Orange Juice Placebo?

tesscaline said:
Thing is, it's your responsibility to show that you're right. You haven't done that.
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More like I'm openly speculating with the disclaimer of "perhaps" before statements.

Media representations of scientific studies are known to be fraught with mistakes, conclusions taken out of context, inappropriate use of quotes from scientists, and even at times out and out lies. Without the actual study, no one can really know if what you're saying the media article says is correct, or if what you're extrapolating from that media article of the study is anywhere near what the study could possibly imply.
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The bitter/nausea study
Here, we report the first direct demonstration that bitter taste stimulation, but not sweet, salty, or umami taste, induces nausea, showing that the body not only detects potential toxins but anticipates their ingestion by inducing a prophylactic aversive state.
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The pain study
 
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Joey McGee said:
What I'm saying is that the body changes what it is doing based on the presence of new nutrients. It's not that the potassium goes directly to the muscles to help, it's that the hormonal changes cause a shift in the state of the body. Does the sucrose go directly to the nerves to dull the pain? They applied the sugar 2 mins before the procedure tops.
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I think you are drastically misunderstanding that study, and how "pain" can be affected by things like taste, sight, sound, etc.

I highly doubt that the study you're referring to is trying to say that the sweet taste has anything to do with how nerve endings respond. In fact, given what I know about the human body and how it handles and interprets pain, I'm pretty darned certain that isn't what the study is saying at all.

But you haven't actually linked the study have you. You're doing nothing but making assumption after assumption based on a really obviously faulty understanding of human physiology.

Show evidence. Don't make baseless suppositions that popped into your head because "you read an article".
 
Joey McGee said:
More like I'm openly speculating with the disclaimer of "perhaps" before statements.
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Right... And it's still not our responsibility to show that you're wrong.

The bitter/nausea study

The pain study
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Oh good. Studies that don't actually say anything about nutrients affecting physiology. I see classes of tastes (sweet & bitter) affecting emotional response and situational perception. Not physiology. These don't actually support your suppositions at all. You've read WAY more into these studies than what they actually say.
 
tesscaline said:
Right... And it's still not our responsibility to show that you're wrong.
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It's not really anyone's responsibility to do anything because I'm not even saying that I'm right, am I? I'm saying what it makes me think, I fully expected people to disagree and hoped to learn something. Is that so wrong? I'd understand your outrage if I was openly declaring it to be true.

Oh good. Studies that don't actually say anything about nutrients affecting physiology. I see classes of tastes (sweet & bitter) affecting emotional response and situational perception. Not physiology. These don't actually support your suppositions at all. You've read WAY more into these studies than what they actually say.
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How is a baby not physiologically affected if an analgesic effect takes place? It's having an "emotional response" and is "perceiving situations differently?" It's a baby.

And if the bitter effect causes "aversive anticipatory responses that prepare the body to contain, repel, and punish our ingestion of anti-nutrients or toxins." How is taste not causing a physiological effect there?

And how is it a stretch to say that orange juice might create similar effect, only positive?
 
Joey McGee said:
It's not really anyone's responsibility to do anything because I'm not even saying that I'm right, am I? I'm saying what it makes me think, I fully expected people to disagree and hoped to learn something. Is that so wrong? I'd understand your outrage if I was openly declaring it to be true.
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You asked us to demonstrate that you're wrong. That's not our job. It's your job to demonstrate that you're not wrong.

How is a baby not physiologically affected if an analgesic effect takes place? It's having an "emotional response" and is "perceiving situations differently?" It's a baby.

And if the bitter effect causes "aversive anticipatory responses that prepare the body to contain, repel, and punish our ingestion of anti-nutrients or toxins." How is taste not causing a physiological effect there?

And how is it a stretch to say that orange juice might create similar effect, only positive?
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Do you understand the brain's role in things like "pain" and "anticipation"? These are not direct physiological responses. They are the brain receiving a stimuli, and causing the body to react a certain way due to expectation of following result. In other words, a placebo effect.

It's not a stretch to say that orange juice might create a similar effect. In fact, that's what just about everyone in this thread has been saying all along. But you don't seem to understand that "placebo effects" are pretty much exactly what you're describing, and are instead attempting to ascribe these effects to a direct physiological cause.

