http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2011/06/detoxifying_fashionably.php

Soo many alt meddies here, figured this forum needed some respectful insolence.



. . . .Continued, clicky link, unless you already know and have already stuck your fingers in your ears and placed your feet in the "detox footbath" of nonsense.

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2011/06/detoxifying_fashionably.php

So ... are the toxins from alien spacecraft? Government conspiracy planes? Infestation of lickable toads? or the the mutant "Mr. Stinky"?

All of the above, evil Mutant Lickable Toad Aliens from the shadow government flying on planes sending out stinky chemtrails.

The other side of the coin are the diseases actually caused by toxins. Smoking is bad for your health. Long (and not so long) exposure to chemicals such a xylene are very dangerous.

Quite right, and its telling that NCCAM, and CAM have nothing to offer the medical profession in regards to how to treat these physiologic conditions.

I don't know...

I'm big on body cleanses, clearing toxins out of the body. I started
7 years ago doing this. I lost over 50 pounds in 4 months and have kept it off with diet, exercise and the occasional cleanse.
I feel and look better at 50 than I did at 35.

In Utah where I was living, there were 'red' days...when the inversion was so bad in the valley that we were encouraged to not even go outside. Breathing in constant pollutants can't be good...and over time i believe can affect health.

Ask the people doing the cleansing what specific toxins are being "cleaned". See if they can articulate what it is specifically, and how the mechanism of the particular "therapy" goes about removing the toxins. Time and Time again, its nonsense used to remove money from your wallet with no real efficacy for treatment.

I don't doubt any of that for a minute....
I have had and continue to have positive experiences, so I'm just going on that.

Actually if you really want the info about the product i used i can get it....

People like to have simple models that explain their experiences; just because the model is wrong doesn't automatically mean the technique is useless. I've done a good deal of fasting in my life, and I'm very happy with the benefits. Fasting has helped me to make long-term beneficial changes in my diet, it has helped me to focus, it has improved my mood, it has even helped me to address long-standing issues with tension and stress. I'm definitely not saying these are automatic benefits of even a careless fast - if you go about it poorly you can have the opposite of all of those effects. I'm sure there are physical or psychological explanations for those benefits that don't require use to invoke the 'mysterious toxins' bogeyman.

Its obvious that some alt-health people have swallowed the toxin theory of disease without examining it, but insisting that the toxins are specified is hardly the measure of whether the theory is sound. I could claim that the toxins are heavy metals, or inhaled volatile organics from household products, are one of the hundreds of carcinogenic compounds produced when most any mix of long-chain hydrocarbon is heated high enough for long enough; lactic acid, CO2, urea and other substances could be said to be natural toxins within the body.

Many of the alt-health wingnuts get very specific and scientific in their claims of toxicity, and neatly dupe their unsuspecting mark into wrongly thinking that these potentially fatal toxins are a problem for them (when they aren't), and that their detox method would help them (when they wouldn't). So having a scientifically sound theory of toxins doesn't guarantee the alt-health wingnuts are selling something useful.

We agree. It is always interesting to ask them what toxins, it reveals if they even have an inkling what they are talking about, it reveals if they are really just scam artists.

Lactic acid(L-lactate) is a great example of a compound that is NOT toxic at the doses you would normally find in the body, and its a compound your body reuses, however how many alt med "remedies" claim to be beneficial by "helping" the body eliminate it!

I just cant find a use for 99% of alt med, too much pseudoscience, mystic, and faith healing boogedity boo to trust any of it, the parts that are legit are co-opted from science based medicine, ie they are not alt med to begin with but that does not stop the alt meddies to claim it as there own. The dichotomy created by the very definitions of alt med just scream of irrationality.

You just highlighted the fact I failed to keep in perspective: one can argue 'there is no such thing as a toxin'... or, 'the dose makes the poison'. Obviously, many substances that are beneficial at one concentration become harmful at another concentration. I only suspect lactic acid may be having a harmful effect on me immediately after extreme exercise - and then the effect is short lived. On a daily basis, I agree with you, lactic acid is not functioning as a toxin.



I have mixed feelings about this divide. It suggests that everything be categorized as either SBM or alt med - with all of alt med being baseless. It suggests that we should not only disregard the idiocy of homeopathy and similar practices, but to many this view suggests that we should only look to people formally schooled in SBM for health advice.

There are non-physicians who preach the benefits of eating 'healthy' and getting exercise, and there are physicians who recognize those benefits but don't bother preaching them (knowing most people will fail to make the lifestyle changes to reap those benefits). Someone might turn to a self-proclaimed "alt health practitioner" and make the very same changes that the SBM doctor would recognize as beneficial, and get scientifically validated health benefits from following the advice of the alt. health practitioner. I don't see how this is bad. Looking at the options we have in the world today, and the way people are often treated by doctors, I think this is necessary. You can say, categorically, that the 'alt health practitioner' isn't really practicing alt med... but the point is they are providing beneficial and medically valid advice, sometimes in more effective ways than doctors (and similarly trained SBM practitioners) do.

