I'm sure most of you have already heard about the claim that toxins in your body are responsible for your ills. But there are some skeptics out there who do not trust such claims - for good reason.
Is there really any rational reason to go detoxify? I mean, avoiding poisons is common sense, but is taking the time and effort to remove toxins worth it?
Is Detoxification bullshit?
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From what I'm seeing on that site, it's a mixture of "chemicals produced by your body when you are under stress and artificial shit in your food is bad for you" mixed with a bunch of mumbo-jumbo bullshit.
So it's not entirely bull, but even the stuff they are correct about is nothing that you have to go out of your way to actually do, and the difference it would actually make in regards to your overall health is probably next to negligible.
From what I'm seeing on that site, it's a mixture of "chemicals produced by your body when you are under stress and artificial shit in your food is bad for you" mixed with a bunch of mumbo-jumbo bullshit.
So it's not entirely bull, but even the stuff they are correct about is nothing that you have to go out of your way to actually do, and the difference it would actually make in regards to your overall health is probably next to negligible.
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I'm slightly confused, do this just mean that the baseline levels of toxins in our bodies should be flushed through fasting/whatever every so often to increase our health? Because while that's sort of what it looks like, I'm having a hard time to separate it from my head from more clinical forms of detox, where you undergo therapy to reduce the affects of acute toxicity, usually from a drug overdose, or as part of a withdrawal from an addiction.
The second sort seems clearly to be a necessary and in the long term good thing, but the juice diet fast kind of thing seems at best to be wishful thinking, perhaps to sell things.
The second sort seems clearly to be a necessary and in the long term good thing, but the juice diet fast kind of thing seems at best to be wishful thinking, perhaps to sell things.
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Fasting can't flush toxins, but specially designed diets and procedures can do it.
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Preach on Rev. Superman. Define toxins is the best question to ask anyone going on about the needs to flush them from your body, I have yet to be told what these toxins actully are.Superman wrote:First of all, define "toxin."
It's bullshit. There is a great South Park episode from a while ago that was about this very thing. Stay away from this kind of nonsense.
Azazal:
OK, here goes. Toxins in the diet, or created by internal bacteria and the like? There are a few. We are not talking here about acute poisons, by the way, although some of the herbal and nutritional aids used in "detox therapy" (for want of a better phrase) are also used in treatment of acute poisoning.
An example is N-acetyl cysteine, used for treatment of paracetamol (acetoaminophen in American) poisoning in hospitals and also in such therapy. By the way, the reason this stuff works for both is that NAC is one of the components of glutathione; and glutathione is the limiting compound for various sorts of detoxification processes in the liver, mostly involving glutathione peroxidase.
Toxins appear as contaminants (pesticide residues, plasticisers leached from containers and heavy metals such as lead), plant-derived compounds such as solanine from tomatoes and potatoes and oxalic acid from spinach, and bacterial metabolic byproducts such as various long-chain diamines (such as putrescine) and various higher alcohols. The toxin consumed in largest quantity is probaly ethanol, by the way.
Detox therapy varies, but usually involves fasting in some form because in this way intake of all three classes of toxins is reduced. As an example, the bacterial byproducts are usually produced from incompletely digested protein, in the lower intestine, by bacteria which are generally pathogenic but kept in check by probiotic bacteria such as Lactobacillus acidophilus.
Detox therapy generally involves getting the stuff out of various storage sites where it's been put to reduce the harm, such as fat cells, into the bloodstream, and then getting it into the liver for detoxification or just straight out through the kidneys or bile. This last is the main route out for heavy metals, and the main agents for it are various sulphur amino acids and other sulphur compounds. This is the reason why garlic is detoxifying; exotic sulphur compounds such as diallylcysteine bind very effectively indeed to heavy metals and the chelate compound is water-soluble. This is a rather milder version of the medical therapy using EDTA.
Detox therapy works, but the trouble is that the subject of such therapy has to cooperate. It isn't an easy option.
OK, here goes. Toxins in the diet, or created by internal bacteria and the like? There are a few. We are not talking here about acute poisons, by the way, although some of the herbal and nutritional aids used in "detox therapy" (for want of a better phrase) are also used in treatment of acute poisoning.
An example is N-acetyl cysteine, used for treatment of paracetamol (acetoaminophen in American) poisoning in hospitals and also in such therapy. By the way, the reason this stuff works for both is that NAC is one of the components of glutathione; and glutathione is the limiting compound for various sorts of detoxification processes in the liver, mostly involving glutathione peroxidase.
