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Douger
New Member
South Africa
1 Post |
 Posted - 09/23/2004 : 00:54:26
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Does anybody have any experience or viewpoints regarding ozone treatment? I have been introduced to a company called Plasmafire Intl, a Canadian company, which seems to flog all sorts of ozone based treatments and ointments. The document that I received quotes a Dr. Saul Pressman, DCh, LTOH who holds the degree of Doctor of Chiropathy from the Romano Byzantine College of Norfolk, Virginia. He is licensed by the Romano Byzantine Synod to teach the Ozone Hyperthermic Technician course, which is accredited by the College. Please comment.
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 07:02:14 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Douger
Does anybody have any experience or viewpoints regarding ozone treatment? I have been introduced to a company called Plasmafire Intl, a Canadian company, which seems to flog all sorts of ozone based treatments and ointments. The document that I received quotes a Dr. Saul Pressman, DCh, LTOH who holds the degree of Doctor of Chiropathy from the Romano Byzantine College of Norfolk, Virginia. He is licensed by the Romano Byzantine Synod to teach the Ozone Hyperthermic Technician course, which is accredited by the College. Please comment.
Sounds like a new scam.
From their website:
"The warm and gentle steam vapor surrounds your body causing the pores to open, allowing ozone to enter through the skin and cleanse the blood, the fat and the lymph."
OK, this claim is bullshit.
"Toxins are oxidized and sweated out. The body is purified, the muscles relax, and your cares are soothed away as the tension of the everyday world dissolves."
Toxins oxidized and sweated out.....(snicker)
It's an overpriced cabinet sauna for cripe's sake. You get the relaxing qualities of a sauna and they claim it does more than that. Which, it doesn't.
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Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
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tomk80
SFN Regular
Netherlands
1278 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 07:09:58 [Permalink]
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| So, on first glance, you actually inhale the ozone (since you're placing it in a room). And then it can do some nice oxidizing in your lungs? Count me out in that case. Bloody morons. |
Tom
`Contrariwise,' continued Tweedledee, `if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.'
-Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Caroll- |
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Plyss
Skeptic Friend
Netherlands
231 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 07:33:23 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Douger
Does anybody have any experience or viewpoints regarding ozone treatment? I have been introduced to a company called Plasmafire Intl, a Canadian company, which seems to flog all sorts of ozone based treatments and ointments.
Considering the reactive nature of ozone i would treat any claim of an ointment based on ozone with extreme scepticism.
Also, to the best of my knowledge there are no medical benefits from exposure to ozone nor are any serious treatments based on its use.
Some chemical safety information (via http:\\www.chemfinder.com) on ozone can be found at http://www.hhmi.org/science/labsafe/lcss/lcss66.html
From the safety sheet: quote:
Ozone is a highly toxic gas that is extremely irritating to the eyes, mucous membranes, and respiratory tract. [...] Animal studies indicate that chronic exposure to ozone may result in pulmonary damage, leading to chronic lung impairment. Continual daily exposure to ozone can cause premature aging.
My guess would be that these people are seeking to abuse the notion that, because of the protection offered by the ozone layer, exposure to ozone will also be beneficial to the human body. |
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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard
3192 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 07:52:51 [Permalink]
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'Doctor of Chiropathy'
I stopped reading after that. |
"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History
"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26022 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 07:57:23 [Permalink]
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Welcome, Douger, to the SFN!
The mission statement of Romano Byzantine College, coupled with its accreditations, suggests that it is unable to offer degrees in any sort of medicine. According to their programs page,Chiropathy is the combination of spiritual healing, healing touch, natural remedy education and supplementation, fitness therapies, and anointing to bring holistic balance into the human body-temple. The ad eundem process requires applicants to possess a baccalaureate's degree with some theological study credit or this must be completed before entering the doctoral process. Those wishing to enter the Doctor of Chiropathy (DCh) degree program must hold the Bachelor of Chiropathy degree earned via academic or the ad eundem process, or hold a recognized undergraduate degree that proves similar requirements have been completed. The doctoral applicant must also prove or complete at least twenty-one (21) graduate specialization credits. This suggests that if one goes through pre-med at a normal college, it'll take just 21 distance-learning credits to earn a "doctorate," a far cry from the amount of work it takes to become "just" an M.D.
