More celebrity woo woo – "Cupping"

[RichardR]

Link: (http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/dailydish/)

Actress Gwyneth Paltrow stunned onlookers at a special New York screening of "Anchorman" by sporting a strapless top that exposed a series of large circular blotches on her skin.

The beauty -- who gave birth to her first child, Apple, with husband Chris Martin in May -- made no attempt to conceal the bizarre spots on a glitzy night out in Manhattan on Wednesday night.

But skin experts have dismissed suggestions there's a sinister background to the marks, believing they were caused by an ancient Chinese healing treatment called cupping, where heated cups draw toxins from the flesh.

Quackwatch describes this as: (http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/dictionary/mdc.html)

cupping (cupping method, cupping therapy; called the "horn method" in ancient China):

Variable method akin to moxabustion. The practitioner may use a cup made of glass, metal, or wood (notably bamboo) and burn alcohol, alcohol-soaked cotton wool, herbs, paper, or a taper therein. Before or after the burning is complete, the practitioner applies the cup upside-down to a relatively flat body surface and leaves it in this position for five to ten minutes.

Results include erythema (reddening of the skin due to capillary expansion), edema (excessive fluid accumulation in tissue spaces), and ecchymoses (purple discoloration of the skin due to rupture of blood vessels).

[Chad Noles]

My idea of "cupping" actress Gwyneth Paltrow brings a different technique to mind.;)

[Ed]

Originally posted by RichardR
Link: (http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/dailydish/)



Quackwatch describes this as: (http://www.quackwatch.org/01QuackeryRelatedTopics/dictionary/mdc.html)



Comes from the mysterious east so it must be good.

Crazy round eyes.

[Lisa Simpson]

Yech...the leprous look is just so attractive. However, I do love those wacky celebs.

[BillHoyt]

Originally posted by Chad Noles
My idea of "cupping" actress Gwyneth Paltrow brings a different technique to mind.;)
I don't think that would leave marks, unless you're overly rough.

[chrisberez]

Originally posted by Chad Noles
My idea of "cupping" actress Gwyneth Paltrow brings a different technique to mind.;)

Can I get an "amen", bretheren?!

My sentiments exactly chad. I'll cup her pseudoscience anyday.

That said, is anyone honestly suprised? I mean, we've got Madonna and Brittany "devoting" themselves to "Kababla", Travolta, Cruise and others taking up the Scientology cause... it's sad really. Many people are stupid, but these particular morons, simply because they're celebs, get the honor of being stupid in full view of the public eye.

The one thing about this- when stupid celebs addapt stupid *****, their stupid fans follow their example. I like Paltrow, I think she has some talents. It's just too bad critical thinking isn't amoung them.

[Chad Noles]

I never said I'd leave marks. That's definiately not my technique. This is neither abuse,nor arguement. They are further down the hall.

[Quasi]

Originally posted by BillHoyt

I don't think that would leave marks, unless you're overly rough.

It does, a new ager I used to know was bruised badly all the way from her lower back to her neck. She totally bought into the whole "toxin removal" cupping thing. If I ever discovered this on someone in my family I would have the woo arrested for assault and battery, regardless of whatever crap they told the police, they would be booked, cuffed, and would then have an arrest record. I think the woos know this danger which is probably why it is not as widespread. This was actually featured in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and in Ghost Magic, as are many other woo practices in the media these days (acupuncture in season 2 of 24, shiatsu massage in 6 feet under, organic foods in 6 feet and smallville.)

[BillHoyt]

Originally posted by Quasi


It does, a new ager I used to know was bruised badly all the way from her lower back to her neck. She totally bought into the whole "toxin removal" cupping thing. If I ever discovered this on someone in my family I would have the woo arrested for assault and battery, regardless of whatever crap they told the police, they would be booked, cuffed, and would then have an arrest record. I think the woos know this danger which is probably why it is not as widespread. This was actually featured in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and in Ghost Magic, as are many other woo practices in the media these days (acupuncture in season 2 of 24, shiatsu massage in 6 feet under, organic foods in 6 feet and smallville.)

(Quasi, I was talking about the other cupping...)

[Zep]

They should do it on her forehead instead.

[BPSCG]

Originally posted by Chad Noles
My idea of "cupping" actress Gwyneth Paltrow brings a different technique to mind.;) You mean "tupping".

From Othello, Act I, Scene I:
"'Zounds, sir, you're robb'd; for shame, put on your gown;
Your heart is burst, you have lost half your soul;
Even now, now, very now, an old black ram
Is tupping your white ewe. "

[BillHoyt]

Originally posted by Zep
They should do it on her forehead instead.
Hey, don't mess up the chinese quack's fun. Gwyneth comes in, complaining of a headache. He says I'll have to treat your breasts, she scratches her head says, "okay," and takes off her blouse. Come on, what kind of a man are you, zep?

