DHEA-disinformation and stress-confusion
While browsing through stress and happiness related sites I come across odd pieces of advice, like e.g. in “Stress-Proof Your Life” by Elizabeth Wilson.
(You can search inside this book: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Stress-Proof-Your-Life-Brilliant-Control/dp/190490260X )
On the first pages Ms Wilson praises DHEA, making references to unquoted research results. The Wikipedia knows more about this, talking about disputed effects: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dehydroepiandrosterone
In the United States, dietary supplements containing DHEA or DHEAS have been advertised with claims that they may be beneficial for a wide variety of ailments. DHEA and DHEAS are readily available in the United States, where they are regulated as foods rather than as medications. Given the lack of any proven benefit from DHEA supplementation, a 2004 review in the American Journal of Sports Medicine concluded that “The marketing of this supplement’s effectiveness far exceeds its science.”[18]
Some in vitro studies have found DHEA to have an anti-proliferative or apoptotic effect on cancer cell lines.[12][13][14] The clinical significance of these findings, if any, is unknown. Higher levels of DHEA, in fact, have been correlated with an increased risk of developing breast cancer in both pre- and postmenopausal women.[15][16]
A 2002 review found that DHEA was difficult to study in an animal model. The authors concluded that there was no evidence that DHEA was beneficial for any of the conditions for which it had been studied to that point, that it was associated with significant side effects, and that based on these findings, “there is currently no scientific reason to prescribe DHEA for any purpose whatsoever.”[17]
Ms Wilson confuses stimulation with stress. She opines that “stress is caused by change” whereas most of us agree on the definition offered by the Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stress_%28medicine%29
“Stress is the consequence of the failure to adapt to change. Less simply: it is the condition that results when person-environment transactions lead the individual to perceive a discrepancy, whether real or not, between the demands of a situation and the resources of the person’s biological, psychological or social systems. In medical terms, stress is the disruption of homeostasis through physical or psychological stimuli. Stressful stimuli can be mental, physiological, anatomical or physical reactions.”
After the false information on DHEA and her personal definition of “stress” Ms Wilson reveals that a bit of stress is actually good for us, never telling us exactly how much is a “bit” and now much is “much”.
On page 5 there are two questions and answers: one about unsatisfactory sex life and the other about “How do you know when you’re stressed positively as opposed to stressed dangerously?” Ms Wilson says “The answer is easy” – but I cannot understand it… Can you?
But as much stress must be dangerously too much, she goes on giving expert advice on how to deal with it, enumerating all the popular household remedies for stress-reduction she could think of and read about.
All in all Ms Wilson’s book is still valuable: it gives us the precious ingredients of how to write another “how to” book: disinformation, confusion as well as the capacity to copy-paste other authors’ disinformation and confusion.
FREE Report about stress
Download instantly your copy!