Newsweek slam Oprah for pushing quackery

Tigana, I said it, not Sineed.  :)

 

Sineed]</p> <p>Um everybody in the business knows methadone was invented by the Nazis.</p> <p>[quote wrote:

Heroin and some other drug addictions can be quickly, inexpensively ended with intravenous (IV) Vitamin C - and IV Vit C also gets rid of Hepatitis.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB5TsbtchT4&feature=player_embedded

So, Sineed, you have the facts; what are you going to do?

On a completely personal note. I have rheumatoid arthritis and hypertension: scratch that, I HAD both of those. My last trip to the doctor (and thats a chore here in AB) I was told that the celebrex would have to be switched up to something stronger for the RA and that I would need to wait to see the specialist. My BP was taken and my prescription renewed - incorrectly as it turned out - good thing it was caught by the pharmacist who expressed surprised at how much stronger my dosage had become. When I saw the specialist he told me my next step would be methotrexate (sp?) and I went home in tears. I was 45 going on 70. So I did what I should have done years ago. I switched to a completely vegan diet, no meat no dairy no eggs. I dumped the wheat products and only infrequently have sprouted grains bread or wraps. Fish is my once a month treat. That was in March. Today I have no RA symptoms, none at all. I have been gardening like I used to do five years ago, walking the dogs and loving the action. My BP is 117/75 and I have lost almost 15 pounds without ever feeling hungry. My doctors didn't recommend this. I found this out by google and gossip, and decided to try it out of sheer desperation. I wish it had been presented to me five years ago as an option, instead of vioxx and diovan.

Sineed wrote:

...

The reason there's all this nonsense infesting the interweb is because there's a lot we we haven't figured out yet.  And then there's the people who know even less, but basically exploit this collective ignorance in order to promote themselves as courageous mavericks, or maybe to make some money by selling "alternative" treatments.

 

What nonsense?  Who hasn't figured it out yet?  The collective we?  Scientists?  Doctors?

I have figured it out and I understand now that that is what each of us must do.  We are unique, we do have different tolerances, we need to learn to listen to our bodies and respect what they communicate to us, if we do that our bodies will respond positively but our body does have limits and if you go too far it may not be possible to come back.  I suppose this is where the snake oil comes in.

Sure they are out there but small time compared to the companies selling anti-depressants which if you want to talk snake oil.....LOL  I read a story about one of the anti-depressants they came up with first and then designed a marketing campaign and people bought it,  went to their doctors and said please, please give me some of this drug, I have heard it will help my whatever and when they decided they maybe didn't want to take it anymore found that they had such severe reactions that they couldn'tstop taking it or that it was very difficult.  My mother says she knew eight people taking anti-depressants and they all committed suicide.

What is wrong that people are constantly seeking some drug to numb them out?  Could it be that people are genuinely ill in some way and it is expressed through this inability to wake up, to take responsibllity?  Could it be that this greed is mis-directed hunger, that truly people are starving?

Tigana, thank you for all the links.  Wow.  I am bookmarking this thread.  :)

Polly B you just made my day, :) I have big smile right now and I am so happy for you.  Yes, yes, yes.

I too spent many hours on the net researching and connecting with others who were struggling as I was and it was through doing so that I found Elaine Gottschall's site and a diet that I could adapt that actually worked for me.  I eat well, I eat lots, I eat incredibly delicious food and I never count calories.  lol 

Doctors are simply not trained to understand nutrition.

I consider myself fortunate that my symptoms manifested in my digestion, it was obvious diet was an issue for me but for many others like you Polly B the symptoms manifest in other ways and it is not so easy to make the connections.  Congratulations to you for figuring it out.

Thanks....I only wish I had taken matters into my own hands much sooner.  I like my doctor, he is a kind and caring man and very intelligent.  But he sees 30 people a day, and is so busy that there is a sign in the waiting room requesting patients to keep visits short and please limit issues to one per visit.  Ha.  I can't name an illness that manifests itself in only one issue - how can you treat anyone that way?

I was blindly doing what he said, having been assured that my fifteen minutes every four months was ample time for him to diagnose my problems and decide what my best course of action would be.  Until he inadvertently double the dosage on my diovan, and I thought to look up what might have happened had I taken them.  (!) 

I don't think the doctors have it wrong necessarily, but the system is whacky.  We need to concentrate on building the healthy body, instead of waiting until disease sets in and then trying to end-run it.  It should be mandatory learning in school, we should be taxing the beejeesus out of junk food and offering healthy alternatives at prices that won't break you.  We could do a lot of this with the money saved from not having to treat the sick, the obese, the hypertensive, the heart attacks, the strokes, the arthritic....

Aint nobody can preach like the recently converted. 

The bonus is that I feel good now.  Really good.  I haven't woke up feeling GOOD for a long long time.  I eat a ton of food, complex carbs and fresh fruit and veggies, I sleep better and have more energy.  My mood has improved.  I spend waaaaayyyyyyyyy less time at my desk which is partly why I haven't been around here lately. 

I just wish I had found it sooner.