[Bunk]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3879447.stm

The BBC's behavior is a bigger embarrassment than Paltrow's. The above link is from the article posted by Richard and shows Paltrow's back.

Quotes highlighted by BBC:

"There have certainly been satisfied customers for 3,000 years"

Professor Edzard Ernst, University of Exeter

"It is important to seek out a registered practitioner"

Mike O'Farrell, CEO of the British Acupuncture Council

The entire article (which appears in BBC's health section) is a raving endorsement of cupping, and I'm not talking about the type of cupping on which Paltrow should be concentrating. The only thing that could be considered remotely critical is "There is no evidence for its efficacy. It has not been submitted to clinical trials," which is followed up in the same sentence with "but there have certainly been satisfied customers for 3,000 years."

[tim]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bunk
[B]http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3879447.stm

The BBC's behavior is a bigger embarrassment than Paltrow's. The above link is from the article posted by Richard and shows Paltrow's back.

Quotes highlighted by BBC:

[b]"There have certainly been satisfied customers for 3,000 years"

Professor Edzard Ernst, University of Exeter

See this link for details of the good professor -
http://www.pms.ac.uk/compmed/ernst.htm

[BillHoyt]

Originally posted by tim
[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bunk
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3879447.stm

The BBC's behavior is a bigger embarrassment than Paltrow's. The above link is from the article posted by Richard and shows Paltrow's back.

Quotes highlighted by BBC:

[b]"There have certainly been satisfied customers for 3,000 years"

Professor Edzard Ernst, University of Exeter

See this link for details of the good professor -
http://www.pms.ac.uk/compmed/ernst.htm

Zep,

See, look at the good professor's face. See that smile? He works for Peninsula Medical School, aka PMS. When Gwyneth comes in to complain about PMS, he says "I'll have to treat your hoo-hoo." She says "okay," and drops her...

See that smile? And you want to spoil a great scam like that? Shame. Shame!

[tim]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Bunk
[B]http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3879447.stm

The BBC's behavior is a bigger embarrassment than Paltrow's. The above link is from the article posted by Richard and shows Paltrow's back.

Quotes highlighted by BBC:

[b]"There have certainly been satisfied customers for 3,000 years"

Professor Edzard Ernst, University of Exeter

See this link for details of the good professor -
http://www.pms.ac.uk/compmed/ernst.htm

[wert]

More informaiton on this nonsense. (http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=84&e=2&u=/pagesix/20040710/en_pagesix/gwynbearit)

The theory behind the procedure, explains Diane Paxton at Inner Fire, a Midtown alternative medicine clinic, is that you're sucking the evil "qi" (or energy) out of your body.

"The Chinese philosophy is that when there's movement of qi, everything's fine. When it's stagnant, that's when you start to have pain."

Or, to put it in more Western terms, "It's similar to what ice would do when you ice an injury," she said. "It's drawing blood to the capillaries."

...

Cupping was used years ago to treat tuberculosis and pneumonia, according to Post readers who called in to share their stories about bankes (the Yiddish word for the cups).

"It hurt like hell, but it worked," said one man.

Back then, the cups were used pretty much as they are now: The oxygen in them depleted by fire (thanks to cotton soaked in alcohol), they were applied to the skin, where the suction caused blood to rush to the area.

"The idea was that they'd draw out the humors," said Harry Schwartzman, a staffer at the Lower East Tenement museum, where a set of bankes are on display.

"It's all rather mysterious. It's folk medicine."

The bolded quote says it all to me. People seem more enticed by the "mysterious" than they are to the actual efficacy of the treatment.

[wert]

dupe post

[JimTheBrit]

"There have certainly been satisfied customers for 3,000 years"
Is there anyone here who would doubt this is the case?

Yes, that pms link lists Prof Ernst's training and accomplishments. What it doesn't cover is his views on his chosen field of expertise.

Radio 4: Woman's Hour 8/3/04: Should we regulate complementary and alternative medicine? (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/womanshour/2004_10_mon_01.shtml) - click on 'listen to this item' (15 mins)

A handout distributed at Prof Ernst's presentation, 11th ECSO (http://www.ecso.org/) conference, Sep 2003 -

"Complementary/Alternative Medicine for Sceptics

Professor Edzard Ernst, MD, PhD, FRCP, FRCPEd, Complementary Medicine, Peninsula Medical School, Universities Exeter & Plymouth, UK

Complementary medicine (CM) is usually defined by what it is not (e.g. not taught in Medical Schools) rather than by what it is. A positive definition now adopted by the Cochrane Collaboration describes it as '... diagnosis, treatment and/or prevention which complements mainstream medicine by contributing to a common whole, by satisfying a demand not met by orthodoxy or by diversifying the conceptual frameworks of medicine' [1]. CM is used by 25 (UK) to 70% (Germany) of the general population of western countries. This extraordinary popularity unavoidably begs the question about its evidence base - is CM safe and effective?