Toxins appear as contaminants (pesticide residues, plasticisers leached from containers and heavy metals such as lead), plant-derived compounds such as solanine from tomatoes and potatoes and oxalic acid from spinach, and bacterial metabolic byproducts such as various long-chain diamines (such as putrescine) and various higher alcohols. The toxin consumed in largest quantity is probaly ethanol, by the way.
Detox therapy varies, but usually involves fasting in some form because in this way intake of all three classes of toxins is reduced. As an example, the bacterial byproducts are usually produced from incompletely digested protein, in the lower intestine, by bacteria which are generally pathogenic but kept in check by probiotic bacteria such as Lactobacillus acidophilus.
Detox therapy generally involves getting the stuff out of various storage sites where it's been put to reduce the harm, such as fat cells, into the bloodstream, and then getting it into the liver for detoxification or just straight out through the kidneys or bile. This last is the main route out for heavy metals, and the main agents for it are various sulphur amino acids and other sulphur compounds. This is the reason why garlic is detoxifying; exotic sulphur compounds such as diallylcysteine bind very effectively indeed to heavy metals and the chelate compound is water-soluble. This is a rather milder version of the medical therapy using EDTA.
Detox therapy works, but the trouble is that the subject of such therapy has to cooperate. It isn't an easy option.
You need to show first that the person is intoxicated or under so much chemical stress that he's suffering a loss in function first.... Which is almost impossible.
The claims that people feel "fresher" or are more energetic can be easily laid at the placebo effect....
Its just another beauty treatment tactic, meant to argue that modern lifestyles are bombarding people with too much toxins and you need help now.
The claims that people feel "fresher" or are more energetic can be easily laid at the placebo effect....
Its just another beauty treatment tactic, meant to argue that modern lifestyles are bombarding people with too much toxins and you need help now.
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From Quackwatch a bit old, but still holds some truthkinnison wrote:Azazal: *snip*
"Detoxification" with Pills and Fasting
Frances M. Berg, M.S.
It's an irrational concept, yet an intriguing idea, that modern life so fills us with poisons from polluted air and food additives that we need to be periodically "cleaned out" ("detoxified"). Never mind that natural chemicals in our foods are thousands of times more potent than additives, or that most Americans are healthier, live longer, and can choose from the most healthful food supply ever available.
The elaborate, manipulative hoax of "detoxification" is gaining ground. Many people sincerely believe that their intestines, colon, and blood stream are subject to "clogging" by undigested foods and poisons. Food faddists seem to have a special fascination with bowels, colons, and body wastes.)
The supposed need to detox is promoted through extensive writings, advertisements and door-to-door pitches. This usually involves fasting several times a year for a few days while taking laxatives or diuretics to "clean out the system."
Some entrepreneurs claim that detoxing is a great way to jump-start a diet by losing 5 or 10 pounds before you even begin the diet itself. And if their scheme is not about weight loss, "rejuvenation" is typically recommended afterward. People who are persuaded that these activities will restore vigorous youth can wind up hooked on an herbal regimen that costs several hundred dollars a month. The questionable products include:
In the "Inches Away plan," the client eats no solid food for three days, drinks only water with lemon juice and honey added, and takes three kinds of herbal capsules. This is claimed to cleanse the digestive tract of accumulated waste and putrefied bacteria, clean out the major organs and blood, and give mental clarity because it stops the mind's bombardment by chemicals and food additives. After three days of detox, the client takes four kinds of diet pills in combination, up to 30 a day, and visits the diet center for weekly body wraps and daily simulated action on 10 passive exercise tables.
In the Sambu Internal Cleansing Program, "Dr. Dunner of Switzerland" advises detoxing by drinking a special tea with pills that combine elderberries and birch-juniper.
The Herbal Cleansing and Detox Program from the Indiana Botanic Gardens of Hammond, Ind., includes a tea and tablets containing ginger, prickly ash, yellow dock, cascara sagrada, psyllium and uva ursi. "With your body free of harmful toxins, you will feel younger, better, healthier and happier!" Claimed benefits are increased energy, better digestion, normal weight maintenance, clearer complexion, good circulation, mental alertness, balanced function of vital cleansing organs, and stronger defense system. (Cost for a supply of tea and tablets is $29.90.)
The Health Center for Better Living of Naples, Fla., promotes Colon Helper and an amusing theory: "It has been proven by medical authorities that nearly half of all sickness starts in the colon . . . when the colon is kept clean, disease in the body is very rare." After this the dieter might choose their Trim Fast pills, Herbal Food Combination Weight Loss Formula #59, Dieter's Delight Herbal Tea, or Good-Bye Cellulite.
