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Transcript

Mini: Red Light Therapy · Why We Do What We Do

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Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we do what we do. Welcome
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Speaker 1: to Why we Do what we do Mini. I'm your
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Speaker 1: host Abraham and I'm your host Shane. We are a
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Speaker 1: psychology podcast. We talk about the things that humans and
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Speaker 1: non human animals do, and we have a particular penchant
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Speaker 1: and joy for debunking myths. So yes, that'll be the
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Speaker 1: theme of the episodes that released this week is is
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Speaker 1: pseudoscience attack?
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Speaker 2: You know, I think at the end of the day too,
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Speaker 2: like I think it's really important for everybody here to
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Speaker 2: know that we don't want to strip you of your joy.
0:48
Speaker 2: We just don't want you to waste time, and we
0:50
Speaker 2: don't want you to waste resources on things that don't
0:53
Speaker 2: work or make promises that they can't keep. That's our
0:56
Speaker 2: goal here.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, And to be fair, this one's going to have
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Speaker 1: more considerations and nuance to it than some of our
1:03
Speaker 1: other takedowns of pseudosciences, So it's not a black and
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Speaker 1: white thing. As a matter of fact, you might say,
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Speaker 1: there's some red in there. We are going to be
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Speaker 1: talking about red light therapy in this discussion for this mini.
1:19
Speaker 1: But if you're joining us for the first time, then welcome.
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Speaker 1: We hope you enjoy what you hear in this today.
1:25
Speaker 1: If you're a turning person, then welcome back and thank
1:27
Speaker 1: you for continuing to check us out. And as I said,
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Speaker 1: we're talking about red light therapy. A mini is a
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Speaker 1: short form episode. We put these out on Mondays. Our
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Speaker 1: full length come out on Wednesdays. Both of them this
1:37
Speaker 1: week will be going after some pseudoscience. And if you'd
1:40
Speaker 1: like to support what you support us after hearing this,
1:43
Speaker 1: you can join us on Patreon, pick up some merch
1:45
Speaker 1: or leave us a rating and a review, like subscribe
1:47
Speaker 1: to a friend. I'll go over that stuff at the end.
1:50
Speaker 1: I think that's what I have to say, though. Are
1:51
Speaker 1: you ready to jump into this, Shane, let's do it? Okay?
1:55
Speaker 1: All right, it's not officially debunking pseudoscience week. It just
1:59
Speaker 1: kind of so happens to be the case that the
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Speaker 1: two episodes we're releasing this week both have to do
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Speaker 1: with that, just a coincidence. It's a hot topic right now,
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Speaker 1: that's all. The rage is our topic today, which is
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Speaker 1: red light therapy, and it makes some pretty remarkable claims,
2:13
Speaker 1: so we need to address those.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, you've probably seen some ads of people wearing what
2:18
Speaker 2: looks like a red hot hockey mask or waving a
2:21
Speaker 2: heat ray at their body. And this is a trending
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Speaker 2: miracle intervention, this idea of red light therapy. So yeah,
2:27
Speaker 2: let's get into it.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to discuss what red light therapy is,
2:31
Speaker 1: what it claims to do, and what the science says.
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Speaker 1: Before we hit record, we were joking that this is
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Speaker 1: sort of like Friday the thirteenth meets Goop.
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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, with a splash of with a splash of
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Speaker 2: tron in there. So yeah, it's so strange, So let's
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Speaker 2: get into it. Right. So, red light therapy or RLT
2:50
Speaker 2: is also called low level laser therapy or LLT or OOLT,
2:55
Speaker 2: and it's also called photo biomodulation PBM. And this is
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Speaker 2: that they where people like they have LEDs or lasers
3:02
Speaker 2: and they shine red spectrum anywhere between six to seven
3:05
Speaker 2: hundred nanometers or near infrared seven hundred eighty two thousand nanometers.
3:10
Speaker 2: They shine light on their body.