Those who employ CM believe it to be natural and therefore safe. Yet the hard evidence is often lacking. Some forms of CM may indeed be natural. The implication that natural always equals safe is, however, at best misleading and at worst dangerous [2]. The truth is that (serious) complications of complementary therapies have been repeatedly documented. The incidence of adverse effects is, however, usually unknown. Arguably, the most serious risk of CM is its use as an alternative to converntional medicine. The term 'alternative medicine' should therefore be abandoned altogether.

In order to judge the risk/benefit relation of CM we must also consider the issue of efficacy. Most patients who use CM preceive it as helpful. Yet the perception of effectiveness does not tell us whether a therapeutic (specific) or other (non-specific) effect led to ths impression (emphasis mine, see quote at beginning of post). With few exceptions, the efficacy for complimentary therapies has not been firmly established [3]. Therefore, we require further evidence, preferably from randomized clinical trials (RCTs). Systematic reviews or meta-analysis are needed where sufficient numbers of good quality RCTs already exist. Subsequently such data need to be put into context with data on safety and costs and to be compared to other treatment options [3].

It is concluded that, in spite of its present popularity, CM is grossly under-researched and its evidence base is therefore highly incomplete. This sorry state of affairs urgently needs changing, not least in the interests of the patient.

1. Ernst E, Resch KL, Mills S et al. Complementary medicine - a definition. Br J Gen Pract 1995;45:506.
2. Ernst E, de Smet PAGM. Risks associated with complementary therapies. In Meyler's Side Effects of Drugs, 13th edition, ed Dukes MNG. Amsterdam:Elsevier, 1996.
3. Ernst E, Pittler MH, Stevinson C, White AR. The desktop guide to complementary and alternative medicine. Edinburgh; Mosby, July 2001."

Let's not be too hasty in our labelling.

[BillHoyt]

Originally posted by JimTheBrit


Let's not be too hasty in our labelling.
While he is trying to be reasonable, he is actually being mealy-mouthed. Here, for instance, is what he said to the Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/interview/story/0,12982,1048653,00.html) last year:

"His first post was in a homeopathic hospital in Munich, where he was greatly impressed. "If you study medicine and pharmacology, you know [homeopathy] can't work," he says. The active substances in homeopathic medicines are so diluted that pharmacology says they cannot have an effect. "Then you start working in a homeopathic hospital and people get better. Is that a miracle? It certainly is very impressive for a young doctor."

Later, we find this:
"Looking through a summary of the mountain of papers his unit has published in 10 years, a lesser mortal might feel discouraged. Most of the findings on the efficacy of therapies and treatments are either negative or inconclusive because too little research has been done for anyone to be sure. But not Ernst.

"They are not always negative results. In meta analyses [pooling the results of all available good quality studies], we generate quite a lot of positive results," he says. "



Are we being hasty? Or is he sadly deluded? Here we see him asserting that medication which absolutely cannot work worked. Here we see him incapable of understanding placebo.

[Ratman_tf]

Originally posted by Quasi

organic foods in 6 feet and smallville.)

I think we already talked about this, but what's the big woo about organic foods? Some people don't like to eat pesticides, and some people provide them with that product. I don't remember anything in Smallville that was wooish about the Kent farm's food products. (Not that they went into it very much anyway)

[Zep]

Originally posted by BillHoyt

Hey, don't mess up the chinese quack's fun. Gwyneth comes in, complaining of a headache. He says I'll have to treat your breasts, she scratches her head says, "okay," and takes off her blouse. Come on, what kind of a man are you, zep? One who would like to see if both Paltrow AND the woo quack would fall for the gag! I reckon it would be a hoot - big red dots on her forehead! Don't give a bugger how the quack gets his hots...

[dmarker]

I may be betraying more knowledge than I should know here. But many of these quack nostroms are practiced in the S&M scene. That includes cupping.

No one think it cures anything, they just like the feeling it gives.

[BPSCG]

Originally posted by Zep
One who would like to see if both Paltrow AND the woo quack would fall for the gag! I reckon it would be a hoot - big red dots on her forehead! Don't give a bugger how the quack gets his hots... Now, wait a minute. This cupping business is really weird. I mean, what cupping amounts to is giving someone a giant-sized hickey.

