I am looking for feedback on Tree of Life Health Practice from the physicians of the board and from anyone who may know something directly about it.
The information is for advice to be given a good friend who is “into” alternative medicine and wants my feedback on it. Clearly, some non-allopathic medical practices are effective and useful, and some are completely out of left field. The friend values my opinion, and I’m examining it from the standpoint of his wishes to be examined and have a dietary regimen recommended by an effective holistic medical institution.
I do not want facile “It’s new age hogwash” responses – I can see already that it’s pretty new-age-y, but I lack the familiarity with the interface between effective health and nutrition and Eastern/Jewish mystic religious practices to be able to say “This place is full of ___” or “If you’re looking for holistic medicine, it sounds like they actually know what they’re doing” as valid advice to him, given his inclinations. I’m inclined to the first, on cursory review, but would like some intelligent perspective from people who know something of the Ayurveda and Kabbalah disciplines (among others) which the group promotes.
A remarkable thing about the Tree of Life Foundation, and Gabriel Cousens, is that there doesn’t appear to be much of that sort of negative slamming. Searching on the two, along with terms like fraud, lawsuit, debunk, or skeptic is a disappointing use of time.
While I gave up on the new age vernacular too long ago to be able to really interpret it anymore, the absence of net based vitriol directed at the foundation suggests that it may in fact be the real deal.
I ask this in complete seriousness. If this friend wants to undergo a natural and spiritual health regimen, why don’t they come to you?
(Depending on how close the friend is and how much time and effort you invest, you may have to charge for this. The friend will still be saving money)
Seriously, you could prescribe a diet based on foods found in the Bible, meditations on various psalms, counseling to help the person rid themselves of hatred and anger etc.
I read a newspaper article (Daily Telegraph, yesterday) on a reporter who posed as a rich businessman who wanted to benefit from Kabbalah.
“Using a secret camera, cancer patient Tony Donnelly went inside the Kabbalah Centre in London to reveal an organisation that charges £860 for dinner, ‘healing’ water and some books in Aramaic.”
“her mother used to have cancer and she doesn’t have it any more… Because she drank the water”
"Shouster explained the importance of the Zohar books. No matter that they were written in Aramaic and, to me, indecipherable, I was told that I only had to run my fingers over the pages and scan the words for the “tools” to start working. "
I can’t say anything about the Tree of Life bunch but I have had several friends sign up for Ayurvedic treatments and “detoxification” regimes in India. So far, not one of them has been cured, or even helped, despite spending large amounts of money and time on this. Some of the folks are Indian and some were Western so belief doesn’t seem to make a difference. I won’t accuse Ayurvedic “medicine” of being New-Age as it is an extremely old system. Unfortunately, it is still “hogwash.”
In yesterday’s Tampa Tribune there was an article about Ayurvedic medicine. The Headline was Herbal Goods From India Show High Lead Levels. Some content:
“Researchers at Boston and Harvard universites have found herbal products from India have high levels of lead, mercury, and other heavy metals…”
“… a patient hospitalized with severe seizures… had a high level of lead in his blood… had been taking an ayurvedic product called guggulu.”
There really is no ‘alternative’ medicine. There is no ‘holistic’ medicine. There is only medicine which has been shown to be effective by evidence-based studies, and medicine which has not been shown to be effective by evidence-based studies. If you go with the former and avoid the latter, most likely you’ll be better off.
My (rather brief) scan of the site you cite indicates to me that what they are promoting falls into the latter category.
#1 The Kabbalah Centre is widely known as crock, and an organization designed to part fools from their money.
#2 I think you and others are misreading the OP. IMO Polycarp isn’t asking ‘Do the methods of this place have any documented benefit?’ or anything similar. He is asking ‘Do these people genuinely believe they are healing people and doing spiritual work? Or are they conmen soley out to gouge as much money from each person as possible?’
For example
Philadelphia has a few occult shops, and New Hope has a great many. Some of these shops are places owned and run by liars out to fleece believers. Others are staffed by people who genuinely believe that their products and methods work as advertised, that they are helping customers by selling these things, and are trying to help people while making a reasonable profit.
Not having waded through the whole Tree Of Life site, I get the feeling they want money.
Patients are encouraged to stay longer than they may feel is necessary.
If a patient sees no improvement in their condition or relapses, it is explained as ‘their body resisting the healing’
Patients are encouraged to continue to buy food, herbal suppliments, etc from the center in order to keep healthy.
Well, new-agey stuff makes me itch, but I’ll try not to scratch. I’ll just point out three obvious warning signs:
Homeopathy is mentioned in several places; if it’s true homeopathy, it can’t possibly work.
Medical astrology :rolleyes: well, you’ll have to make up your own mind on that.
The liver and gallbladder cleansing, using “lemon electrolyte drink” and olive oil, is a proven fraud – the ingredients have been shown to produce the “gallstones” without passing through a GI tract.
Doc.
I take your point that some of these guys are crooks while others are simply deluded but at the end of the day; what difference does it make? The stuff doesn’t work.
I’m not disagreeing with you, neither am I wanting to pump the claims of (so-called)‘alternative’ medicines or therapies.
However, I think (sorry, no cite) there is a possibility that ‘conventional’ (i.e. tried and tested, real medicine, when embedded in a framework of other therapies such as meditation, massage, counselling etc may be more effective than medicine alone in a more clinical framework - even if the only extra factors at work are the placebo effect and the patient’s general feeling of wellbeing and optimism. The conventional medical system is not necessarily always ideally adapted to provide this.
