Posted by Cam W. on February 5, 2000, at 17:08:39
In reply to Re: been there, done that, ("natural" stuff), posted by Adam on February 5, 2000, at 15:56:17
> I think there may be a middle ground between "all natruopathy and/or supplements are useless" and blind faith in herbalists and the dreaded toxicity of mainstream pharmaceuticals.
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> There's quite a lot of fair to good research on omega-3 fatty acids, hypericum, SamE, inositol, etc. Few, if any of these have been at any time subjected to the scrutiny that your average FDA-approved pharmaceutical has, though, and even those can have dubious claims made about them.
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> One of the most troubling problems is the questions of dosage: supplements aren't held to the same standards of quality that pharmaceuticals are, and thus it's difficult to know what you're really buying. It's a sad truth in my country (USA) that if you try to sell something that really has an effect, you must endure an enormously expensive and time-consuming approval process; if you sell some ground-up leaves that do essentially nothing you can market it as a supplement and make any wild claim you want about it, practically, so long as you include a little fine print that nobody reads anyway.
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> So, often you read a paper that says substance X has been shown in an open trial to significantly improve depressive symptoms in 6 weeks, etc. What you've got then is a preliminary report, with no placebo control, that often shows only a modest but statistically verifiable change in HAMD or BDI scores, or whatever, using carefully measured and administered dosages of that substance from a source that probably isn't available to the consumer. This seems to be, more often than not, where the study of supplements is at currently.
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> It will get better. HHS has put some real money and personnel to work at the NIH and elsewhere to rigorously study these substances, and that I find encouraging. There's also plenty of good-quality independant academic research underway. For the present, though, I would be somewhat suspicious of supplements unless you can find really good research on their effectiveness, and good consumer reports about a particular brand's purity and actual dosage. There are a lot of variables that are not controled for well in the realm of supplements, and the quality of what's out there, in the way of information and product, may not be worth your hard-earned dollars. Caveat emptor, as always.
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> > Janice, I have spent hundreds of dollars on so-called "natural remedies" for depression as well as fatigue. Not once did I find anything worth buying a second bottle of. Seriously, if it says, "lifts moods" or "increases energy", I've tried it! There was never anything that I could even tell a difference if I took it or not. So, now I'm on Wellbutrin and Adderall, and the only supplements I take are: a multi-vitamin, calcium, vitamin E, and fish oil capsules. And, the fish oil, I only keep taking because of all the hype about cold water fish being good for the cardio-vascular system(although, I did *start* taking it to see if it would help my depression, no luck!).
> > The only thing I have not tried is SAM-e. The reason is, it is so expensive, that I really have to experiment with all the stuff that my insurance will cover, before I try it, in case it works! CarolAnnJanice - Some controlled trials have been done recently showing some good results from omega-3-faty acids (in fish oils) in bipolar disorder, but Dr.Calabrese (an expert in bipolar disorder) has pointed out some design flaws and has raised some questions not addressed by the study. He does not believe that they work.
poster:Cam W.
thread:20564
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20000128/msgs/20579.html