Detoxification Relief is marketed by Home Health of Virginia Beach, Va. It helps you stop harmful effects from "overindulgence," or from tobacco, alcohol and pollution.
Dr. Clayton's Natural Program for Weight Control combines three kinds of pills, two for cleansing and one for weight loss. Blood Cleanser is claimed to "detoxify the blood and tissues," and the Herba-Clenz is for "cleansing and healing the bowel."
The detoxification theory can enable con artists to gain great power over their customers by diagnosing and curing "potentially fatal" (but nonexistent) illnesses. "They have to invent the idea of toxins," says Peter Fodor, president of the Lipoplasty Society of North America, "because that gives them something to pretend they can fix."
It can be terrifying to believe that one's body is being poisoned by toxins from within. But if this were true, the human race would not have survived, says Vincent F. Cordaro, M.D., an FDA medical officer. "A person who retained wastes and toxins would be very ill and could die if not treated. The whole concept is irrational and unscientific."
This was covered on the BBC's "The Truth about Food" series; your body will get rid of "toxins" in short order naturally (usually within 48 hours), detox diets don't do shit.
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Amen, brother. You beat me to it.Azazal wrote:snip
"Detoxification" is just more acting out crap that crazy people get into. These are usually the same people who distrust mainstream medicine (medicine is "the man" afterall), so they get into aromatherapy, homeopathy drinking urine, etc. Then when mainstream science comes along and shows why these things are bs, they plug their ears like a creationist and say "nuh uh!"
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I'd also like to point out that fasting actually brings some genuine toxins out of fat-storage and into the bloodstream where they can start doing damage again. These are not, however, commonly found in the environment and generally cause such distress anyhow that its pretty obvious the person is sick.
Otherwise - we evolved to cope with plant and bacterial toxins in the environment. I mean, our distant ancestors drank water straight from rivers where hippos and crocs shit daily, ate uncooked food, ate wild plants which almost invariably contain more toxins then domestic ones, ate unrefrigerated meat, and had the sanitary practices of animals. If they couldn't have coped without weird ass juice diets and herbal capsules we wouldn't be here.
Otherwise - we evolved to cope with plant and bacterial toxins in the environment. I mean, our distant ancestors drank water straight from rivers where hippos and crocs shit daily, ate uncooked food, ate wild plants which almost invariably contain more toxins then domestic ones, ate unrefrigerated meat, and had the sanitary practices of animals. If they couldn't have coped without weird ass juice diets and herbal capsules we wouldn't be here.
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One thing I wanted to mention about a previous reply that had to do with detoxification and substance abuse; the word "detox," as it applies to going into rehab, is somewhat misleading. It doesn't refer to a patient somehow cleansing pathogens from his or her body, it just means that the individual is managing a withdrawal syndrome in a supervised setting.
Sure, the human race is adapted to environmental toxins or we wouldn't be here.
However, I know of no natural sources of DDT, Alar, PCBs, tetraethyl lead, dinonyl phthalate, organophosphates, paraquat, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, glyphosate or chloroform. There aren't many sources, or particularly concentrated ones, of polonium, lead, cadmium and mercury either. Also, most animals, and humans in a natural state, don't have mercury embedded in their teeth. Therefore, we aren't particularly well adapted to getting rid of all that filth.
It is suspected that one of the reasons for the downfall of the Roman Empire was their habit of sweetening wine with lead acetate. Combined with their lead pipes...
Detox therapy doesn't work? OK. Tell that to the dozens of people that I have personally advised and now feel much better, including at least one that had asthma, hypertension, a suspected brain abscess, vertigo, eczema, acne rosacea and a few other problems, including about sixty excess pounds - and all those problems pretty well went away when she started on a Candida albicans-reducing exclusion diet.
Incidentally, the reason why conventional medicine doesn't recognise candidiasis, unless it's so severe that the stuff is in the bloodstream, may not be unconnected with the fact that said profession causes about 95% of cases by grossly excessive use of antibiotics and steroids.
Doctors and the drug industry have a very effective propaganda organisation, despite the fact that they, between them, kill more people than all the criminals and careless drivers put together.
However, I know of no natural sources of DDT, Alar, PCBs, tetraethyl lead, dinonyl phthalate, organophosphates, paraquat, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, glyphosate or chloroform. There aren't many sources, or particularly concentrated ones, of polonium, lead, cadmium and mercury either. Also, most animals, and humans in a natural state, don't have mercury embedded in their teeth. Therefore, we aren't particularly well adapted to getting rid of all that filth.
