A general record of my ongoing battle with all forms of nonsense.

Monday 3 August 2009

Chinese Medicine Allergy Tests in the Leicester HighCross Centre

Claims to be able to test for allergies using nothing but a lock of your hair should always be treated with suspicion, but especially so when the claims are made by a shop advertising Traditional Chinese Medicine.

But it’s always worth trying these things out, so a couple of us went along for a test. After a couple of weeks we both got our results with some added advice on which supplements we should be taking.

My results:

Low reaction to wheat, "pepper/spicy", nuts. Moderate reaction to dairy, caffeine, yeast. I could benefit from more chromium and valerian.

My friend's results:

Low reaction to Nightshade family, citrus fruits, salt, sweet, beet/cane sugar, house & dust mite. Medium reaction to dairy, orange and grass pollen. He could benefit from more Omega-3, Milk thistle herb and co-enzyme q10.

With the exception of dairy, our results were completely different.

Which is quite strange, since we both took in a sample of my hair.

I’ve written to the company to request an explanation and have not yet received one. Nor have they offered to refund the fee.






3 comments:

Zeno said...

Utterly brilliant. Shows how easy it is to do science and expose quackery for the nonsense it is.

Michael Kingsford Gray said...

As I commenced to pen this reply, I glanced at the semi-cryptic 'word verification' section which one must mimic in order to successfully complete a posting.

It summed up my attitude to woo in one neologism:
"unctine"

Brilliant!
Far superior to 'turpitude'

XRAYBOB said...

I think your article proved without a shadow of a doubt that its complete TOSH!. thankful cos my missus was about to put coin in the mits of these chinese charlatans.