Polycarp I can’t be of any direct help with your question. IANAMedical Type, {though I used to be a food microbiologist (exploding marshmallows, yes, exploding body parts, no)}, but are you aware of this site?
I take your point that it is cheaper to go to an honest quack than a dishonest one. If the “health” problem is some kind of psychosomatic thing then there is a chance it will even work.
OTOH, this is one of my serious soapboxes. My wife has cancer. (Thymoma) So far she’s gone through 2 rounds of chemo, 3 surgeries, and enough radiation to kill a cockroach. Her next surgery is due in one month.
We are constantly getting offers from well-meaning but incredibly naive people offering us strange rocks, homeopathic remedies, “energy-based” healing, Chakra realignment, Reiki, and other useless items. What particularly pisses me off are the “true-believer” types that tell me that the radiation, chemo and surgery are all unnecessary or, worst case, the treatments have actually caused the recurrance of her cancer.
Most of them don’t talk to me, oh no. They get my wife off in a corner somewhere and talk about their great aunt Tilly or someone who was completely cured of damn near everything by this "wonderful new therapy from ancient India/China/Amazonian Indians or wherever. The next step is telling her that “guys like your husband have minds that are just too closed, too stuck in mundane reality, to benefit from these great ancient Indian healing methods.” As if age were some kind of guarantee of efficacy.
People say “It’s harmless, so what if someone drinks magic water or sleeps with some quartz crystals under their pillow?” It isn’t harmless. This bullshit has caused my wife and I some serious issues. As I said, she has her 4th surgery next month and is understandably less than eager. A treatment that promises to kill cancer without poisoning her or irradiating her or cutting her open is very attractive and it is becoming more difficult to keep her away from such things.
OK, I’ll put my hands up and step away from the soapbox now. “Alternative” medicine is just one of my hot buttons.
My thanks to all who have responded, and in particular QtM for his expertise and Mame for that link.
Testy, my wife’s and my prayers are with you and your wife, for what comfort that may be.
I think some of you are misconstruing QtM’s comment – there are a lot of bizarre programs out there. A few of them work; most of them don’t, or have merely “placebo-effect” results. What QtM was saying is, whatever can be proven by tests and medically-acceptable evidence to be effective is a good idea; the rest is not.
Take for example the folk remedy of foxglove tea for people with heart problems. You know what? – that one works – it’s a moderate dose of digitalis administered by consuming an infusion. Should not substitute for a cardiologist and probably ought to be consumed only as part of a regimen suggested by him or a dietitian he refers one to. But as part of such a regimen, it’s effective.
On the other hand, we could run this thread to great lengths with anecdotal accounts of quackery – copper bracelets, “healing crystals,” and so on. Testy’s comments are pretty much on target on these.
That’s what “evidence-based medicine” needs to be referencing (and my impression that QtM meant by it – not merely “Was it produced by Shambhala Health Foods or Glaxo Smith Kline?”
Thank you for your thoughts and prayers. It is very kind of you to take the trouble over someone you’ve never met.
My own read on QtM’s post was that there is **no such thing ** as “alternative” medicine. If something can be proven to work, it is then adopted by the medical community and ceases to be “alternative.” If something remains “alternative” then it either hasn’t been tested or was tested and failed.
That’s how I read it too, but I do think it would be true to say that the medical profession, in the mainstream, isn’t necessarily equipped or enabled to do touchy-feely ‘soft’ things, some of which may involve pandering to the individual religious/social preconceptions and prejudices of the patient.
For example, Prayer might not be demonstrable to work in double-blind trials, but in cases where the patient knows they are being prayed for, in the specific manner they believe to be effective, might actually help them, if for no other demonstrable reason than the morale boost and the placebo thing. I could quite understand if the medical profession decided not to arse about with such arcane and variable things, but that doesn’t make them utterly worthless to the individual patient.
I’m sure you’re correct about the medical wizards not being able to do the “touchy-feely” part of things. Some of the surgeons I’ve been dealing with are brusque to the point where it is simply hair-splitting not to just say “asshole.” They are good surgeons though, and that’s what I’m looking for.
As far as the prayer thing goes, my wife is religious and very much appreciates people praying for her. It makes her feel better. I’m not sure how this is different than someone telling the patient that they hope they get better or that they will come along when the treatment happens. Having a friend for moral support is a great idea and I believe it does make a difference to the patient’s outlook. I don’t think it has anything at all to do with their disease though.
And Polycarp, I do apologize for hijacking your thread. I’ll shut up now and let this go.
I suspect it does make a difference, to some individuals, some of the time - but that’s the whole point - it isn’t something that can be quantified in a way that many medical professionals are going to want to be bothered with.
Quite aside from the placebo effect, there may be other factors, such as a depressed or anxious patient being too preoccupied to take their medication at the right time and dose, or just moping around, which isn’t good for the circulation etc.
For your wife, praying is different from just wishing her well, because she thinks it is - this might not directly translate into any measurable physiological effects, but it could, as you say, effect her general outlook - which might in turn knock-on to her having a better appetite, going out for a walk in the nice sunshine, feeling positive the the medicine is going to work (and so placing a higher importance on observing the procedure of self-medicating)… and so on. None of this is technically impossible to achieve by other means, but some people have different buttons that need pressing in different ways to achieve a similar end result.
