Don't mean to start this thread to bash holistic healing or anything, I'm just rather curious about it and wanted to hear peoples stories and experiences with different types. I have a cousin who started working at a spa a few years ago, where they offer BEST (Bio Energetic Synchronization Technique) healing. To describe it in simplest terms, it's a non-forceful way to re-balance your bodies energy so that it can heal itself. She get's it done very regularly and now she swears by it. As of lately she has been pressuring me to try it for my arthritis and other social issues, and she swears it will heal everything. She's told me its healed arthritis for some of her older clients and I just don't see / understand how it works. It all just seems far too crazy / unrealistic. To make it even more difficult, she swears its super effective and to go read reviews and such, but the only patient reviews are from the website for the doctor / person who created the technique. There just isn't a lot of information about it available except for on their website. At this point, I feel like she's brainwashed as her whole life revolves around BEST and how it's helped her. Every conversation with her turns into BEST and how it can help people and how she now has a "higher sense of thinking". I'm all for natural remedies but some of the holistic healing techniques just seem to be too far fetched, so just very curious about any experiences and opinions about it all.
It is. What a surprise! Because it's a load of tripe. You've heard of how cults take people's money, right?
CULT! That is a great way to describe her behaviour / attitude towards it. She swears its helped her entire family who have gone for sessions. The other day we were at the store and I was asking about body wash since she works at a spa and would be more knowledgeable, and she started doing weird hand gestures to "test the energy and see if the soap was good for me". I usually just ignore what she says but it's gotten ridiculous.
Sometimes people just want to feel cared for. They feel crap, and then someone gives them comfort, safety, makes them feel special and valued, and lo, they feel better. It is the cornerstone of medicine in all cultures, throughout human history, from shamanic witch doctor rituals right to good bedside manner in Western medicine. Holistic therapies fulfill psychological needs. They make people feel whole. As a consequence, they are also used to fill psychological holes. That does not invalidate them, but they should be recognised for what they are. Aromatherapy is not going to cure your cancer. But it sure makes the chemotherapy more bearable.
So what does this do for people who are critical thinkers? You should get her into Apple products, at least that's slightly more bearable, she'd be getting something that works and does something. I know Nexxo might just on me for that comment, but I think too much emphasis can be placed on these treatments sometimes.
They recogise it for what it is. I have aromatherapy massages. It's a great stress relief and I feel relaxed after. But I don't accord it any special healing powers beyond that. I agree that they often get overinflated. But then again, I find that hypnotherapy works better when I present it with a bit of mystique. What can I say? People need magic in their lives. They need magic wands.
I get massages, but not aromatherapy ones. They really do help me to relax, especially if I'm not sleeping. How does hypnotherapy work exactly?
What can I say? I like the smelly stuff. It is basically autosuggestion while being in a state of relaxed, focused concentration.
Nope. Like most things, you have to believe that it will. Depends on what you expect it to do. Remember placebo and nocebo effects? These are a real problem for medicine. For instance, in 30% of cases antidepressants work only because people believe that they do. But the same goes for medication for hard physical conditions. Surgery may result in improvement of symptoms even when it did not actually change anything. People may feel ill just because they think they were exposed to something noxious. Placebo effects even work when people are not consciously aware of their expectations. What is more, placebo effects are becoming more powerful every year. As medicine appears more powerful and sophisticated in people's minds, so do placebo effects become more pronounced. So if people believe that alternative medicine will make them feel better, and it does, is it still bogus? It's shamanism, sure, but shamanism works --for a given value of "works". BTW I love Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency.
I think there's a few interesting things here, the main one being, who profits from the placebo effect? That is the fundamental problem I have with it. There are thousands of snake oils, many of which are multi-level-marketed (aka nearly pyramid schemed), and whilst the patient may feel better, one cannot deny that someone else is profiting from a lie. That "success" story then turns into a multi national business, rises in price, and a market for something is made where there genuinely shouldn't be one. It's quite clearly the same as false advertising. I don't care if it makes people feel better, profiting from it is outright unethical, and in my view, totally and utterly morally abhorrent. If placebo is going to be used as a legitimate treatment, it should be done only under the control of a trained medical professional who understands what they are trying to achieve and the implications of doing so. Genuine placebo is not an alternative medicine. Telling someone to drink aloe vera sap for £3 a pop on the basis that it might improve knee joint pain is alternative, and ********, medicine. ps. If you didn't realise, I feel very, very strongly about this.
