Stuff that occurs to me

All of my 'how to' posts are tagged here. The most popular posts are about blocking and private accounts on Twitter, also the science communication jobs list. None of the science or medical information I might post to this blog should be taken as medical advice (I'm not medically trained).

Think of this blog as a sort of nursery for my half-baked ideas hence 'stuff that occurs to me'.

Contact: @JoBrodie Email: jo DOT brodie AT gmail DOT com

Science in London: The 2018/19 scientific society talks in London blog post

Sunday 31 March 2013

I wonder what happened to this woman who had 'suspected cancer' - live blood analysis

What on earth is going on with the world of live blood testing / live blood analysis / nutritional microscopy? The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has added a fourth company to their non-compliant online advertiser list who has been selling both a live blood test and a dried blood test, among other things, and doing so misleadingly as there's no evidence either is of much use as a diagnostic tool in a health setting.

There are a total of 46 non-compliant online advertisers on the ASA's list. Four of them are offering something to do with live blood tests - that seems a fairly high percentage. No evidence is forthcoming that it works though.

Many people offering live blood tests have been trained by Robert O Young who has some very peculiar ideas about alkalising diets as well as what can be seen under a micrsocope. Here's a page listing people who've been trained according to his methods and the country they're now flogging live blood tests in - I had a look at England and spotted a few familiar and unfamiliar names.

On one of the microscopist's pages, which is about their consultations, there's the question "What do you do with suspected cancer?" (full post here).

This seems a fairly disingenuous post. A young woman's doctor apparently gives her an unconfirmed diagnosis of suspected cancer and it seems some time is elapsing as she waits for these confirming tests to happen or for the results to appear. Meanwhile she undergoes the live blood test (with many pictures of the slides made from her blood on show) and makes changes to her diet. Whether it's the dietary changes that make her feel better I don't know... but what happened next?

The post ends with the phrase "Watch this space as we post her 3rd blood assessment pics soon" however no date is given so no-one really knows how long we'll have to wait to hear how this woman is doing.

Fortunately we have the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine which can't tell us the exact date either but it can show us a screenshot of the page as it was on 24 June 2010. Pretty much exactly the same it seems, so that page has been waiting for nearly two years for an update. I hope she's doing well.




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