August 2006 Archives

I've had a few queries lately about a product called Digestrol, so I thought I'd write an explanation about why I wouldn't recommend it, and why in fact it's a good example of the kind of product you probably shouldn't touch with a barge pole.

Let's start with what the manufacturers, Techmedica, say about the product on their own website.

Digestrol™ contains all-natural ingredients that are essential in making it gentle and effective. It contains no chemically generated compounds

There's a very odd school of thought that says anything "natural" is automatically safe and gentle, and anything "chemically-generated" is harsh and nasty and a Very Bad Thing. Well, deadly nightshade is natural, gentle and safe, right up to the point where you're dead.

"All natural" means nothing by itself - lots of natural flora and fauna are harsh if you swallow them, as anyone who has ever taken the laxative senna will know.

Digestrol, requiring years of research and clinical studies

Where can I read details of the research? Where were the clinical studies published? Were they independently-funded and double-blind, placebo-controlled trials? Because if they weren't, they won't prove anything.

Our scientists have discovered at the molecular level, how to maximize potency and absorption, utilizing our patent-pending 12 step pharmaceutical-grade blending and extraction process

Wow, that sounds AMAZING! Wait a minute though...how is that actually gonna make me feel better? Or is it just an impressive-sounding "science bit"?

I know that Digestrol works. I see it every day in customer re-orders and testimonials

What percentage of your customers re-order? Do they re-order because it works or because they are just desperate for help?

And never, ever rely on testimonials. Testimonials are the easiest thing in the world to get - find me the most despicable, pathetic, money-grubbing product on the internet and I'll guarantee that they've got some testimonials.

Before you rush out to buy 100 bottles of Digestrol, let's have even more fun and take a look at the website of MicroNutra Health, who seem to sell exactly the same products as Techmedica, and so I presume are either the same company in disguise or at least are connected in some way.

Ready?

The first few paragraphs are actually fine - they say lots of people have IBS, describe the symptoms a bit, say that doctors don't have all the answers. Fair enough. But then it gets interesting...

8 out of 10 of the patients who have IBS report it as a progressive condition that can disable them within only a few increasingly painful years from the point of experiencing the first symptom

Umm...you what? IBS is NOT a progressive condition in any shape or form. Of course some people get worse, but others stay the same, and lots more get better. This sentence makes it sound like if you don't treat your IBS right this MINUTE you're gonna descend into a kind of nightmare downward spiral. Complete hogwash.

But Digestrol is the ONLY solution that addresses the root cause of the actual problem at a cellular level

Wow, how lucky am I to stumble upon the ONLY product that does that! And you mean you're actually offering to sell it to me too! I cannot believe the immensity of my good fortune.

Digestrol gives you back the balance, increases overall energy, reduces your waist size

And I'm gonna lose weight while I'm at it! I'm bouncing off the ceiling with glee!

Digestrol is the FINAL IBS and colitis answer

Wait, all of a sudden it cures colitis as well? Isn't that a totally different illness? With a totally different cause? No, must be my mistake.

Digestrol contains synergistically blended ingredients that soothe the brain to replenish stomach nerve endings that create the painful attacks of swelling, cramping, and constipation

So soothing the brain replenishes my stomach nerve endings, yes, I see. Hang on a minute...

We even took it one step further and commissioned a clinical study on 22 Digestrol users

First, 22 patients is not enough to prove diddly squat. Second, it sounds like there was no control group, which invalidates the study. If I told 22 people with IBS to play netball with the Pope for three months they'd probably report improvements in their IBS. That's how placebos work.

Over 50,000 people add Digestrol to their meals as least once a day

How can you possibly know that? You can't. Fifty thousand people might have bought Digestrol, but 49,999 people might have used it once and thrown it in the garbage.

Digestrol has a 99% success rate

OK, I'm getting a bit tired of this now. Measured by what? The amount of people who don't ask for a refund? Or did you survey 50,000 people, using an unbiased questionnaire and an independent survey company?

What's the final word? Well over 90 out of every 100 women who use Digestrol are absolutely satisfied and healthier for doing so!

My maths is a bit shoddy - does 90 out of 100 equal 99%? And why are we suddenly talking about women - you realize that men get IBS too, right? (Maybe they don't.)

And finally, just to round off this little marathon, my absolute favourite quote from the site, and a warning to shoppers everywhere to for goodness' sake BEWARE...

A Few Bottles of Digestrol Now Or Surgery Later?

This is so true - if I could only count the number of IBS sufferers who have to resort to surgery. Oh, wait a minute, I can count them - zero. There is no surgery for IBS. We don't have surgery. You are trying to scare us into buying your product, you slimy little grizzly wart-bound toads.

I feel so much better now. In fact, I think I'm cured.

I've been helping out with quite a few media-related things lately, partly due to people finding the IBS Tales website and partly because it's currently something called "Gut Week" in the UK, which is an awareness week for stomach and bowel disorders.

So, yesterday I made the very brave decision of saying yes to a live radio interview. In fact, I turned down a live national TV interview (GMTV for the Brits who are interested) because I just thought the chances of me saying intelligent things while looking intelligent were quite low, and the chances of me saying stupid things while looking seasick were quite high. Unfortunate, because it would have been great for IBS, but I honestly didn't think I could do it.

But I was very brave and did the radio interview instead, and I thought it actually went OK. It was for "Colourful Radio" which I'd never heard of but I think is a soul music kind of station, one of these new ones which are only on digital.

