I’ve been lurking a while now, but what I came across today inspired me to sign up…
So its ‘Health and Safety Week’ in my office, and apparently, across Europe. To promote this, our company is paying for a bunch of alternative health therapies during office hours.
One of these is a ‘non-invasive allergy test’. You go into a room, and sit down with the therapist who asks you to hold a metal pipe (connected to a fancy machine) in one hand. Then, the therapist places various phials in the machine, which contain the types of things you could be allergic to (lactose/milk, dust mites, etc). Once a phial is inserted, the therapist touches your other hand with a metal rod, and interprets the movement of a voltmeter type needle.
Now, this is a second hand account from my colleague, but it seems pretty accurate going on the website of the company that came in (http://www.allergytest.co.uk/). He seemed quite convinced that it was all above board, but surely, surely it’s bunk.
Their machine appears to be measuring the combined resistively of both the ’patient’ and whatever happens to be in the phial. I’m no scientist, but I’m pretty sure the electrical signal that the machine is detecting isn’t ‘flavoured’ with whatever happens to be in the phial.
That said, I’m willing to accept that I could be wrong, however the only sites on the internet that mention the machine they use (Bio-Electronic Regulatory Medicine, RM10S) are similar alternative medicine sites.
So has anyone come across these methods before? And does anyone know of any evidence relating to the validity of this method?
This device is yet another of the galvanometer quackery series. See QuackWatch for more details.
The only thing that this allergy-meter could feasibly measure is how nervous you get when told that a certain substance is close to you. (Galvanic response changes with perspiration.)
Your link claims that everything from headaches to asthma to stomach upset is caused by allergies. Then they use acupressure theory to measure a person’s electrical resistance-- and ostensibly their allergy-- to certain substances.
I’m guessing every single test case demonstrates some allergy and some symtom to go with it.
Here’s a pretty good article about testing for allergens: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/111/6/S2/1672
"Food allergy affects 2% of the general US population, and its prevalence seems to be increasing. Despite the potential for a fatal outcome, no definitive therapies are available for food allergy. This article reviews novel approaches for the diagnosis and treatment of food allergy. Improved diagnostic methods include more precise in vitro and in vivo tests for immunoglobulin E-mediated food allergies, in vitro assays for predicting development of oral tolerance, *and novel noninvasive tests for cell-mediated food allergies such as patch testing, cytokine assays, and detection of eosinophil activation markers. * Several promising novel immunomodulatory approaches to food allergy are discussed, including monoclonal anti-immunoglobulin E; probiotics; traditional Chinese medicine; and immunotherapy with modified food proteins, peptides, bacterial adjuvants, and immunostimulatory sequences. " (italics mine)
"Purpose of review: Alternative and complementary medicine approaches to allergic disorders are commonly used by patients. Not all have been subjected to experimental analysis to support or refute their validity in the armamentarium of a practitioner. This review covers some of the most common unproved alternative or complementary approaches to diagnosis and therapy that we see in use by patients. These include the use of specific IgG to foods accompanied by rotary diets, provocation-neutralization testing and therapy, applied kinesiology followed by acupressure or acupuncture, and changes in cell size upon in-vitro exposure of leukocytes to food extract (using automated assays going under various trade names) followed by elimination diets or rotary diets.
Recent findings: There continues to be a dearth of well performed studies investigating these approaches in the literature, but many testimonials have been posted on websites of practitioners using these methods attesting to their effectiveness. Several recent studies have refuted the use of applied kinesiology and provocation-neutralization in diagnosis. The placebo effect must not be overlooked as a potentially important factor in some approaches.
Summary: There have been no studies supporting the use of these techniques, and several have refuted their utility. A beneficial placebo effect may be responsible for the perceived clinical effectiveness in many cases of food intolerance."
But this appears to be the final nail in the coffin: http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/links/doi/10.1046/j.1365-2222.2002.01398.x/abs/
"BackgroundMany unconventional diagnostic procedures based on bioelectrical skin responses are presently widely used for allergic diseases, but rigorous experimental evaluations of their accuracy are still lacking.
AimWe assessed whether an electrodermal device can correctly diagnose respiratory allergy.
MethodsThe diagnostic accuracy of the electrodermal device was assessed in double-blind fashion in 72 allergic patients and 28 healthy volunteers. A random sequence of substances in sealed vials, including histamine, allergens, immunoglobulins at various dilutions and physiological saline, were tested in duplicate in each subject.
Results A wide variability of the measurements was found in most patients irrespective of their allergy status and of the substance tested. Allergic patients showed more negative skin electrical response at the second trial, compared to normal controls, independent of the tested substance. No significant difference in skin electrical response between allergens and negative controls could be detected.
Conclusion We conclude that the studied bioelectrical method, under blind testing, cannot correctly detect respiratory allergy." (italics mine)
Please feel free to pass on my research to your employers.
