The BioMed Center New England looks more like a spa than a health clinic.
Just three blocks from Brown University’s medical school, in Providence’s Jewelry District, visitors step into a spacious, light-filled office suite. To the right of the reception desk, a decorative “moss wall” stands illuminated like a landscape viewed from an airplane.
There’s an area with cubbies to store belongings and a kitchen that can double as a cafeteria. One room has a line of massage chairs with foot baths, like the ones you see in nail salons.
“So what you’re looking at here is a foot bath with some ions infused into it with some electricity gently — no shock involved,’’ says Dr. Heather Tallman Ruhm, the clinic’s medical director. Tallman is a physician but she says her role here is not to offer any medical diagnosis, treatment or even disease management.
The clinic’s “bioregulatory” medicine and dentistry, their application states, incorporates homeopathy, naturopathy, Chinese and ayurvedic practices to improve patients’ physical and emotional well-being.
“So people who come here may have a preexisting diagnosis,’’ Tallman says, “but they’re not here looking for a diagnosis. They’re here looking for what might be underlying their dysregulation, where the priorities of the body might be and how to support that.“
The privately-owned clinic is operated by the American Center for Bioregulatory Medicine and Dentistry, LLC, whose owners include Jeoffrey Drober, a Scottsdale, AZ-based naturopathic physician, Gerry Curatola, a New York City-based dentist, according to the application filed with the Rhode Island Department of Health. The application states that Robert W. Dulaney, a private equity investor in Kentucky, is providing the center with $3.6 million in start-up money funds through his company, Robert Woodford Enterprises, LLC.
Stress, fatigue and chronic muscle tension are among the symptoms the clinic claim to help. Their treatments include an Ion Cleanse foot bath and Full Body Vibration Therapy.” That later involves standing on what looks like a tread mill, except that nothing moves.
“By standing on this you’re essentially getting a frequency massage of all of the organs in your body; all the tissues,’’ Tallman Ruhm says.
Sound waves also are central to full body vibration therapy. That involves lying on a water-filled mattress that sends sound waves through your body, she says, so you can “dip into that place that’s more meditative.”
And then there’s Ozone Therapy, where clients get hooked up to an IV for infusions of oxygen into their bloodstream. “So not unlike that fresh experience you have when you come into nature after a storm,’’ she says.
But Dr. Mariah Stump says there’s little to no scientific evidence to show that these types of therapies the BioMed Center is offering are effective. “You know a lot of these treatments I think they mean well,’’ Stump says. “I think the problem, though, is that there’s just not a lot of data behind them.”
Stump is both a physician and a medical acupuncturist with Lifespan Health System. She says you won’t find many of these therapies written up in peer-reviewed American medical journals. “I don’t know if a patient came to me asking about oxygen therapy or some of the other things that were offered,’’ Stump says, “whether that was something that I could recommend for them.”
But the BioMed Center’s Tallman Ruhm says these treatments are rooted in Eastern medicine and whole-body practices which are used more widely in Europe. And people are already coming to the center. And they’re shelling out significant money for these therapies.
And like a spa, purchasing more treatments can lower the per-item cost. For example, a ten-pack of oxygen therapy treatments costs “under $1,000,’’ Tallman Ruhm says.
Dr. Peter A. Hollman, president of the Rhode Island Medical Society, said the “biggest risk” to patients who engage in treatments that may not have a strong scientific or medical basis is that those patients may forgo other necessary medical treatments — or engage in more unnecessary testing that may be harmful.
“With all the focus that we’ve had on rising costs of health care,’’ Hollman says, “I find it fascinating that…many members are of the public are willing to spend very large sums of money on stuff that isn’t proven to be effective yet are very concerned about the cost of things that are proven to be effective.”
There is no national accrediting body for bioregulatory medicine and dental clinics.
The BioMed Center’s dental services include replacing “toxic elements such as mercury fillings and corrosive metals in dental implants with composite.’’ As one of the center’s conditions for approval of its license, state health officials require written consent from patients with a disclaimer “indicating there is currently insufficient evidence to support or refute any adverse effects associated with amalgam or composite restorations…”
The BioMed Center isn’t claiming to provide any cures or medical treatment. In fact, Tallman Ruhm, the clinic’s medical director, says they disclose as much in consent forms they say they require patients to sign. Meanwhile, the center is positioning itself to expand its reach throughout New England and beyond. The center’s is in the process of negotiating contracts with local hotels to provide special rates for people who come from out-of-town for treatment.