They had a nice doctor on first talking about general "what is IBS" stuff, and then the presenter lady talked to me (over the phone) about my own experiences. She was very nice and actually admitted to having IBS herself which I thought was good of her, and took it seriously rather than making embarrassed jokes about bottoms, which is always a plus.

The only downside to the interview was that I felt there was rather too much emphasis placed on stress as an IBS factor. Stress is a huge trigger in IBS, but I do worry sometimes that interviews like this lead people to believe that the way to deal with IBS is to remove all stress from your life. This is of course a) impossible and b) not true, as there are plenty of people who find that decreasing their stress has no effect on their symptoms.

Still, overall it went well, so I'm quite proud of myself for that, and although I stumbled over my words a few times I thought in general I did OK, and was quite passionate at saying how we should all talk about IBS and not be embarrassed, cause the only thing that comes from embarrassment is more suffering. Which is true.

On top of this, one of my newsletter subscribers is hopefully being interviewed for the November issue of UK Cosmopolitan, which is pretty great - Cosmo has a huge number of readers. I know from personal experience, and from what other people have told me, that publicity for IBS really does help people feel better and seek further treatment, so it's definitely a worthy cause.

If anyone's reading this and thinking that you'd like to help out with this kind of publicity, the best thing to do is join the IBS Tales mailing list, because I usually ask for volunteers through my newsletter. There are sometimes added benefits as well - journalists do pay for some stories, or you might get to go to a nice photo shoot (expenses paid), or you might even be invited on live national television! (Not for the cowardly custards.)

The weekend of the guy who lives in the flat upstairs

On Saturday, he wakes up with his girlfriend. They talk and giggle for a while (the ceiling is fairly thin, and the sound just travels down). They then make love (girlfriend is pretty loud, bed is pretty squeaky). They get up and clank pans around, presumably for breakfast, laugh and talk a bit more, and then go out at about noon, presumably for lunch.

They come home later, talk and laugh again, make love again, and then go out at about eight. They don't come home on Saturday night.

My weekend

I wake up and feel fairly uncomfortable, because I am constipated from the day before. I have breakfast and a cup of coffee, but when I try to go to the bathroom nothing much happens. This means that I have now been constipated for two mornings running, which means bloating and tightness and pain.

I try to sleep some of the day away, and don't do much in the evening. I find it difficult to sleep on Saturday night, and my gut feels congested and stretched. On Sunday I wake up and have breakfast. I go to the bathroom and finally manage to have a bowel movement, but it is hard and reluctant to greet the world, and I have to strain on the toilet.

In the evening I am in the shower when I start getting some really vicious stomach cramps, and after about half an hour of terrible cramps I have another bowel movement.

And then I feel fine.

You quite often hear people talk about "pain thresholds" when it comes to IBS, because of course pain is such as vital part of the joy that is an irritable bowel. But I've always been a bit confused about the concept.

Now, I understand that if I am in a room with nine other people, and we all get our legs chopped off, and I'm lying on the floor screaming while the other nine are doing their knitting, that probably means that I have a lower pain threshold than they do. But how can you measure a threshold just by anecdotal evidence - how do you know your pain isn't just less/more than other people's unless you've all just had your legs chopped off together?

People sometimes say "I think I have a high pain threshold", and that's fine, maybe they do, but I always think "Well, how do you KNOW?" Women sometimes say it just after they've had a baby, and that always puzzles me. How do they know that their baby wasn't just unusually smooth, or their cervix unusually cavernous?

It's the same with IBS. Some people may well have high pain thresholds, but how do they know?!

There was a painful article in the Guardian newspaper a while back, written by a journalist who had lost his 13 year-old son to cancer. Matthew Engel describes life before and after the cancer ("We were not quite as happy as we bloody well should have been"), and also how he coped with other people's reactions to his son's illness.

Reactions ranged from extreme empathy, practical help, and genuine selflessness, through to complete insensitivity. The reaction that really struck me was this one: "I'm sorry about your news. I'd hate it to happen to my son."

Now, I'm going to go from talking about a fatal cancer to talking about IBS, so I just want to say that I don't compare the two for the moment - Mr Engel and his son suffered appallingly, and there's just no comparison to be made. However, I do think that all of us human beings need to consider carefully what we say to people who are sick and suffering.

In particular, we need to avoid the kind of selfish impulse that is found in that statement - "I'd hate it to happen to my son". Because that isn't sympathy, and it's certainly not empathy. What that person is thinking is clearly "Thank God my family's alright, thank God it wasn't us".

And that's understandable, that's a human response - up until the point where you actually say it out loud, and then it's just crass.

I occasionally get people who write to me, telling me about their IBS, and it turns out that they've suffered for a couple of months, or they only get symptoms once a year, and that's fine, I can cope with that. But it's also pretty clear from the way they phrase their email that one of the reasons they are writing to me is because they are pleased that they haven't suffered for 16 years, or had the symptoms that I have had. They are relieved not to have suffered like I have.

It's a fine line. If you say "I'm so sorry to hear about your suffering" then that's great; if you say "I can't imagine living with this for 16 years, I'd hate to have to do that" then that's maybe borderline. If you say "I'm so glad I just have a mild form of this disorder, you must be so brave, I'm really so glad I'm not like you" then I would say that was taking it a bit far.

It's a difficult one though. I think that a lot of us probably say the wrong thing to people in pain, which is why lots of different groups of sufferers have their own pet hates - IBS sufferers and the "all in your head" notion, ME sufferers who get told to make more of an effort, depression sufferers who are supposed to keep their chin up and look on the bright side.

Maybe the solution is to listen more, and talk less. And if you find yourself thinking "Thank God I don't have your problem", make sure you keep it to yourself.