Welcome to the Podiatry Arena forums, for communication between foot health professionals about podiatry and related topics.
You are currently viewing our podiatry forum as a guest which gives you limited access to view all podiatry discussions and access our other features. By joining our free global community of Podiatrists and other interested foot health care professionals you will have access to post podiatry topics (answer and ask questions), communicate privately with other members (PM), upload content, view attachments, receive a weekly email update of new discussions, earn CPD points and access many other special features. Registered users do not get displayed the advertisments in posted messages. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so please, join our global Podiatry community today!
If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact contact us.
The Herald Sun are reporting: Aromatherapy 'a health con'
02apr06
Quote:
AROMATHERAPY is a "New Age marketing con" that does nothing more than burn a hole in your pocket, researchers say.
Psychologists claim to have debunked the idea that aromatherapy oils can relieve pain and alleviate ill health.
A psychologist who specialises in the power of scent says his experiments expose a massive marketing exercise that has no scientific basis.
Rather than relieving pain, aromatherapy could make people experience pain more intensely, says Dr Neil Martin, of Britain's Middlesex University.
In his study, volunteers were asked to plunge their arms into freezing water to see whether a pleasant lemon smell could mitigate their discomfort, or if the unpleasant smell of machine oil would make it worse.
But the lemon and the machine oil performed equally badly. In fact, the volunteers not exposed to any odours at all were best off.
Dr Martin said millions of people were convinced aromatherapy oils were doing them good. But mood music and massage used by aromatherapists applying the oils were the most likely explanation for a short-term feel-good factor, he said.
"They do make you smell nicer and temporarily lift mood, but the experiments do not support claims that aromatherapy can alleviate ill health and illness," he said. "That is more a marketing ploy than a scientific statement."
Carol Preen, secretary of Britain's Aromatherapy Consortium, said: 'This research did not involve aromatherapy because they simply used a certain smell to gain an effect.
"Aromatherapy is so much more than that and I do not see how they can say that this proves it does not work."
They are always saying that Pts say they feel better.
But research regularly does not support this.
If the essential oils are that therapeutic i am sure that VERY MANY AROMATHERAPISTS would have OD'd on the oils and have complications due to poisoning by the oils.
A friend who is an aromatherapist could never provide an intelligent response to this argument.
The Placebo effect has a major impact.
Also MASSAGE in its own right has a positive impact upon people even if only temporarily.
Aromatherapy 'a health con'
Linear Mode
