{"id":2354,"date":"2017-05-30T07:00:28","date_gmt":"2017-05-30T11:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chaneyhealth.com\/healthtips\/?p=2354"},"modified":"2017-05-29T15:55:37","modified_gmt":"2017-05-29T19:55:37","slug":"clinical-trials-misleading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chaneyhealth.com\/healthtips\/clinical-trials-misleading\/","title":{"rendered":"Are Clinical Trials Misleading?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Is Most Of What You\u2019ve Been Told About Vitamins Wrong?<\/p>\n

Author: Dr. Stephen Chaney<\/p>\n

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\"man<\/a>I am a scientist and a professor. I taught medical students for 40 years. I believe in evidence based medicine. Why would I tell you that many of the clinical trials about the impact of individual nutrients on your health are misleading?<\/p>\n

Let me start by sharing a story that I used to tell every new graduate student in my lab. The story goes like this: There is this drunk on the sidewalk, on his hands and knees under a lamppost, just groping around. A policeman comes up to him and says, \u201cWhat are you doing?\u201d The drunk says, \u201cI\u2019m looking for my housekeys.\u201d The policeman gets down on his hands and knees and he looks too, and finally he says, \u201cI can\u2019t find them anywhere. Are you sure you lost them here?\u201d To which the drunk relies, \u201cNope, I lost them over there, but the light\u2019s better here.\u201d<\/p>\n

The point I was trying to make is that we can only do experiments where the light is good. But the questions we sometimes want to ask are over in the corner, where we can\u2019t really shine the light on it directly. It\u2019s often difficult to look in the right place and\/or to ask the right questions.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s particularly the case with holistic approaches because holistic approaches, by their very nature, are multi-factorial. You have multiple variables that you\u2019re trying to change at one time. For example, you might want to optimize weight, exercise, vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty acids if you\u2019re trying to look at a healthy lifestyle.<\/p>\n

But, in the 21st<\/sup>-century, studies generally focus on individual nutrients or individual drugs in an intervention<\/em><\/strong>, placebo-controlled trial. This is considered the \u201cGold Standard\u201d for evidence based medicine. However, it\u2019s very difficult to evaluate holistic approaches with that kind of study.<\/p>\n

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The Whole Is Greater Than The Parts<\/h3>\n

\"internationally<\/a>One of the examples that I love to use, because it really made an impression on me as a young scientist, occurred at an International Cancer Symposium I attended more than 30 years ago.<\/p>\n

I attended a session in which an internationally renowned expert was giving his talk on colon cancer. He said, \u201cI can show you, unequivocally, that colon cancer risk is significantly decreased by a lifestyle that includes a high-fiber diet, a low-fat diet, adequate calcium, adequate B-vitamins, exercise and weight control. But I can\u2019t show you that any one of them, by themselves, is effective.\u201d<\/p>\n

The question that came to me as I heard him speak was: \u201cWhat\u2019s the message that a responsible scientist or responsible health professional should be giving to their patients or the people that they\u2019re advising?\u201d You\u2019ve heard experts saying: \u201cDon\u2019t worry about the fat\u201d \u201cDon\u2019t worry about calcium.\u201d \u201cDon\u2019t worry about B-vitamins.\u201d \u201cDon\u2019t worry about fiber.\u201d \u201cNone of them can be shown to decrease the risk of colon cancer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Is that the message that we should be giving people? Or should we really be saying what that doctor said many years ago \u2013 that a lifestyle that includes all those things significantly decreases the risk of colon cancer?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Are Clinical Trials<\/strong> Misleading?<\/h2>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"clinical<\/a>A recent paper about how to best evaluate the relationships between nutrition and disease (Shao et al, European Journal of Nutrition, DOI: 10.1007\/s00394-017-1460-9<\/a>) caught my attention. This paper, written by a team of 10 international experts, was a summary of key findings from a recent international meeting of the Council for Responsible Nutrition.<\/p>\n

The paper started out by reviewing the strengths of clinical studies in which the effect of a single intervention on a health outcome is evaluated in a double-blind, placebo controlled clinical study; something they referred to as a reductionist approach<\/strong>.<\/p>\n