they're doing?

[TZ]

6. Thats exactly what I think.

I've had long conversations about treatment with my Mayo doctor and although he doesn't shy away from technical terms with me (since he knows my background) I've NEVER heard that term.

[Warpy]

8. Yes, I have

and it's usually a discussion among them about what would be the best approach for a patient: surgery, rehab, drugs, whatever. All might have the potential to fix the problem, but issues like recovery time, patient compliance and others factor into the final decision about treatment modality.

So yeah, they do.

[Orrex]

9. Interesting.

LeftishBrit made an observation above about the term being more common in doctor:doctor discussions than doctor:patient; is this your experience as well, or have you seen it in talks between the doctor and patient?

[Warpy]

10. No, "modality" is a two dollar word

and they dumb things down for civilians. Even the educated patient is sitting there in a state of shock that drastic medical things are being considered and health care professionals tend to keep it simple for them.