I have a friend who has struggled with a variety of issues that followed from excess marijuana use. Of all the people in her life, it was her homeopath who inspired her to quit smoking weed all the time. She is gradually getting better. The good news is she is actually making the changes she needs to make;her faith in her homeopath was helpful for this purpose.

The bad news is that she actually thinks the useless crap her homeopath is giving her is contributing to her improvement.

I do not consider nutritionist's Alt-Med. They practice science based medicine, just do not have an MD.

Well and as far as who provides motivation, I cannot see a good argument to support Alt-Med just becuase a person felt motivated by another person who practices magic water creation.

Many people get motivation from all kinds of people in there lives, being paid attention to, having someone care, the bottom line is that science is a standard that should be met before we fund medicine. That is not the same as getting good advice from a friend, or even paying someone to pay attention to you and give you a framework to change your life, still not medicine even if it involves health.

Medicine involves targeting therapies toward a physiological issue. I would not include motivation as a therapy even though it can have dramatic life changing results, I would not consider the kinds of advice the homeopath provided your friend as therapy. I am not against people setting up an acupuncture/counseling service on his own dime just like any other business. It is when we provide federal funding that it becomes a problem, or when these people claim health benefits that are deceptive.

That much is obvious. I'm not speaking of people who are actually nutritionists, but of people who offer nutritional advice (which might be only partly scientifically valid) that benefits people.



It seems to me that this is exactly because of the categorization scheme you are using. I'm not saying that 'being motivated' makes the whole of alt-med acceptable or palatable, I'm saying that your categorization scheme, if taken without examination by any reality-oriented person, might lead to an non-helpful wholesale rejection of (or hostility towards) all things associated with the label 'alt med'.



Absolutely! I completely agree.



Is the funding issue the main place that you are coming from in this conversation? I'm not clear on why you are emphasizing this definition of medicine, unless its to wisely discriminate between 'those approaches that are worthy of tax-supported research' and 'those approaches which are not'. It sounds at time like you believe that approach (or person or modality or business or..) which fails to meet this definition of medicine is completely unworthy of being used to treat a health issue.




Would cutting salt out of the diet of a person with high BP count as a therapy? Would taking aspirin every day count as a therapy? Are there any individual science-informed deliberate actions intended to address a physiological issues that would count as a therapy?

Of course 'motivation' isn't a therapy. I submit 'quitting marijuana' to address mood issues to be as much a 'therapy' as taking aspirin to address a blood clotting issue.



This raises other issues... I believe people ought to be honest in their business practices, I'm somewhat against many specific manifestations of these kinds of services. They often overstate their efficacy and deliberately mislead their customers.



Oh, you already addressed that point. We agree.

There are anti-nutrients in many of the foods you eat, those are toxins that need to be flushed from your body.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antinutrient

UPDATE: I'm not giving any credence to the whole toxin flushing movement. I'm just saying that there are toxins that we consume and that they need to be flushed from your system (which would happen through drinking water and eating foods low or lacking toxins).

NCCAM and CAM offer a place in the professional national funded research space for pseudo-scientific pursuits. It makes official these modalities which offer no efficacy as treatments.

Your examples frankly are not representative of what I am talking about and really should not be considered alternative.

I don't disagree at all, and want to add that I think these anti-nutrients have their impact within the intestines. Like you say, being hydrated and eating other foods leads to them being pooped out.

True, and I agree this is a problem.



I see that my examples are not reflective of the problem stated above, but I believe these examples illustrate what can get caught in the cross-fire when we say "CAM is, by definition, useless. By definition, only SBM is effective".

There is no 'flushing' technique and detox is exactly as the OP stated - a myth.

Ben Macintyre puts this nicely to rest in his book Bad Science.

However, a good diet, as close as possible to the neolithic with lots of hydration and no real vices will indeed make you look younger and live longer. There is also evidence to suggest calorie restriction / semi-starvation can add up to 11 years to the life of an average adult.

Both of which detox regimes take advantage of with their claims.

Good point, and this is exactly what I mean when I say that CAM tends to co-opt science based medicine.

The discoveries that calorie restriction is strongly correlated to longer life: science, good nutrition: science. Science uncovers it and charlatans use that whole cloth as there own, and then point out bad greedy doctors as the representatives of "western" medicine which anyone with any knowledge knows is a false representation.

I pretty much agree with with both of you. Zen, when you say there is no flushing technique and detox is a myth, I take the context for your statements as: wrt the myriad of flushes and detox methods advocated by the CAM community.

This does not validate the claims made by the pro 'detox' crowd, but there are situations in which a person is being adversely effected by a toxic substance (such as a heavy metal), and benefits from using a detoxifying therapy. This is one of the few situations in which chelation therapy is useful. Sadly the hippie detox crowd pushes for chelation therapy is situations where it doesn't apply.