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Speaker 1: Yes, So why do they do this thing? Well, let's
3:17
Speaker 1: give a little background on light. If you know anything
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Speaker 1: about ultraviolet light, this can actually burn the skin. Ultraviolet
3:23
Speaker 1: light is how tanning beds get you looking like a
3:26
Speaker 1: baked potato. And it's one of the concerns that dermatologists
3:30
Speaker 1: have about put potential skin cancer is the ultraviolet light
3:34
Speaker 1: that we get from the sun, but red light actually
3:37
Speaker 1: penetrates deeper and does not cause the same burning.
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Speaker 2: Sure, so well basically like in doing so in shining
3:44
Speaker 2: this red light onto your body, proponents claim that this
3:47
Speaker 2: light can do a lot of things. I mean, this
3:50
Speaker 2: is just like one of those fun panacea of things, right.
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Speaker 2: It can reduce acne, It can rejuvenate your skin, It
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Speaker 2: can improve healing, it can reduce inflammation, It can accelerate
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Speaker 2: fat breaking down and support weight management, and it can
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Speaker 2: minimize fine lines and wrinkles, among other things.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, it reduces arthritis, joint pain, it reduces muscle pain,
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Speaker 1: and can amazingly even help heal cancer.
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Speaker 2: Oh wow, that's pretty impressive. It can promote hair growth
4:17
Speaker 2: prevent hair loss, so it can do you know, both
4:20
Speaker 2: of those things at the same time, tackling two problems
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Speaker 2: with one stone. It can improve cognitive performance, okay, it
4:25
Speaker 2: can reduce the symptoms of dementia. It can improve sleep,
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Speaker 2: and it can improve athletic performance.
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Speaker 1: And it can play ads. All right, those a little
4:41
Speaker 1: earlier for an AD break but it just felt it
4:43
Speaker 1: just felt right, you know, right.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, sometimes we just feel it. It's a vibe.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a vibe. So wow, with that list that
4:52
Speaker 1: we just read, those so many things, we've discovered the
4:54
Speaker 1: cure for everything, and it's as simple as shine a
4:58
Speaker 1: light on it. Boom, I will say. And when you
5:02
Speaker 1: hear a list of benefits that long, someone is definitely
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Speaker 1: trying to sell you something and it should raise some
5:08
Speaker 1: red flags.
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Speaker 2: Sure, let's get into that too. Like I mean, like
5:12
Speaker 2: we know, historically, anything that pseudoscientific is that it's a
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Speaker 2: it's a panacea, it's snake oil, it serves all those things, right,
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Speaker 2: And in versions of red light therapy have actually been
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Speaker 2: around for quite a long time.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, some sources suggest that red light therapy has been
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Speaker 1: in use for over a century. More credible sources that
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Speaker 1: I found point to the nineteen sixties when a Hungarian
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Speaker 1: scientist investigating the possible cancer causing effects of red light
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Speaker 1: discovered instead that the mice upon which who has experimented
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Speaker 1: had sprouted new hairs, not what he was expecting.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's different side effect. It's like, well you still
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Speaker 2: have you still have the problem, but now you have
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Speaker 2: more hair about it.
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Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 2: Others claim the NASA was conducting experiments in space with
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Speaker 2: red lights on plants, and notice that the wounds on
6:00
Speaker 2: astronaut's hands healed faster. However, we were unable to track
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Speaker 2: down a primary source for this claim and only found
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Speaker 2: evidence of this on wellness websites in naturopathic blogs. It
6:09
Speaker 2: should not have been that difficult to track down a
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Speaker 2: study your information directly from NASA where this is the case.
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Speaker 2: So again, major red flag.
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Speaker 1: Yes, major red light flag. Amidst the myriad of claims.