It is suspected that one of the reasons for the downfall of the Roman Empire was their habit of sweetening wine with lead acetate. Combined with their lead pipes...
Detox therapy doesn't work? OK. Tell that to the dozens of people that I have personally advised and now feel much better, including at least one that had asthma, hypertension, a suspected brain abscess, vertigo, eczema, acne rosacea and a few other problems, including about sixty excess pounds - and all those problems pretty well went away when she started on a Candida albicans-reducing exclusion diet.
Incidentally, the reason why conventional medicine doesn't recognise candidiasis, unless it's so severe that the stuff is in the bloodstream, may not be unconnected with the fact that said profession causes about 95% of cases by grossly excessive use of antibiotics and steroids.
Doctors and the drug industry have a very effective propaganda organisation, despite the fact that they, between them, kill more people than all the criminals and careless drivers put together.
I recognise most of those things being treatable with other placebos, I wouldn't rely on them, though. A "detox" diet is no better than a simple proper diet.kinnison wrote: Detox therapy doesn't work? OK. Tell that to the dozens of people that I have personally advised and now feel much better, including at least one that had asthma, hypertension, a suspected brain abscess, vertigo, eczema, acne rosacea and a few other problems, including about sixty excess pounds - and all those problems pretty well went away when she started on a Candida albicans-reducing exclusion diet.
Hah! You can fuck off to your homeopathy kit, frankly.Doctors and the drug industry have a very effective propaganda organisation, despite the fact that they, between them, kill more people than all the criminals and careless drivers put together.
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Oh, jesus. Why is that every quack around the world says either to "the downfall of the Roman Empire happened because they did/had/used <enter what the quack thinks is The Killer(TM)>?kinnison wrote:It is suspected that one of the reasons for the downfall of the Roman Empire was their habit of sweetening wine with lead acetate. Combined with their lead pipes...
Alternative, they use ancient Egypt or Greece.
Come on, people. If your particular diet or miracle cure works, it should be simple to prove without using retarded arguments like these.
To add to that, there's also the idea of Darwinian Gastronomy, which posits that humans acquired tastes for spices to protect us from those same natural toxins. Which is to say, a healthy and flavorful diet will give you a healthy body (no shit!). Detoxification is just another one of these bizarre "health" obsessions that completely ignore the way our body actually works.Broomstick wrote:Otherwise - we evolved to cope with plant and bacterial toxins in the environment. I mean, our distant ancestors drank water straight from rivers where hippos and crocs shit daily, ate uncooked food, ate wild plants which almost invariably contain more toxins then domestic ones, ate unrefrigerated meat, and had the sanitary practices of animals. If they couldn't have coped without weird ass juice diets and herbal capsules we wouldn't be here.
Here's a hint. Its call urine and sweat. Even fat deposits. As long as the toxin is stored in an inactive form, it doesn't do stuff to you. That's why its harmful to have abdominal fat deposits, but not fatty thighs. The fat in your thighs is inactive, but the one on your tummy isn't.kinnison wrote:Sure, the human race is adapted to environmental toxins or we wouldn't be here.
However, I know of no natural sources of DDT, Alar, PCBs, tetraethyl lead, dinonyl phthalate, organophosphates, paraquat, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, glyphosate or chloroform. There aren't many sources, or particularly concentrated ones, of polonium, lead, cadmium and mercury either. Also, most animals, and humans in a natural state, don't have mercury embedded in their teeth. Therefore, we aren't particularly well adapted to getting rid of all that filth.
And the Chinese routinely imbue mercury in lots of Chinese medicine. So?It is suspected that one of the reasons for the downfall of the Roman Empire was their habit of sweetening wine with lead acetate. Combined with their lead pipes...
Hypertension? You put her on a low salt, fat diet. She presumably lost weight.Detox therapy doesn't work? OK. Tell that to the dozens of people that I have personally advised and now feel much better, including at least one that had asthma, hypertension, a suspected brain abscess, vertigo, eczema, acne rosacea and a few other problems, including about sixty excess pounds - and all those problems pretty well went away when she started on a Candida albicans-reducing exclusion diet.
Suspected brain abscess? Its either yes or not, isn't it?
Vertigo? It comes and go. Live with it.
Asthma and eczema? If the person in particular is actually allergic to red meat, I don't see what the miracle cure is.