Mechanically.

So, this is really weird, right? I mean, if I were going to give Gwyneth Paltrow a hickey, I could think of better ways to do it than by hauling out a bunch of equipment.

[Soapy Sam]

At last! The killer idea for my retirement fund!
Soapy Sam's Hollywood Hypobaric Whole Body Hickey (Pat pending).

Gwyneth, my love, you want equipment, THIS is equipment.

http://www.qinetiq.com/home/core_skills/knowledge_information_and_systems/Sub_Landing1/facilities/hypobaric.html

[SquishyDave]

Originally posted by Ratman_tf
I think we already talked about this, but what's the big woo about organic foods? Some people don't like to eat pesticides, and some people provide them with that product. I don't remember anything in Smallville that was wooish about the Kent farm's food products. (Not that they went into it very much anyway) Pesticides are used on organic foods. Here is a list of synthetic pesticides that can be used in the US and UK and still retain an "organic" label on your food.

copper sulfate
copper oxychloride
copper hydroxide
potassium permanganate
mineral oils
calcium polysulfide

If you are buying organic because you think there are no pesticides, you are misinformed, let me know if you would like to know more about organic growing practices.

[Blondin]

This reminds me of a similar "remedy" called "coning" or "candling".

See:
Health Canada (http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/english/iyh/medical/candling.html)
or
CBC Marketplace (http://www.cbc.ca/consumers/market/files/health/earcandle/)

If you google candling you'll find plenty of sites like the above which warn about the ineffectiveness and hazards of this silly practice but they are far outnumbered by the perveyors and proponents.

I can't find it right now but a few months ago I came across an article about a slightly different kind of candling - they put the candle or cone in a different orifice (yes, that one!). I wish I could find it, it was quite serious but hilarious. At least it isn't as likely to leave marks where most people will see them...

[shemp]

More about this horsesh!t:

CBS Early Show (http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/12/earlyshow/health/main628788.shtml)

I actually wasted 5 minutes of my life watching this segment while I was on the treadmill this morning. What a load! Especially this claim:

"Cupping brings fresh blood to the area," Gaeta says. "So it tends to improve circulation. It also helps open up the chest and benefit the lungs and can even benefit menstrual problems and digestive problems, too. Most commonly, it's used for aches and pains of various types as well as respiratory problems, cough, wheezing, things like that."

I hear it's good for the dropsies and "bad vapors" too! Yeah, sure, ya betcha!

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by SquishyDave
If you are buying organic because you think there are no pesticides, you are misinformed, let me know if you would like to know more about organic growing practices.

I'm sure the readers of SR would like an article on that.

I would...

[tim]

I hate to admit it, but I've used a similar proccess to cupping in the treatment of spots and boils.
When such an unpleasant item is, shall we say, coming to maturity, it can be painful. Some people squeeze spots, but this isn't a very good idea - and anyway, it hurts.
Get a glass bottle, jar or glass and immerse it hot water for a few minutes. Hot, but not too hot too bear. Place the mouth of the bottle so that it surrounds the site of the spot and wait. As the bottle cools so does the air inside, which contracts and forms a partial vacuum, which will cause the offending spot to burst without putting pressure on it.
Yes, it's gross I know. But it often works...........

[Blondin]

There is some evidence that painting your spots with floor paint will make them disappear...
Finnish spot remover (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=42758)

[john5578]

My theory is that cupping actually sucks intelligence right out of your body. That's how the practice has survived for so long.

[TragicMonkey]

This sounds like an S and M practice. Amazing how many of those double as alternative medicine. Only they cost more and are considerably less entertaining that way.

Anyway, who looks to Gwynyth Paltrow for medical advice? Clearly we should follow Scientology because John Travolta does, and who knows more about medicine than John Travolta? He was in Saturday Night Fever!!

[SRW]

Originally posted by TragicMonkey
This sounds like an S and M practice. Amazing how many of those double as alternative medicine. Only they cost more and are considerably less entertaining that way.

Anyway, who looks to Gwynyth Paltrow for medical advice? Clearly we should follow Scientology because John Travolta does, and who knows more about medicine than John Travolta? He was in Saturday Night Fever!!

For shame for shame, clearly Paltrow just had a baby, and Gwynyth was simply carring the child as a pappose...the marks clearly were made by the child on her back attempting to obtain a teat.

It imply Paltrow is into some odd woo woo practice is as absurd as to think that barbi is a dominatrix.

[Soapy Sam]

Perhaps she's making a movie where she wrestles naked with a giant squid?

I have to go and lie down in a dark room for a while.