Raeburn's rule #56: When a treatment is claimed to be effective in the treatment of multiple, unrelated illnesses and conditions, you can be almost certain it isn't effective in any of them.
I put "chiropractic infrared light therapy brain" into Google, and on the first page of results, I got links to the use of infrared therapy for plantar fasciitis, heel pain, Alzheimer's dementia, arthritis, back pain, fibromyalgia, myofascial pain, diabetic ulcers, multiple sclerosis, concussion, injuries, wounds, and to improve the brain-body connection.
My expert opinion, therefore, is that you should be a little skeptical if your chiropractor recommends it for anything. (Many of these links were to chiropractic clinics.)
I wouldn't have run this search if I hadn't read about the false claims being made for "near infrared laser therapy," or NILT, in a blog post Sunday by John Gever at MedPage Today. [Disclosure: My wife, Elizabeth DeVita-Raeburn, writes for MedPage Today.] Gever writes in particular about the use of this therapy to help patients recover from strokes and head injuries by producing "an energy jolt" in damaged brain cells. "It sounds too good to be true," he writes. It's hard to argue with that. But this is more than simply Gever's uninformed opinion. He notes that the "two largest clinical trials, conducted in patients with ischemic stroke, ended in failure." And the sponsor of the trials, Gever reports, "declared bankruptcy last year."
Gever acknowledges that small studies (one of them was based on two patients) have shown significant improvements. This isn't a hatchet job; Gever is fair. And he notes that infrared laser therapy is approved by the FDA for musculoskeletal pain, and the devices that generate the light "are commonplace in physiotherapy clinics and chiropractic offices, whose clienteles tend to be dominated by patients with pain complaints." Gever also fingers one outfit that appears to be selling an infrared helmet without FDA approval.
Last week, Gever went after fish oil, another product for which expansive claims are often made. Researchers reported that "Fish Oil Might Guard Against Loss of Brain Cells," as HealthDay reported on WebMD, or that "Omega-3 Fatty Acids In Fish Might Protect The Aging Brain" as you could have read at Forbes.
Not so, Gever reported. "Such conclusions are a complete overreach," he wrote. "The study had only one measurement of omega-3 levels in red cells, and only one brain MRI scan–8 years after the blood sampling!" You might wonder what the researchers could conclude about changes in brain size if they only measured it once.
I would have missed this one, too, if Gever hadn't blown the whistle on it.
It's always nice to have another set of critical eyes out there.
-Paul Raeburn
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