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[ethercat]

Narconon claims that their sauna programs removes toxins that are trapped in fat cells; scientology claims the same about its "purification rundown."  Both Narconon, with its "Sauna Detox," and Scientology, with its "Purification Rundown," claim that the sweating produced in a sauna washes toxins which have accumulated from the body.  The toxins are said to be from everything from drug use (including aspirin) to environmental toxins, acquired by living in the modern world.  Scientology and Narconon are not the only groups making this claim these days; everywhere you look, you will see advertisements for "detox" pills, treatments, juices, berries, even foot baths and pads which stick to your feet and supposedly pull the toxins from the body.

Narconon makes its claims on its website: http://www.narconon.org/drug-treatment/narconon-detox.html

While drugs and their metabolites quickly become undetectable in blood and urine, some as rapidly as 3 days after last usage, drug metabolites remain stored in fatty tissues for years. That accumulated drug residues continue to cause adverse symptoms led L. Ron Hubbard to develop a program aimed at reducing levels of toxins in the body to assist in recovery.

The New Life Detoxification Program utilizes a combination of exercise, induced sweating in a sauna, and nutritional supplements to produce the following results...:

The fact is, you don't need these various methods for removing toxins - your body is designed to remove toxins on its own.

http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/635923.html

Sweat Lodges, Steam Rooms Aren't for Detox
The concept that sweating can cleanse the body of impurities is a myth, expert says

By Jennifer Thomas
HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, Feb. 12 (HealthDay News) -- The Web is filled with products and practices that promise to "detoxify" the body through various means, from extreme diets to spa treatments to sweating.

Though some may be relatively harmless, the desire to detox was brought to a tragic conclusion last fall when three participants died and several were made seriously ill during a pricey sweat lodge ceremony in Arizona. Self-help guru James Arthur Ray was arrested Feb. 3 and charged with three counts of manslaughter in the deaths.

Doctors say the notion that you can -- or should -- undertake special efforts to cleanse the body of impurities is not only not necessary but potentially dangerous. The body has evolved through time to detoxify itself through its own processes, said Dr. Rachel Vreeman, an assistant professor of pediatrics at the Indiana University School of Medicine and co-author of Don't Swallow Your Gum! Myths, Half-Truths and Outright Lies About Your Body and Health.

When it comes to removing toxins from the body, several organs are designed to do just that.

    * The liver plays a major role in breaking down and filtering substances from the bloodstream that the body can't use.
    * The kidneys remove substances such as urea, a byproduct of protein metabolism.
    * The gastrointestinal tract, including the colon, is also designed to get rid of what the body cannot use and to keep what it needs.

"There are myths that toxins clog up or get stuck in these organs," Vreeman said. "That is just not true."

And without a doubt, she said, sweating definitely would not be the way to go about it.

The primary reason we sweat is to regulate the body temperature. When moisture produced by the sweat glands evaporates, it cools the body.

Though the main component of sweat is water, sweat does contain small amounts of dissolved minerals and trace elements, including sodium, lactate, urea, potassium, calcium, magnesium, zinc, copper, nickel, iron, chromium -- none of which are considered toxic, Vreeman said.

When you sweat, the major thing you lose is water -- something your body can't survive long without.

"The term 'detoxify' is used so often that it makes people think that special steps need to be taken so 'detoxifying' happens," Vreeman said. "It leads to people not trusting their bodies. Your body, however, does not need special cleansing efforts. What it does need is for you to get enough fluids and to eat a healthy, balanced diet."

That's not to say sweating, or spending time in a sauna, has been proven to have no health benefits.

Some studies have indicated that saunas lower blood pressure, enhance blood flow and improve cardiac functioning in people with congestive heart failure or other cardiovascular disease, Vreeman said. One study found weak evidence that saunas could help with chronic pain, and another showed minor benefits for some with chronic fatigue syndrome. There have been almost no studies done specifically on steam rooms or sweat lodges.