 

 

 

As I suggested earlier, their are risks to taking any body/mind affecting agents, particularly powerful hormones (I prefer not to address Somers' particular case as haven't read her--see my first post).  

Trevormkidd wrote:

contrarianna wrote:

One could flippantly say that 500 millions years of evolution would have made human hormones fairly well tested

We are talking about elevating - in many cases significantly - the levels of hormones above what evolution and our DNA has programmed.....

 In addition to the systemic process of evolutionary development,  the action of endogenous/bioidentical hormones within the body have been studied a great deal over many years (long  before modern therapies) and the action of endogenous/bioidentical hormones and their metabolites are better known than the interactions of the patent drugs.

On evolution, perhaps we can just agree that any hormone therapy artificially intervenes with the evolutionarily programmed decline of hormone levels in the individual--
Whether any hormones should be taken should be left up to individual-- preferably after plenty of personal research.
 

Trevormkidd wrote:

Also, people are generally only "replacing" one or two hormones out of a couple dozen. That leaves the bodies balance of hormones extremely out of wack from what it was evolved to be....

I'm glad you replaced your earlier "hundreds" of hormones with "a couple of dozen"; and though you are essentially correct, the metabolites of  even the "one or two" hormones frequently end up as other active hormones. But agreed, the whole is very complex, and always needs more study --and careful monitoring and self-monitoring if someone is getting hormone replacement.  For those interested in a glimpse at the steroidal  hormone (including sex hormones) conversions in the body  (sometimes referred to as the hormone "cascade") here is a diagram: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Steroidogenesis.svg

Trevormkidd wrote:

Testosterone is a class IV in Canada - get caught trying to buy it and there is a good chance you will go to jail.  Get caught trying to sell it and you will definately go to jail.  Now, like bioidenticals, I don't think testosterone should be illegal (and only testosterone is illegal).

I think you mean Schedule IV, not Class IV, but, yeah, if you sell T on the black market it is treated as the equivalent of peddling a performance enhancing anabolic steroid (which in substantial doses it is)--and you could go to jail.
However, personal possession is not illegal, and it is extremely commonly prescribed in hormone replacement regimes for both men and women in Canada--just like other HRT or BHRT hormones.   

----
In response to the main part of your post.
Even on the face of it, the claim that bioidentical hormones carry the "same risks" or severity of risks as the more commonly prescribed non-human replacements is grossly unscientific (quackery if you will, regardless of who utters it).
Think about it.
There is ZERO justification to extrapolate that chemically different agents--(even if they act on a same receptor) behave the same in the body when it is well established they often metabolize very differently (much drug testing would be unnecessary if that absurd equivalence-thinking was instituted generally).

When you say you "can't find a single high level medical organization or journal" that favors Bioidentical HRT, I take your word that you are probably correct for the organizations (I won't blather on right now about financial dependency of organizations like ACOG on big pharma  but it is usually the case).
Your journal claim is a little more puzzling because journals, as entities, seldom come out with endorsements of particular protocols.
 If, however, you are referring to journal articles which suggest differences between HRT and BHRT that  favour  bioidentical there is considerable evidence, as a search of Medline would reveal.    

As a shortcut I'd refer you to this survey of the literature paper which gives 196 references in its bibliography, many from "high level" journals:
 

Quote:

 
Postgraduate Medicine: Volume 121: No.1
The Bioidentical Hormone Debate:
Are Bioidentical Hormones (Estradiol, Estriol, and Progesterone) Safer or More Efficacious than Commonly Used Synthetic Versions in Hormone Replacement Therapy?
Kent Holtorf, MD
......
CONCLUSION: Physiological data and clinical outcomes demonstrate that bioidentical hormones are associated with lower risks, including the risk of breast cancer and cardiovascular disease, and are more efficacious than their synthetic and animal-derived counterparts. Until evidence is found to the contrary, bioidentical hormones remain the preferred method of HRT. Further randomized controlled trials are needed to delineate these differences more clearly."

http://www.postgradmed.com/index.php?free=pgm_01_2009?article=1949&ex=1949
The PDF of the paper
is here:
http://www.holtorfmed.com/wp-content/pdfs/BHRT-PGM-2009.pdf

Now, as you may point out that Holtorf has his own medical clinic which, among other things, treats with bioidenticals. Yet his conclusions in the peer-reviewed journal are backed up by plenty of peer-reviewed literature. The same cannot be said of the opposition which bizarrely claims their is "no data" or "no expected difference" to support the superiority of  bioidenticals).

Among the most impressive studies for me (mentioned in the article in my first post) is the large French gov funded epidemiological study which demonstrated the superiority of progesterone over progestins in protecting  against breast cancer:

"Unequal risks for breast cancer associated with different hormone replacement therapies: results from the E3N cohort study.
Agnès Fournier,1 Franco Berrino,2 and Françoise Clavel-Chapelon1*
Breast Cancer Res Treat. 2008 January; 107(1): 103–111.

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2211383

For a lay persons summary:
http://www.virginiahopkinstestkits.com/bioidenticalbreastcancer.html
 
----
There are at least  2 common ways in which "serious" websites and some journals perpetuate the "same risks" mythology and dogma.