Sugar affecting the nerve endings directly? Where did you come up with that? o.O
 
tesscaline said:
You asked us to demonstrate that you're wrong. That's not our job. It's your job to demonstrate that you're not wrong
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Give me a break. Adman said sorry to be snarky so what I meant was if you prove me completely wrong I'll be happy and will thank you. I'm not taking up an adversarial position, you are. I'm not saying I'm correct, I'm trying to have a conversation. I'll think twice next time, believe me.

Do you understand the brain's role in things like "pain" and "anticipation"? These are not direct physiological responses. They are the brain receiving a stimuli, and causing the body to react a certain way due to expectation of following result. In other words, a placebo effect.

It's not a stretch to say that orange juice might create a similar effect. In fact, that's what just about everyone in this thread has been saying all along. But you don't seem to understand that "placebo effects" are pretty much exactly what you're describing, and are instead attempting to ascribe these effects to a direct physiological cause.

Sugar affecting the nerve endings directly? Where did you come up with that? o.O
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It's obvious, if you don't think drinking OJ can have immediate physiological effects, then you don't think tasting sugar water can.

A preliminary study has been done with adults that used distilled water as a control. They also did one with an fMRI I thought it was all placebo?

The clear inference of the studies is that we have responses shaped by evolution. So it's a placebo just because we happen to be conscious of some of it? That seems to be what you're saying.
 
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I didn't hypothesize that taste alone would account for Robert's effect. He could hold some juice without swallowing it and see if that did the trick, but I doubt it would work.

There are taste cells beyond the mouth, indeed throughout the entire digestive system. Information about how much of the substance has entered (weight, expansion of stomach) and other information impossible to get from a quick taste of the tongue would be gathered there. You would think that taste would simply be the preliminary assessor.
 
Geez guys, you're harsh! All Joey did was post some interesting studies and a hypothesis which he was quite happy to be argued with, shot down in flames. He thought it was interesting (and I agree, even if I wouldn't have come to the same conclusions) so posted it for discussion and you're all over him.

A bit of politeness and a 'Here's why I disagree / think you've read too much into this' would have been a bit more appropriate.:cool:
 
From the perspective of a physician...

You don't hear about various concoctions for the treatment of leg cramps from doctors because they tend to make evidence-based recommendations. The conditions are ideal for the discovery that lots of stuff "works" regardless of whether they have an effect - the vast majority of muscle cramps resolve in a short period of time, their frequency waxes and wanes, our recollections as to their frequency and our expectations as to what we can expect without treatment are highly influenced by suggestion.

I have to admit that it didn't occur to me that I had to tell anyone that basic treatment for a leg cramp is stretching and rubbing/massaging the muscle. I thought that was common knowledge.

An important quality for a primary care physician is that they listen to you and are not dismissive. This may not matter much if you are healthy and uncomplicated. But if you can, it's good reason to look for a different primary care doctor.

I find Joey McGee's idea intriguing. Taking, as an example, something we know fairly well...when your blood sugar drops, one of your body's responses is to release adrenaline, which leads to tremors, sweating and hunger. If you take a sugary drink, these symptoms resolve within a few minutes. Considering that the absorption of sugars takes longer than a few minutes, there is likely some other reason for the resolution of these symptoms. Could it be that in anticipation of the eventual sugar absorption (which you know about because of the sweet taste of your drink), your body turns off the adrenaline release? While this is unlikely, it's worth considering long enough to discuss it a little.

Linda
 
fls said:
From the perspective of a physician...

You don't hear about various concoctions for the treatment of leg cramps from doctors because they tend to make evidence-based recommendations.
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For my part, I was not wondering why my doctors never recommended "concoctions", but why they never mentioned to me the role that Potassium and Sodium can play in musclw cramps. It would then have been up to me to make the connection to my extremely high sodium intake and extremely low Potassium intake. Or for the doctor to order blood/urine tests to measure their levels in my body. As for stretching and massaging's help being "common knowledge". I first started having these issues when I was 11 or 12 years old, when I was quite short on "common knowledge". Also, I would thin it fairly unwise, if not dangerous, for a doctor to simply assume that a patient knows something pertinent to a condition they have.
 
A.T. said:
Correct, but don't use the counteracting muscles to stretch the cramped muscle. They might cramp too, and then you are really screwed.
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Even now, at 53 years old, I don't fully understand which muscles are the "counteracting" ones to which.