Western medicine has largely ignored sweat lodges, but they continue to play a significant role in Native American culture, said David Delgado Shorter, an associate professor of world arts and cultures at the University of California, Los Angeles.

"Sweats" have been used for many centuries to purify the mind and body among tribes throughout the Americas, Shorter said. Women in Mayan and Aztec culture, for example, used them as a fertility ritual, and men among the Plains tribes used sweats in preparation for hunts, among other reasons.

"The combination of the physical, emotional, psychological and religious is something many tribes find incredibly important and have fought for their right to do that," Shorter said.

During earlier times, when colonial settlers and government agents were sometimes violently suppressing Native American religion and culture, tribes fought to hold on to the tradition, for both spiritual and practical reasons. Sweat lodges offered a private place to sing, pray and gather.

That's why many in the Native American community take offense to non-Native Americans co-opting and charging for participation in sweat lodges, Shorter said.

Anyone thinking of participating in a sweat lodge ceremony or something approximating it should exercise caution, experts say. In harsh environments, hot or cold, the body will work hard to balance how much heat it makes and how much it loses. But if you are in conditions that are too hot for too long, the body may not be able to cool you off sufficiently.

In Arizona, in addition to those who died, 18 people were hospitalized with burns, dehydration, respiratory arrest or kidney failure, according to published reports. Participants, who had paid $9,695 for the "Spiritual Warrior" retreat, said that some people were vomiting, lethargic and collapsing after an hour into the session.

"These are all signs of heat illness and are warnings that your body cannot keep itself cool," Vreeman said. "Vomiting, thirst, dizziness, being uncoordinated or clumsy are all signs of heat exhaustion or heat stroke. Heat illness can kill you and should be treated as an emergency."

Someone who becomes overheated should get to a cool place, drink fluids and seek medical care, Vreeman said. People with heart conditions should always talk to their doctor before trying a sweat lodge or sauna.

More information
The American Academy of Family Physicians has more on heat illness.

SOURCES: Rachel Vreeman, M.D., assistant professor, pediatrics, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis; David Delgado Shorter, Ph.D., associate professor, world arts and cultures, University of California, Los Angeles

Anyone who is thinking of falling for this type of pseudoscience, and going into a sauna program, detox program, or undergoing any kind of "purification"  which involves saunas and or excessive sweating, should first familiarize themselves with the signs of heat stroke and heat exhaustion. 

Cool yourself immediately if you have these symptoms:
    * Heavy sweating
    * Feeling weak and/or confused
    * Dizziness
    * Nausea
    * Headache
    * Fast heartbeat
    * Dark-colored urine, which indicates dehydration

Get medical help immediately if you have these symptoms:
    * Skin that feels hot and dry, but not sweaty.
    * Confusion or loss of consciousness.
    * Frequent vomiting.
    * Shortness of breath or trouble breathing.

[Stutroup]

Wow thanks for the info, EC. Maybe I was too lazy but I hadn't taken the time to find an actual  resource to cite.  Now I have one.

[mefree]

I know we have touched on the detox foot bath quackery before. There is some relevant info on this blog regarding how the body removes toxins, as well.

Real detoxification of foreign substances takes place in the liver, which modifies their chemical structure so they can be excreted by the kidneys, which filter them from the blood into the urine.

http://www.eons.com/blogs/entry/782679-The-Foot-Detox-Bath-Scam

[ethercat]

Wow thanks for the info, EC. Maybe I was too lazy but I hadn't taken the time to find an actual  resource to cite.  Now I have one.

You're welcome, Stu.  It is much easier to find sites (most with a profit motive) which make the claim that various detox programs help than it is to find medically and scientific sites which state the opposite.  Personally, I would take the word of a trained specialist in a scientifically recognized field above the word of someone who stands to make a profit from misleading people, any day.

