Re: Arthritis - is Arnica Gel for real, or just a lesser form of Voltarol

bae_at_cs.toronto.no-uce.edu.yyz
Date: 07/24/04 

Date: 24 Jul 2004 02:16:16 GMT

In article <8b1e8161.0407220905.7490965d@posting.google.com>,
dorothy <dorothy.bradbury@ntlworld.com> wrote:
>A relative has a painful knee.
>o Doctor has gone thro the usual tablets, but most don't work well
>o Most cause stomach ache mainly (from CoCodamol to CoProxamol)
>
>The Doctor hasn't prescibed some other drug to ?line the stomach?
>
>Voltarol cream is currently in use - knee is classed as "wear & tear".
>Works a bit - better than rubbing the packet against her knee :-)

Wear-and-tear arthritis is a common name for osteoarthritis. Most people
get some as they age. I'm not a doctor and am not familiar with those
drugs. They are probably sold under different names in the US than
in the UK. Perhaps someone else can comment.

>Q: Is Arnica Gel basically the same type of thing?
>---- ie, is it an NSAID like brufen/aspirin
>---- it doesn't seem to be "snakeoil"

I did a literature search on PubMed for you. Arnica contains some
compounds that show anti-inflammatory effect in vitro. They may
have a different mechanism of action than other NSAIDs. Whether they
are safe or effective in animals and people isn't known yet. Taking
arnica internally has caused serious illness for some people. There's
no reason to believe it will soak through your skin to the inflamed
joint. Also, many people develop an allergic contact dermatitis to
arnica preparations, and cross-react to other plants in the Compositae
(daisy family).

Arnica has long been a folk remedy for bruising and inflammation.
Controlled studies showed no effect on bruising due to surgical
procedures. There's also a popular homeopathic remedy made with
arnica. Controlled studies showed it to be indistinguishable from
placebo for a wide variety of conditions.

There was one paper that claimed positive effect for arnica gel rubbed
into arthritic knees for six weeks. As far as I can tell from the
abstract, there was no control -- i.e. they compared before and after
six weeks of treatment. From this one can conclude one or more of: (1)
it works (2) something in the gel, not necessarily the arnica, works
(3) rubbing stuff on your knee works (4) believing that it works works
(5) if your arthritic knee hurts badly enough to go to a doctor about
it, it will more likely than not improve in six weeks no matter what.

Since arthritis is one of those things that tends to get better and
worse on its own schedule, I'm inclined to believe that (5) is most
or all of it. But if the stuff isn't too expensive, and your relative
thinks it's helping, and it doesn't give her a rash, it's probably
harmless at least. Pain is subjective, and it often makes people feel
better to be able to do something for themselves. It's certainly
frustrating to feel helpless.

>Q: Do those magnetic bandages work, as I'm dubious?
>---- specifically, is there something special about 39.99 v 9.99 ones?

You're right to be dubious. There's no rational reason for these things
to have any effect. People may expect more from the more expensive ones
and therefore get a stronger placebo effect. Again, pain is subjective,
and arthritic knees get better and worse. If you pay 39.99 for this
thing, you're motivated to credit it for any improvement, real or imagined,
whether or not it would have happened anyway. You certainly don't want
to feel like you've wasted your money foolishly!

>Often unsure to know which are more "monetised placebo's",
>whose medical benefit is more for the seller than the buyer.

There's a *lot* of that out there. Osteoarthritis is common, annoying,
chronic, and tends to get better and worse. It's an ideal condition
for quacks to thrive on.

You seem to have a good skeptical attitude, so you'll likely be able to
detect the scams and quacks that proliferate on the web. Big promises
are one sign of a scam - if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
Also alleged conspiracies - if there's a good treatment, it can't be kept
secret or suppressed by the whole world's medical "establishment". And
a whole raft of testimonials is worth nothing. They are easy to write,
and even if they come from actual satisfied customers, you have no way of
knowing if they would have gotten better anyway, at least for a while.
Everybody gets better, at least for a while, no matter what they do.

Good sources of information are non-profit arthritis societies, government
health sites and sites at university medical schools.

I hope this helped. Best of luck to you and your relative.

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