And where does this interesting fact comes from? Cause, most of the stuff I see is that candidiasis emerges from poor sex habits, lousy hygiene and poor immunity.Incidentally, the reason why conventional medicine doesn't recognise candidiasis, unless it's so severe that the stuff is in the bloodstream, may not be unconnected with the fact that said profession causes about 95% of cases by grossly excessive use of antibiotics and steroids.
Except that even though their propganda is effective, so is their drugs. Yours isn't.Doctors and the drug industry have a very effective propaganda organisation, despite the fact that they, between them, kill more people than all the criminals and careless drivers put together.
Let him land on any Lyran world to taste firsthand the wrath of peace loving people thwarted by the myopic greed of a few miserly old farts- Katrina Steiner
Wait a second, somehow I missed this part.
* This completely over-the-top exaggeration of the number of Monastat commericials I've seen is sponsored by Monastat-7.
Conventional medicine doesn't recognize candidiasis? You mean like yeast infections, among others? That's funny, 'cause I was totally sure I've seen on the order of a few hundred million* Monastat-7 commercials on TV. And you want to explain how antibiotics cause fungal infections, or are you just totally talking out of your ass?kinnison wrote:...and all those problems pretty well went away when she started on a Candida albicans-reducing exclusion diet.
Incidentally, the reason why conventional medicine doesn't recognise candidiasis, unless it's so severe that the stuff is in the bloodstream, may not be unconnected with the fact that said profession causes about 95% of cases by grossly excessive use of antibiotics and steroids.
* This completely over-the-top exaggeration of the number of Monastat commericials I've seen is sponsored by Monastat-7.
kinnison is full of bullshit, but antibiotics can in some cases cause/worsen a fungal infection if they nuke the benign bacteria that's competing with the fungi for resources.Turin wrote:Wait a second, somehow I missed this part.Conventional medicine doesn't recognize candidiasis? You mean like yeast infections, among others? That's funny, 'cause I was totally sure I've seen on the order of a few hundred million* Monastat-7 commercials on TV. And you want to explain how antibiotics cause fungal infections, or are you just totally talking out of your ass?kinnison wrote:...and all those problems pretty well went away when she started on a Candida albicans-reducing exclusion diet.
Incidentally, the reason why conventional medicine doesn't recognise candidiasis, unless it's so severe that the stuff is in the bloodstream, may not be unconnected with the fact that said profession causes about 95% of cases by grossly excessive use of antibiotics and steroids.
* This completely over-the-top exaggeration of the number of Monastat commericials I've seen is sponsored by Monastat-7.
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Damn, PainRack beat me to my usual rebuttal - good job!
But kinnison - I want to add one more concept to the dialogue here:
DATA IS NOT THE PLURAL OF ANNECDOTE!
But kinnison - I want to add one more concept to the dialogue here:
DATA IS NOT THE PLURAL OF ANNECDOTE!
A life is like a garden. Perfect moments can be had, but not preserved, except in memory. Leonard Nimoy.
Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
Sam Vimes Theory of Economic Injustice
Now I did a job. I got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character so let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job. And then I get paid.- Malcolm Reynolds, Captain of Serenity, which sums up my feelings regarding the lawsuit discussed here.
If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. - John F. Kennedy
Sam Vimes Theory of Economic Injustice
I will be the first to admit that conventional medicine is not perfect or even optimal for treating chronic problems. If you have a broken bone going to the doctor's great, but a tension headache the doctor's likely to give you some Tylenol and send you on your way, unless you go to a headache specialist who will teach you how to avoid triggers. Also, doctors rarely tell older patients to work out, exercise, lose weight -- they treat the symptoms and that's bound to lead to problems since the cause isn't addressed such as poor eating habits and so on.kinnison wrote:Doctors and the drug industry have a very effective propaganda organisation, despite the fact that they, between them, kill more people than all the criminals and careless drivers put together.
But to equate that with murder? Or even negligence? You are one dumb fuck. Doctors do the best they do with the training at hand, and it's also an economic problem. A doctor cannot afford to spend 30 minutes every single checkup to explain to you to get a better diet and eat less bullshit. Most people wouldn't listen anyway. So they do the best they can in the 15 minutes they have with you. There is a non-trivial distinction between actively going out to kill someone and not doing everything you can to save someone's life -- a doctor can't help a fatass lose weight if he doesn't want to.