Here are some more references:
Detox Demystified

How the Body Cleanses Itself
The human body helps rid itself of potentially harmful substances in a number of ways:

Liver-This organ is the principal detoxifier. Blood that passes through the intestines can reach the heart and lungs only after passing through the liver. One of the liver's two main functions is to filter toxins for excretion.

Lungs-In all breathing passages, mucus traps impurities while hairlike projections called cilia carry the mucus from the lungs and toward the throat. Impurities are then coughed out or swallowed.

Kidneys-Another filtering organ that cleanses the blood of waste products. The kidneys contain millions of tiny filtering units called nephrons that act to separate nutrients from waste and send waste into the urine.

Skin-Sweat glands carry waste products, primarily urea and ammonia, from the body to be excreted in the form of perspiration.

Intestines-The small intestine absorbs nutrients. The remnants enter the large intestine, which transports waste to the rectum for elimination. The large intestine also absorbs needed water and minerals.

You sweat, but toxins likely stay

The bottom line: Sweat does contain trace amounts of toxins, says Dr. Dee Anna Glaser, a professor of dermatology at St. Louis University and founding member of the International Hyperhidrosis Society, a medical group dedicated to the study and treatment of heavy sweating.

But, Glaser, adds, in the big picture, sweat has only one function: Cooling you down when you overheat. "Sweating for the sake of sweating has no benefits," she says. "Sweating heavily is not going to release a lot of toxins."

In fact, Glaser says, heavy sweating can impair your body's natural detoxification system. As she explains, the liver and kidneys -- not the sweat glands -- are the organs we count on to filter toxins from our blood. If you don't drink enough water to compensate for a good sweat, dehydration could stress the kidneys and keep them from doing their job. "If you're not careful, heavy sweating can be a bad thing," she says.

Sweating definitely won't help clear the body of mercury or other metals, says Donald Smith, a professor of environmental toxicology at UC Santa Cruz, who studies treatments for metal poisoning. Almost all toxic metals in the body are excreted through urine or feces, he says. And less than 1% are lost through sweat. In other words, you'll do far more detoxifying in the bathroom than you ever could in a sauna.

"Detoxification" Schemes and Scams

Sweating Out Alleged Toxins

Some recommendations for "detoxification" are based on blood tests that can detect chemicals in concentrations of parts per billion. This enables levels too low to be clinically significant to be misinterpreted as dangerous. If any "toxin" level is interpreted as abnormal, the patient may be advised to use exercise, sauna treatments, showers, massage, herbal wraps, and/or high doses of niacin (which can increase blood flow to the skin). Real detoxification of foreign substances takes place in the liver, which modifies their chemical structure so they can be excreted by the kidneys which filter them from the blood into the urine. Sweat glands in the feet can excrete water and some dissolved substances, but its minor role in ridding the body of unwanted substances is not changed by anything done to the skin.

[ethercat]

There's also this about the medical validity of narconon: http://xenu.net/archive/oca/narconon/medical.html with this report by the State of Oklahoma Board of Mental Health linked from it: http://xenu.net/archive/oca/narconon/91report.html

The Narconon program requires its patients to sweat up to five hours per day, seven days a week, for approximately thirty days. The rationale, according to Narconon for the sweat-out is to rid the body of fat-stored drugs and chemicals through sweat. However, there is no scientific basis for the technique. Most drugs of abuse are removed from the body by detoxification and excretion through the liver, kidneys and (in some instances) through the lungs. Although minute quantities of some drugs may be found in sweat, the amount represents such a small fraction of drug elimination that no matter how much an individual sweated through exercise or saunas, the clearance of most drugs of abuse would not be significantly increased.

I thought it was interesting that they saw fit to include this in the report:

The Board has not considered any evidence of the beliefs or opinions of any witness on matters of religion in making its findings of fact. To the extent there may be some affiliation between Narconon and any religion such affiliation has been totally disregarded by the Board. The Board has not made its decision on certification based upon any consideration of religion or religious affiliation.