Saul Pressman has a vested interest in ozone therapy, as he is a founder of Plasmafire. He is a bad source of information on the subject, and his Story of Ozone doesn't seem to once mention that ozone is a major component of city smog, and a health hazard. Quite the opposite, he claims - without presenting evidence - that:Ozone is safe to breathe when it is bubbled through extra virgin olive oil. If true, what comes out after bubbling through the oil must not be ozone. If it's simply oxygen, then breathing more rapidly should provide the same effects.
He also talks about the "gel" left behind after bubbling ozone through olive oil for weeks, but this, I suspect, is simply rancid (oxidized) olive oil, and nothing truly therapeutic.
Another sign of quackery is at the start of the "Story,"Canada and the United States are signatories to the World Health Organization's Declaration of Helsinki, which states:
"In the treatment of the sick person, the physician must be free to use a new diagnostic or therapeutic measure, if in his or her judgment it offers hope of saving life, re-establishing health or alleviating suffering."
Any college or board of physicians or equivalent medical licensing board that investigates or harasses a physician for using ozone therapy is in violation of the Helsinki Declaration. There are several problems with these bold statements. The least of which is that it is the World Medical Association, and not the World Health Organization, which created the Helsinki Declaration.
Section II, subsection 1, does indeed read as Pressman claims it reads. However, it is obvious that most "physicians" (which typically means M.D., which Pressman is not), when using ozone therapy to treat patients, will violate Section I, subsections 1 through 12 (all of them). Section I of the Declaration is titled "Basic Principles," and says things like,1. Biomedical research involving human subjects must conform to generally accepted scientific principles and should be based on adequately performed laboratory and animal experimentation and on a thorough knowledge of the scientific literature. Pressman is clearly a quack, abusing the language of the Declaration to suit his own purposes. If he practices ozone therapy in the U.S., the government is free to slap all sorts of injunctions upon him, as the Declaration also states,It mu |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 08:16:01 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by tomk80
So, on first glance, you actually inhale the ozone (since you're placing it in a room). And then it can do some nice oxidizing in your lungs? Count me out in that case. Bloody morons.
Nope, they claim it is absorbed through the skin using a cabinet sauna.
http://www.plasmafire.com
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Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
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Siberia
SFN Addict
Brazil
2322 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 08:31:44 [Permalink]
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| Absorbed through the skin, but if you're in a cabinet sauna (I'm envisioning a hot room full of ozone), wouldn't that mean you'd inhale it too? |
"Why are you afraid of something you're not even sure exists?"
- The Kovenant, Via Negativa
"People who don't like their beliefs being laughed at shouldn't have such funny beliefs."
-- unknown
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Valiant Dancer
Forum Goalie
USA
4826 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 08:43:45 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Siberia
Absorbed through the skin, but if you're in a cabinet sauna (I'm envisioning a hot room full of ozone), wouldn't that mean you'd inhale it too?
Not the way they describe it. If you've ever seen British television where they have those sit down thingys where your head sticks out the top and a towel is put around your neck to prevent the steam from escaping, that is a cabinet sauna. (The website has a picture.)
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Cthulhu/Asmodeus when you're tired of voting for the lesser of two evils
Brother Cutlass of Reasoned Discussion |
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Siberia
SFN Addict
Brazil
2322 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 08:58:38 [Permalink]
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| Oooh, THAT. Thanks ;) |
"Why are you afraid of something you're not even sure exists?"
- The Kovenant, Via Negativa
"People who don't like their beliefs being laughed at shouldn't have such funny beliefs."
-- unknown
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Plyss
Skeptic Friend
Netherlands
231 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 12:29:43 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.
Saul Pressman has a vested interest in ozone therapy, as he is a founder of Plasmafire. He is a bad source of information on the subject, and his Story of Ozone doesn't seem to once mention that ozone is a major component of city smog, and a health hazard.