1) Confusion of terms: as deliberate obfuscation,  inconsistent conventional usage, or ignorance. Names of very different hormones and drugs are used interchangeably. Eg methoprogesterone acetate (Provera) often refered to as "progesterone" or "progesterone therapy" add into that mix the terms "progestins" and " progestogen" both which have specific meanings but are often slung around inconsistently (not terribly scientific, that).

2)As alluded to before, studies which purport to compare bioidentical hormones with patented synthetics and  use " insufficient evidence" to reach a conclusion.
In this case, drawing a conclusion of equivalence of effects on the basis of insufficient data is hardly a model of the scientific method.

Have a look at this article:

 On the bases of "inadequate evidence" the article states :"Natural hormones, including estradiol, estriol, estrone, and progesterone, can be expected to have the same adverse event profile as conventional menopausal hormone regimens."

Combine this with what sounds to me loaded phrasing in the article "bioidentical is a pseudoscientific neologism" and what sounds like the same strawman "gotcha" revelation as appeared in the the OP article (eg  the fake revelation that "bioidenticals are synthesized" gasp!-see my first post) as if something is being slipped past them.
.

J Gen Intern Med. 2007 July; 22(7): 1030–1034.
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2219716

a lot of the stuff sounds weird man all the hormones I wouldnt trust that. N shit she either brave or stupid cuz aint NO needle going near my dicc lol

For a critical review of one of Somers' books by Holtorf (whose clinic prescribes bioidenticals), see:

http://www.holtorfmed.com/topics/bioidentical-estrogen-progesterone/revi...

Essentially, he praises the book for bringing bioidenticals to light but has some serious reservations about the safety of particular uses touted.
For example:

Quote:

1. The recommendation that oral estradiol be used.

    * Oral estradiol is superior to Premarin and other synthetic oral estrogens, but when given orally it also increases the risk of stroke, heart attack and DVT when compared to transdermal (gel) estrogen.
    * When any estrogen is given orally, it goes through the liver and stimulates binding proteins for thyroid, testosterone, adrenal hormones and growth hormone, lowering these hormones with potentially detrimental effects. This does not occur with transdermal preparations.
    * Oral estradiol will increase inflammation, including CRP, which increased the risk of heart disease. This does not occur with transdermal preparations.
    * When oral estrogen is given, it is first metabolized by the liver (called 1st pass metabolism) which breakdowns the estrogen to unwanted metabolites (you don’t get what you give)
    * Oral estrogen increases insulin resistance while transderamal does not....

Whatever ones opinion, this review illustrates several things:

Simply because a a treament regime uses bioidenticals does not mean it is automatically:
A)optimal or
b)a treatment recomended by any consensus of bioidentical prescribing doctors
c) safe 
======

Note to Sineed:
Climacteron (Testosterone-Estriodal injectable) is not something I was aware of for BHRT (but then I'm not a doctor).

Though I am definitely not making any recommendation to you, more familiar for BHRT is testosterone administered transdermally (ie. creams, gels, patches)  --prescribed by (many, but not all) doctors and filled through compounding pharmacies.

Thanks to tigna for the graphs showing the unmatched pharma profit margins.

A bizzare illustration of the way money and power can appear to influence not only hormone debate and prescribing habits,but also the availability of hormone choice for women, was Wyeth's "citizens petition" to the FDA. The result was the banning of estriol in the US in 2008.

Quote:

The FDA claims that it is taking estriol off the market because it is not a component of any FDA approved drug, despite the fact that the hormone has been used for decades without problems. Estriol has a long standing United States Pharmacopoeia monograph, an accepted standard for drug ingredients absent significant health risks. Other common drugs that are not components of FDA approved drugs include aspirin.
....
The citizen petition filed by Wyeth with the FDA requested that estriol be removed from the market, along with other requests to remove customized medications that compete with their flawed products. The petition created a tremendous backlash from women, doctors and pharmacists. Over 77,000 comments, a near record, were filed with the FDA in response to the petition, all but a handful opposing Wyeth's request.

http://www.elixirnews.com/newsView.php?id=1252&catID=11

It's intersting that the maker of Prempro (which was used in the abruptly halted Womens Health Initiative study--but is still frequently prescribed) targeted the bioidentical estogen that seems to be the best protection against breast cancer and has been safely used for years. For that position see Holtorf's survey of the medical literature:
http://www.holtorfmed.com/wp-content/pdfs/BHRT-PGM-2009.pdf

Even more bizzare, human identical estriol was actually sold by Wyeth in Europe in 2 products at the same time as it launched its petion to the FDA :

Wyeth on Estriol:
“The ideal therapy””
- German ad for estriol-based
Wyeth drug

“A serious threat to public health”
- Citizen Petition to FDA to get estriol banned in the US.

http://www.iacprx.org/site/DocServer/PharmasCampaignAgainstBHRT-_updated...

In Canada, women can still be prescribed estriol (usually as bi-est or tri-est from compounding pharmacies.) But the pharma lobby never sleeps and its close association with the government means constant vigilence to preserve choice.
http://www.harperindex.ca/ViewArticle.cfm?Ref=00152