[Sunshine]

From Narconons website: http://www.alcohol-dependency.net/alcohol_dependency.html
Alcohol moves from the bloodstream into every part of the body that contains water, including major organs like the brain, lungs, kidneys, and heart, and distributes itself equally both inside and outside of cells. Only 5 percent of alcohol is reduced from the body through the breath, urine, or sweat; a larger portion is oxidized or broken down in the liver.

Yet they claim that their sauna detoxification program removes the alcohol residues that have accumulated in the fatty tissue.

From the same website: http://www.alcohol-dependency.net/science_of_addiction.html
The Narconon program produces spectacular results in removing the root causes of addiction. One of the cornerstones of our treatment is the Detoxification program. Drugs such as crack cocaine, heroin, valium, PCP, amphetamines (crank, crystal, meth, ecstasy, etc.) alcohol and their residues, including medicinal drugs such as narcotic painkillers, tranquilizers and sleeping pills, can remain in the body for years. These residues can trigger a variety of symptoms, including drug cravings and depression. A vital step in the successful rehabilitation of substance abuse is flushing out these accumulated toxic residues so that the person no longer experiences unwanted adverse effects from the drugs he has taken. An exact regimen of medically supervised exercise, periods of time sweating in a dry sauna and nutritional supplements are used to rid the fatty tissues in the body of these drug residues.The results can be spectacular.

From http://www.narcononhawaii.com/about-narconon-hawaii/outpatient-treatment-program/
One of the most important parts of the program is the sauna purification, created to rid the body of all drug residuals and any future cravings. The drugs and toxins from long term alcohol abuse and drugs store in the fatty tissue, organs and cells of the human body. It is very hard for any long term recovery to be successful without the drug toxins being removed from the body.

From Narconon International:
 http://www.narconon.org/drug-treatment/narconon-detox.html
Drug Detox Program
The Narconon New Life Detoxification Program
While drugs and their metabolites quickly become undetectable in blood and urine, some as rapidly as 3 days after last usage, drug metabolites remain stored in fatty tissues for years. That accumulated drug residues continue to cause adverse symptoms led L. Ron Hubbard to develop a program aimed at reducing levels of toxins in the body to assist in recovery.
The New Life Detoxification Program utilizes a combination of exercise, induced sweating in a sauna, and nutritional supplements to produce the following results:
•   Reduction or elimination of drug and alcohol cravings.

So you pay $30,000.00 to eliminate less than 5% (breath and urine remove part of the 5%).

Question;
How does Narconon test to determine the amount of drug/alcohol residue in the body and how do they test that all drug/alcohol residues have been eliminated from the body?

[ethercat]

Question;
How does Narconon test to determine the amount of drug/alcohol residue in the body and how do they test that all drug/alcohol residues have been eliminated from the body?

Those are good questions, and I'd also like to know about drug testing by employers and courts - if the "residues" remain, how come these tests don't pick it up after some period of time has passed (different times for different drugs)?  Are these drug tests flawed? 

To answer yours: Narconon doesn't need to do any testing or unbiased study, that's just a wog thing.  They just postulate it and it is so.

   

[mefree]

Drug testing, you say?

A June 2009 complaint investigation of Narconon of Georgia revealed the following:

Based on review of the facility policies and procedures, and staff interview, it was determined that the facility failed to have written procedures which address the way the facility employees should conduct drug screens on employees and clients. 

Findings were:
A review of the facility policies and procedures on 6/17/2009 revealed that the policies and procedures did not include any written procedures which addresses the way the facility employees should conduct drug screens on employees and clients.

An interview on 6/17/2009 at 1:00 p.m. with the director confirmed that the facility did not have procedures which addresses the way the facility employees should conduct drug screens on employees and clients and that the facility should write a procedure and train employees on the procedure.

http://167.193.144.170:7001/ORSINV/HTML_DRUGABUSE/DRUG002034D8RO11.htm