My god, that is one hideous article. Anyone who can, with a straight face, claim the following needs to go back to school: "Radionics research has shown that water whose bond angle is 101 degrees is ‘dead' water, bereft of life-giving energy. "
Further in the text, the section "HOW DOES OZONE WORK BIOCHEMICALLY?" contains so much nonsense that reviewing it is futile.
For the record, i haven't been able to come up with an article in Medline that has both the phrase "ozone" and the name "Pressman" in the text. If he has any expertise in this area he has never been able to get it passed peer review. Which, considering the text of that article, doesn't surprise me.
Also, the phrase "Colorectal insufflation" of ozone/oxygen" makes me wince.
quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.
There are, indeed, standard medical practices in which ozone has been, or is, used. "Ozone therapy" is not one of those standard practices. It may become one in the future, but until the time that it becomes serious medicine, it will be just quackery.
As of yet this is the only one i found that looks serious. Then again, medicin is not my field.
On one of the other links there's a picture of one of those cabinet sauna, for those who wish to know what one looks like.
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tomk80
SFN Regular
Netherlands
1278 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 13:07:04 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Valiant Dancer
quote:
Originally posted by Siberia
Absorbed through the skin, but if you're in a cabinet sauna (I'm envisioning a hot room full of ozone), wouldn't that mean you'd inhale it too?
Not the way they describe it. If you've ever seen British television where they have those sit down thingys where your head sticks out the top and a towel is put around your neck to prevent the steam from escaping, that is a cabinet sauna. (The website has a picture.)
You're right, saw the picture. Still, I wouldn't really like sitting in steam containing ozone.
Although, of course, it always is a matter of concentration. Maybe it's more of a homeotherapy kinda thingy were the concentrations are actually too low to do anything. Anyone know anything about toxic concentration for the skin? |
Tom
`Contrariwise,' continued Tweedledee, `if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.'
-Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Caroll- |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2004 : 15:29:26 [Permalink]
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Ozone (O3) gas will eat your face off, burn out your eyes, and sear your lungs.
If anyone is ever stupid enough to directly inhale it straight up, they probably don't live long enough to worry about the blindness though.
quote:
It's an overpriced cabinet sauna for cripe's sake. You get the relaxing qualities of a sauna and they claim it does more than that. Which, it doesn't.
Exactly. You'd get the same benefit from a nice massage and sauna session. None of their claims, aside from the relaxation from cooking in a sauna, are even remotely valid. |
Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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jhancock6
New Member
1 Post |
Posted - 10/21/2004 : 19:07:01 [Permalink]
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| Ozone is an extremely powerful oxidizer, but so many other substances. Ozone like all substances is perfectly safe if used wisely. It is true that ozone can be harmful and possibly fatal is misused, but pure oxygen can kill you as well, simply put, our bodies are not designed to handle much beyond the atmospheric norms. Ozone is also 3000 times more powerful than chlorine at killing germs and viruses. In fact many of the large water treatment plants in the US use ozone to purify drinking water and almost all bottled water is treated with ozone. This germ killing ability is what you are speaking of and has some merit. Many case studies around the world show that ozone in theraputic levels can be beneficial. One thing to keep in mind is that ozone has a half life of about 30 minutes and then reverts back to oxygen(O2), this being said it means that when the ozone reaches the end of it half life all you are left with is pure oxygen. What many practioners are doing with people that have viruses is to use alternate ways of getting ozone and it's germ and virus killing abilities into the body, this can be done by drinking water that still has ozone in it, removing small amounts of blood, difusing ozone through it and the reintroducing it back in to the body and even letting the body absorb ozone through the skin, like it absorbs many other substances through the skin, good and bad. There are many uses for ozone and most can be found on the web just verify the source, which started this discussion. With some due diligence it is fairly easy to identify the BS sites from the legitimate sites. |
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ktesibios
SFN Regular
USA
505 Posts |
Posted - 10/21/2004 : 20:34:54 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by jhancock6
Ozone is an extremely powerful oxidizer, but so many other substances. Ozone like all substances is perfectly safe if used wisely. It is true that ozone can be harmful and possibly fatal is misused, but pure oxygen can kill you as well, simply put, our bodies are not designed to handle much beyond the atmospheric norms. Ozone is also 3000 times more powerful than chlorine at killing germs and viruses. In fact many of the large water treatment plants in the US use ozone to purify drinking water and almost all bottled water is treated with ozone. This germ killing ability is what you are speaking of and has some merit.
