I didn’t understand why it was called homeopathic, either, considering my understanding of what that is supposed to mean. But that is what it is called on the label…as opposed to Satan’s Nasal Goo, which would be my preferred name for it.
I never thought I’d see the day when I’d cherish the truly nauseating stench of flytraps…but I did.
And my darling 'luc… I get all fired up each and every day, and frequently I get the urge to dash over here and take up arms. But then I think: to what purpose? Anyone left who’ll argue anything is… well, they moved this to MPSIMS, so I must show restraint. But seriously, life is way too short. Better I should do something productive.
I do drop in to cheer you on silently, however, never fear.
(ALSO: I got a literary agent and I’m supposed to be putting together a book proposal right now, along with some other writing projects. It would be just wrong for me to blow much of my writing energy having pointless debates around here, ya know?)
And thanks to all on your good wishes for my recovery. I’m almost completely back to normal. Scariest bullet I ever dodged.
I have an ex-boyfriend whose mother is into the idea that science and medicine are ‘full of shit’ and that doctors don’t know anything about what causes disease and how to fix it. She once shit a brick because I wanted to take an aspirin for a headache instead of letting her put a pendulum over a book and figure out what was wrong with me.
This is the same woman who wanted to give me, a person with a severely hyperactive immune system and an inability to take steroids if I happen to have a severe allergic reaction, a bunch of herbs I’ve never touched before. She was insulted when I passed on it. Of course, I can no longer ask her if she’s ever heard of this shit, because I don’t date him anymore. I avoided it at the time because it just seemed like such total bullshit to me that I knew it’d cause an argument. I kinda wonder if she still walks around with her little 9-Volt battery pack getting ‘recharged’.
I had one major discussion with her around the time she found out that I had SLE. The general idea of it was that she was astonished that I had actually gone to doctors, been in various departments of the hospital, had a whole lot of tests and poking and prodding in order to find out that I had SLE. Her remarks were to the effect that she did not understand why I would want to deal with those ‘know-it-all quacks who think they’re god’. My response was that they know more than how to hold a magic crystal over a book.
That’s interesting. Either we have the homeopaths trying to gain reputability for their “science” by associating it with herbal remedies that have an actual chance of being effective, or it might actually be possibly effective herbal remedies using the name of ineffective snake oil for marketing purposes.
Or it could be just plain sloppiness, I suppose. If they’re that lax about the science of it, I guess it’s too much to expect them to be consistant about labels.
The stuff I used for pain relief may have been an herbal remedy. But the allergy stuff was deffinately homeopathic. One of the ingredients was ragweed. It made my nose itch for a few minutes, then no more itchy nose or other symptoms for several hours.
I agree that placebos can have a strong effect. A doctor gives you a pill and says “this will cure what ails you”. That’s all it takes, “the doctor said so”. But, some people aren’t as easily convinced. I’m currently on 3 perscriptions for 2 conditions. For one of the conditions, it took my doctor 4 years to find the two pills that worked. I wasn’t willing to settle for “kind of” working or side effects that were worse than the condition itself. For the other condition, my doctor is still trying to find a better remedy. I’ll let him run his tests, and try to figure out the problem. But, if nothing works, I’m going to look for an alternative. It doesn’t make since to give up.
Just want to add my own comments and anecdotal accounts to the thread because I’ve been very interested in zinc as treatment for colds for a few years. I have used zicam more than a few times in the past for colds and, after reading this thread, well that’s the end of that.
But usually I just use zicam as a supplement to Cold-Eeze (zinc losenges). I was very excited when I first read about some pro-zinc studies about 5 years ago and since then have immediately saturated myself with zinc every time I’ve felt the first signs of a cold. And in these 5 years my colds have undoubtedly been far less severe than any before I started taking the zinc. I mean, the results have been even more dramatic than the studies even indicate.
I should probably avoid these discussions and just about any info from anywhere on the subject because if it is just a placebo at work, I got a good thing going. But my passionate desire for info and truth will undoubtedly be my undoing, because I’ve read Cecil’s take on it, as well as the skeptical comments of doctors in various threads here and elsewhere, all who seem to lean towards a placebo explanation.
Anyway, every time I see a thread about zinc I rush in with the hope that some new definitive study or new info will present itself. I am truly my own worst enemy, no?
They call it “homeopathic” to take advantage of a loophole in FDA regs & laws. They haven’t done the requisite research into its efficacy and side effects, so they can’t market it as a cure for the common cold. Blame a few congresscritters (I’m not sure which specific ones to blame, but Congress put the loopholes there to placate the “natural health practitioner” lobby).
Actual homeopathic medicine is bunk, but mostly harmless bunk (placebos won’t do any actual harm, other than keeping sick people from seeking effective medical care). This stuff, and other “natural/herbal” products, have the potential to cause harm that hasn’t been studied in a scientific manner.
So, although you’ve had good results, you’re willing to ignore those results because someone who is not your doctor and has never diagnosed your symptoms, says that it’s bullshit?
I’ve never been impressed with all this zinc business myself. But if it works for you, that’s what you need to continue doing, just not in your nose.
Glad to hear the ol’ schnoz is back in the saddle. I inexplicably lost my sense of taste, almost completely, for about six months or so few years back, and I’m here to tell you that it was not pleasant. Colds just simply aren’t so bad that I would risk permanent damage. Thanks for the heads up.
Can anyone provide me with a link detailing the dangers of Zicam? All I can find are sites run by personal injury lawyers, and I’d like to find something totally reliable and respectable so I can get my family to stop using the stuff.
This was in James Randi’s weekly commentary a few weeks ago… while it’s about Cold-Eeze Nasal Spray, it’s a similar enough product to Zicam that I thought Randi’s conclusion about the product was worth posting here
There was also a small follow up a couple weeks later, under “CAVEAT EMPTOR”.
As I recall, she was in class like one full weekend every month or so and the program lasted two or three years. The school was in Southern California somewhere. If you passed all of their tests, they gave you their own certification.
I am proud to say that I was a big part of her quitting the program and getting most of her money back. In one of her weekend seminars they taught her about ear candles which I was able to prove to her that they were a bunch of bullshit. That was my first ever SDMB thread by the way.
So I’m guessing that my ex’s mother is on some kind of road to nuttersville and/or has already arrived in town and taken up lodgings at the Crazy Fuck Inn.
This stuff just gets more and more wacko sounding the more I hear about it.
They do ear candling at the very expensive spa I go to for hair coloring. 'Nuff said.
However, YMMV and if you have a chronic condition, I don’t blame anyone for looking into alternative means of treatment. I have a relative who is highly educated and working as a psychotherapist, and she is pretty med-resistant, but she claims to get results with homeopathic “remedies”.
Well if you were in severe pain, but someone gave you a pill which effectively alleviated it, and which you then took every time the pain came back with the same results, but then one day you found out the pill was nothing but sugar, how would you react? Would you continue to take it? Might the fact that you know the truth about it render it ineffective?
I honestly don’t know if reading about the lack of support from science will plant enough of a seed of skepticism in me to render it ineffective (assuming it is just a placebo at work) and that does worry me, because if that is the case then, well, ignorance is working for me. But I’m generally uncomfortable with being ignorant.
So I guess the answer to your question is, no I’m not willing to ignore my results and yes I would continue to use it. I just fear that if I keep reading about the liklihood that’s it’s all in my head I will simply stop seeing those results.