Or am I overestimating your intelligence and are you actually claiming doctors kill people with medicine, and that this is statistically significant? Because I'd like to see your proof of that, and the cost-benefit analysis you've done. I bet you'll bring up bullshit like one person's allergic reactions to a vaccine, when millions are helped by it.
Sorry for double post, but forgot to reply to this point. Excessive use of antibiotics? Excessive use of steroids? Says fucking who?
Doctors are loathe to prescribe antibiotics, because they know overprescription can negate the effectiveness of their frontline drugs. One time I went in with a sore throat, and got turned away and told to suck it up because my throat didn't look bad enough. It fucking hurt like hell, and the doctor was still wary. Then I came back later and he grudgingly gave me antibiotics. Another time with an ingrown toenail the doctor didn't want to give me antibiotics, even though it was clearly infected, because I was having surgery anyway to fix the toenail and there was no point giving antibiotics for an open wound that would just get reinfected later. I had an abscess in my ass awhile ago, and the doctor told me there was no point prescribing antibiotics since the infection was so bad the only way out was draining it.
And steroids? Look: the last time I went in to the hospital they prescribed codeine to me as a pain killer, but the nurse even encouraged me not to use it unless pain was excruciating. All the pharmacies over here give out pamphlets and brochures outlining the side effects of drugs. The pharmacist I bought my drugs from kept pestering me whether I had ever taken antibiotics before or painkillers before. So I have a hard time believing that there's an overprescription of hormones, especially since I am one of these "always sick never feel healthy" people who have seen many doctors and have never had any bullshit medicine prescribed to me. It's the complete opposite.
So before you bash doctors for all the problems of patients let me clue you in on something: any person who goes to a doctor expecting a magic pill and blaming the doctor for not giving one is a moron. It won't happen, and when it doesn't they blame doctors for not dealing with mercury fillings, sore muscles, poor diet, chemicals in their food which causes allergic reactions. Well fucking duh a doctor isn't a dentist, a doctor isn't a personal trainer, a doctor isn't responsible for what you eat besides giving general guidelines. He can do thousands of expensive diagnostic tests to figure out that there's nothing wrong with you, or he can do what most doctors do, brush off people with chronic problems who don't want to help themselves for patients with acute problems. Any person who goes into a doctor and expects a pill for "feeling bad" and is unable to articulate his problem beyond that is just plain stupid. The blood tests will come up negative, and doctor will say either nothing or if he's one of the good ones suggest a lifestyle change. But doctors are not personal coaches or Richard Simmons.
Doctors are loathe to prescribe antibiotics, because they know overprescription can negate the effectiveness of their frontline drugs. One time I went in with a sore throat, and got turned away and told to suck it up because my throat didn't look bad enough. It fucking hurt like hell, and the doctor was still wary. Then I came back later and he grudgingly gave me antibiotics. Another time with an ingrown toenail the doctor didn't want to give me antibiotics, even though it was clearly infected, because I was having surgery anyway to fix the toenail and there was no point giving antibiotics for an open wound that would just get reinfected later. I had an abscess in my ass awhile ago, and the doctor told me there was no point prescribing antibiotics since the infection was so bad the only way out was draining it.
And steroids? Look: the last time I went in to the hospital they prescribed codeine to me as a pain killer, but the nurse even encouraged me not to use it unless pain was excruciating. All the pharmacies over here give out pamphlets and brochures outlining the side effects of drugs. The pharmacist I bought my drugs from kept pestering me whether I had ever taken antibiotics before or painkillers before. So I have a hard time believing that there's an overprescription of hormones, especially since I am one of these "always sick never feel healthy" people who have seen many doctors and have never had any bullshit medicine prescribed to me. It's the complete opposite.
So before you bash doctors for all the problems of patients let me clue you in on something: any person who goes to a doctor expecting a magic pill and blaming the doctor for not giving one is a moron. It won't happen, and when it doesn't they blame doctors for not dealing with mercury fillings, sore muscles, poor diet, chemicals in their food which causes allergic reactions. Well fucking duh a doctor isn't a dentist, a doctor isn't a personal trainer, a doctor isn't responsible for what you eat besides giving general guidelines. He can do thousands of expensive diagnostic tests to figure out that there's nothing wrong with you, or he can do what most doctors do, brush off people with chronic problems who don't want to help themselves for patients with acute problems. Any person who goes into a doctor and expects a pill for "feeling bad" and is unable to articulate his problem beyond that is just plain stupid. The blood tests will come up negative, and doctor will say either nothing or if he's one of the good ones suggest a lifestyle change. But doctors are not personal coaches or Richard Simmons.