The fact that a substance is good for killing microorganisms in water or on objects isn't particularly relevant to its use in or on the body. Chlorine bleach is a pretty good disninfectant- it kills bacteria, viruses, molds and mildew- but it you apply it to your skin about all you're likely to get for your trouble is a chemical burn. Ingest it and the results are unlikely to be positive or pleasant.
Even if ozone, in the concentrations necessary to act as a germicide, is safe for skin contact, one has to wonder what the benefit would be, given that we seem to manage to survive while carrying assorted germs without number around on our pelts.
I'm afraid that I have to regard arguments based on ozone's effectiveness as an in vitro germicide as a red herring, if what's being discussed is its use in medicine.
quote:
Many case studies around the world show that ozone in theraputic levels can be beneficial.
Does "many case studies" mean controlled clinical tests such as are used to evaluate the effectiveness of drugs or medical devices? You know, the sort of thing with blinding, randomization, control group, statistical analysis and so forth?
If so, citing the results of such tests, published in peer-reviewed journals, would be much more appropriate than simply claiming "many case sutdies around the world"
In addition, if a body of scientific evidence exists which supports the usefulness of this particular device and not some unrelated use of ozone, it would be much more appropriate to submit it to the process for approving a medical device than to try to flog it on the Web.
Or, on the other hand, does "many case studies" mean "a collection of anecdotes with no blinding, controls or any other usable means of sorting out what really happened and what the cause was"? If so, kindly spare us. The only use anecdote collections have is to provide a demonstration of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy and to illustrate the standard promotional techniques of quackery.  |
"The Republican agenda is to turn the United States into a third-world shithole." -P.Z.Myers |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 10/21/2004 : 22:37:23 [Permalink]
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quote:
Many case studies around the world show that ozone in theraputic levels can be beneficial
Cite your sources please.
quote:
What many practioners are doing with people that have viruses is to use alternate ways of getting ozone and it's germ and virus killing abilities into the body, this can be done by drinking water that still has ozone in it, removing small amounts of blood, difusing ozone through it and the reintroducing it back in to the body and even letting the body absorb ozone through the skin, like it absorbs many other substances through the skin, good and bad.
Here is a nice Ozone MSDS
And some Basic Ozone Information.
And a little MORE ozone info, if you're still thinking that ozone is in anyway a good thing to expose yourself to.
Please note the repeated references to "poisonous" and "toxic".
Oh.... and don't forget this tidbit...
quote:
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency characterizes ozone levels as "unhealthful" when they exceed the National Ambient Air Quality Standard of 125 parts per billion (ppb). In the state of Wisconsin, an "ozone alert" is issued when the average concentration of ozone over a four hour period is over 100 ppb. An "ozone warning" is announced when the this level reaches 300 ppb. An «ozone emergency» is declared when it exceeds 350 ppb. In addition to posing a threat to health, ozone in the air also damages polymeric materials such as rubber and plastics, causing them to deteriorate prematurely.
It's a health hazard at 125 parts per billion.
Ozone, in high enough concentrations, will burn your skin and instantly destroy mucus membranes. You'd die of pulmonary edema in a couple of minutes if you inhaled it in concentrated form. Not to mention that it's an extremely powerfull oxidizing agent, it reacts readily with organic compounds.... this is not a good thing.
And what part of the world are they taking blood, exposing it to ozone, and returning it to you? As a healthcare professional I'm interested in the various types of fraud practiced by the quacks around the world.... always good for a laugh.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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