I get cramps in my calves and in my thighs. And I know that in one case, stretching the muscles by "pointing the toes" forward helps, and, in the other, harms. In the other case, stretching by standing a couple of feet away from a wall, placing the foot of the cramping leg flat on the floor a step behind me, and leaning forward into the wall though doing push-ups on it) is the right way to stretch the muscle.
 
RSLancastr said:
For my part, I was not wondering why my doctors never recommended "concoctions", but why they never mentioned to me the role that Potassium and Sodium can play in musclw cramps. It would then have been up to me to make the connection to my extremely high sodium intake and extremely low Potassium intake. Or for the doctor to order blood/urine tests to measure their levels in my body.
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Evidence-based medicine would apply to this part as well. You made a self-diagnosis but I wouldn't really expect a doctor to bring it up unless it was a legitimate concern, and we don't know that this was the case.

As for stretching and massaging's help being "common knowledge". I first started having these issues when I was 11 or 12 years old, when I was quite short on "common knowledge". Also, I would thin it fairly unwise, if not dangerous, for a doctor to simply assume that a patient knows something pertinent to a condition they have.
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I think it is as children that we learn about these things. That's when we first start doing sports and get exposed to things like Charley horses, for example. I'm not chastising you for not knowing something, it's just that doctors don't necessarily realize that a patient is doing something out of the ordinary if the patient doesn't bring it up. And it may not be fruitful to play twenty-questions with all your patients in order to avoid missing something like this. Open-ended questions might help pick something like this up, such as, "describe what happens when you get a cramp". That was one thing which experience taught me very quickly...learning how to ask questions in a way that will bring something non-obvious to light.

Linda
 
fls said:
Evidence-based medicine would apply to this part as well. You made a self-diagnosis but I wouldn't really expect a doctor to bring it up unless it was a legitimate concern, and we don't know that this was the case.
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I think it is as children that we learn about these things. That's when we first start doing sports and get exposed to things like Charley horses, for example.
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Perhaps with most people. I, on the other hand, at 53 years old, still have only a vague notion of what a Charley Horse even is. If I've ever had one, I didn't know what it was called.
 
Apparently Charley-horse can mean two different things. We don't use the expression here and would call the two things a "dead leg" and just a cramp in the leg.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charley_horse

Stetching against the cramp was certaibly something I learned as a child. I did a lot of gymnastics and all that toe pointing would often result incramp in the toes or arch of the foot. Everyone knew to pull the toes upwards to get rid of it. Walking on a very cold surface also seemed to help.
 
Professor Yaffle said:
Apparently Charley-horse can mean two different things. We don't use the expression here and would call the two things a "dead leg" and just a cramp in the leg.
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Where I grew up (Southern California), it referred to a specific type of leg cramp resulting from a sharp blow to a leg muscle. Again, I've never had one.
 
Very interesting stuff all around, wouldn't it be awesome to see an orange juice trial to dig into it?

Richard Feynman knew a thing or two about orange juice, he was onto it for sure.
 
Speaking of cramps, here's a mutha I still get on occasion:

It happens sometimes when I yawn. a muscle in the front right side of my neck cramps up like a rock. Stretching - by pointing my chin towards the ceiling - usually relieves it, but not always. Dunno if I've ever tried the OJ cure with it...

Another, which usually happens while I am leaning way forward (say, picking something up off of the floor). A muscle in the right side of my stomach area siezes up. It's not a run-to-the-bathroom-quick kind of stomach cramp, just a muscle near the surface, under my right moob. If I'm in bed when this happens, I can stretch it out by straightening my body out as far as I can, but this is problematic if it happens while I'm in my wheelchair. Again, dunno if I;ve tried the OJ with it.
 
Had another leg cramp last night. I'd decided after starting this thread that I would do my best to not ask Susan to get me a bottle of OJ, but to just do stretches/massages and/or "tough it out" rather than add to her already-considerable burden of taking care of me (and to spare me more of her mocking my "Magic elixer". But last night the cramp set in hard and fast, and no sitting up, massaging/stretching was having an effect on it. So I asked her for a bottle, and she graciously brought me one without comment. I drank it down, and - voila!! cramp gone.
 
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