I agree that it is basically a valid and informed consent issue. If (say) aromatherapy is sold as delivering an experience of comfort and stress relief, then that's cool; experiences are subjective so YMMV. If it is sold as something that cures or prevents physical illness, then that's an objective claim and it better bring some hard evidence to the table, else you're being lied to. Holistic/homeopathic/snake oil/shamanistic/faith healing is subject to the same rules, IMO. That doesn't invalidate them if the subjective experience is valued (we all like to feel comforted, cared for, relaxed, valued etc. It's why we pay so much for luxury products we don't need as such and and first class travel even when economy class gets us to our destination in the end). But if they make objective claims, especially ones relating to life and death, they better have some really objective proof for those claims. Placebo effects are subjective experiences. If someone promises that remedy X relieves my pain and it does, then I'm not too fussed about how it did that. after all we don't know how aspirin works either. But no cancer was ever cured because a patient expected it to be. However if, hypothetically speaking, cancer could actually be cured by tricking people into believing that they will get better, then that's fine with me. This may seem a shocking statement, but most patients don't actually know how chemotherapy or radiotherapy works either. They kind of accept it on faith: because the guy in the white coat who looks competent and caring tells them it will work (probably). And interestingly, when the doctor doesn't appear caring and competent, patients have a much harder time with the treatment. Another wrinkle is the psychological stress-immune system feedback loop. Research in 2009 showed that women who suffer from clinical depression post breast cancer are significantly more likely to suffer a recurrence of the disease. Those who have incurable breast cancer also have a shorter life expectancy when depressed. Even treatments that make you feel subjectively better can really save your life.
What's even more surprising (or depressing depending on your point of view) is how little of "mainstream" medicineis actually evidence based. Many therapies are based not on rigorous clinical trials, but rather on one or two small studies that are often statiscially insignificant. You want an example? Look at CPR standards. When I started in emergency medicine we were trained to do 5 compressions for every breath. The average person's pulse is about 60 and they breathe 12 times a minute, so it makes sense, right? It's only been in the last 10 years that anyone actually studied CPR outcomes and discovered that people who got 5:1 CPR did no better than people who got no CPR. Then they tried 15:2 and that was better. Now the standard is 30:2 because it turns out that it takes 30 compressions to make up for the perfusion you lose when you stop to ventilate. It's not any better in most things. Most people who go to the ER for abdominal pain leave with a diagnosis of Abdominal pain (unknown cause) and a prescription for pain pills. You remember the recent thread on anti-depressants? If you go see your doctor for depression they won't check your serum serotonin level or other physical indicators, or look at possible organic causes such as thyroid function. Instead they will prescribe whatever anti-depresxant they feel works best. If things don't improve in a couple of months they'll try something else until they get lucky. Much of medicine is a process of throwing things at the patient until they either get better or die. If they do get better you still don't know if it was because of the treatment or because they just got better.
My eyes almost inevitably start rolling when I hear the word energy in a medical or healing context. Science based medicine is far from perfect but it's the best we've got and my guess is that it does improve over time. I have very little respect for alternative healers. Mostly because of the utter nonsense that forms the basis of the therapy. The effectiveness of placebos are undeniable however. Which can be good. Placebos are bad when used on cancer or clinical infections diabetes etc. Which are situations which can occur when too much faith is put in alternative medicine. So I guess if someone wants to go for a big old placebo they should do it along side the science based medicine. I suppose if either one of them works then great.
I was more interested in hearing some people who had positive experiences, but I assumed most people would say its all a bunch of crap (which I'd agree with).
