Information: Is it reliable and accurate? Is it true?

I was recently asked how to verify that information found online is true and accurate.

We have all found statements online that seem exciting at first sight, especially ads from natural health companies that want to sell us something.

Years ago when I was working in my very first job, a colleague asked me “Is the United Kingdom the same as Great Britain”. I believed it was, so I said “yes”. She submitted her report on that basis but it came back with a correction. She was furious with me: “The United Kingdom consists of Great Britain and Northern Ireland”.

The trust that is lost when you make that kind of mistake can never be regained. Ever since then I have checked and re-checked everything I say or write. This is especially important when you’re being paid to give people health advice.

I am frequently asked whether it is worth taking x, y or z new supplement. Here’s how to deal with it. First of all, ask yourself if this is a nutrient that can be obtained from a good whole-food diet. If it is, then why take it as a supplement? We cannot take every single element from a whole-food diet in a pill, it simply doesn’t make sense. So why would we want to take one or two of these items?

Never forget that supplement companies are always trying to come up with new stuff that they want to convince us we need. To keep up sales there has to be a constant stream of new ideas. Much of that is about obscure nutrients found in plant foods. Eat the plant foods! Drink the juices! Never be afraid to keep doing what’s tried and tested. I didn’t get my reputation for success by reading magazines and the latest best-sellers, unlike some of my colleagues. One client came to me after his nutritional therapist had recommended so many pills (about 70 different ones) that the only way he could take them was to put them in a blender. I pity his poor kidneys…

Obviously some of the new developments are important and useful to us. You will usually find that the more science-based supplement companies are a good source of reliable information about these. Life Extension is pretty good, and I often recommend the Protocols section of their website. If the information is coming from a book or a small company, look up the references in Pubmed to see if the research they are mentioning actually exists. I’ve often found that either it doesn’t, or that when you actually read the summary of the study, it doesn’t say what the writer claims it says. Sometimes it even says the opposite!

Best-selling authors want to sell books. To make the book sell better they may massage the facts a little and cut corners. But sometimes they are just blinkered by only having knowledge in their one little area, not understanding the more holistic aspects. For instance, an author hailed as having created an amazing new Alzheimer’s diet may know absolutely nothing about the role of mercury poisoning on the brain. He will only be likely to tell us about his successes, not about the people who didn’t get better. If you actually study this so-called miracle diet, you’ll usually find that it’s just a variety of whole-food diet. But the public don’t know that. Most people are so appallingly uneducated about health and nutrition that they will believe anything. That’s why we need properly conducted studies and clinical trials, since they are intended to eliminate bias.

Quality is important. When searching for a brand, look for this kind of quality assurance in the small print (you won’t find it in a cheap brand) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Resveratrol-Capsules-Supplement-Vitality-Pro/dp/B086R2VLHH/

To summarise:
Stick with what you know.
Take every best-seller book with a pinch of salt.
If Life Extension are selling it, it is probably useful.
Beware companies selling cheap: some products contain no active ingredient when tested.
Look it up on Pubmed. If it’s reliable there will be lots of research there.
Beware multi-nutrient products that claim to contain an ingredient when the amount must be so small as to be negligible. Even good, reputable companies do this. But what good is 10 mg of aloe vera!