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Speaker 1: The mechanism behind how red light therapy is supposed to
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Speaker 1: work is that the red light is absorbed by cytochrome
6:29
Speaker 1: c oxidase. CCO is how it's abbreviated. All you don't
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Speaker 1: need to know really anything about that. The idea here
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Speaker 1: is that it displaces nitric oxide or NO, which blocks
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Speaker 1: mitochondrial respiration, and that this stimulates the mitochondria and therefore
6:45
Speaker 1: results in ATP production. ATP is a denizene triphosphate, which
6:51
Speaker 1: is considered like that's just energy. It's energy our body makes,
6:54
Speaker 1: it's how it works, and doing all of this yields
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Speaker 1: these amazing benefits. This is very similar to Robabble, which
7:00
Speaker 1: we did an episode on Forever Ago where it's throw
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Speaker 1: a bunch of medical words at someone that they don't
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Speaker 1: know and they'll be like, oh, that sounds very real.
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Speaker 2: So what does the science say, Well, this does seem
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Speaker 2: to be effective at stimulating hair growth follicles that are
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Speaker 2: not dead, and someone who is bald will not benefit
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Speaker 2: from this, So you can't shine. You can't shine a
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Speaker 2: red light on a shiny bald head.
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Speaker 1: I mean you can, it just won't spread to hairs.
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Speaker 1: You can. It won't work.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, you're allowed to. But like it won't
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Speaker 2: do anything for you. If you stop using it. The
7:31
Speaker 2: effect stops as well though, So like it's one of
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Speaker 2: those things where it's like it works while you're using it,
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Speaker 2: it stops when you're not.
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Speaker 1: Based on some research that I found, there does seem
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Speaker 1: to be a modest effect on its ability to reduce acne,
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Speaker 1: potentially mitigate wrinkles a little bit, and there might be
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Speaker 1: some slightly accelerated healing of minor wounds maybe maybe now.
7:51
Speaker 2: A twenty twenty five meta analysis by sun at all
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Speaker 2: Son and friends I agree with data from eleven randomized
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Speaker 2: controlled trials and found some support for reducing some markers
8:01
Speaker 2: of inflammation, and some improvements in connitive function. These were
8:04
Speaker 2: not elaborated on in the paper. However, weight management was unclear.
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Speaker 2: They noted that it may be an adjunct for weight management,
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Speaker 2: but will not be effective on its own.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, so you can't just shine a red light at
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Speaker 1: your belly and like all the fat will melt away
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Speaker 1: over time. It sorts you aren't eating the whole time
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Speaker 1: that you're shining right there, and you do it for
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Speaker 1: weeks on end, then it will melt away, but not
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Speaker 1: because of the red light. Among other emerging research, they've
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Speaker 1: suggested that it might be effective and slowing down small
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Speaker 1: early stage skin cancer, but again that research is emerging
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Speaker 1: and it's not particularly clear just yet right now.
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Speaker 2: As far as the billion other things they mentioned, the
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Speaker 2: evidence tends to be at chance levels or so barely
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Speaker 2: detectable as to be statistically insignificant. Now, there's no real
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Speaker 2: evidence that it actually improves sleep or athletic performance.
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Speaker 1: Now it is. We're saying that as far as safety,
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Speaker 1: this is relatively safe. You're unlikely to do much damage,
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Speaker 1: particular given the weakness of at home products that you'd
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Speaker 1: be able to purchase. The clinic level red light therapies,
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Speaker 1: they might be powerful enough to do something, but it
9:08
Speaker 1: depends on what you're trying to get out of it.
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Speaker 1: It does seem like it might help you grow more
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Speaker 1: hair if you have hair follicles in the places where
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Speaker 1: you're shining light, and that's what you're trying to do.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean if you and I think that's important
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Speaker 2: to note, Like, if you have it on your face,
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Speaker 2: you're probably gonna grow more hair on your face, so
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Speaker 2: which we see those masks and like, I don't know
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Speaker 2: that's what you're trying to do. But Okay, Now, generally speaking,
9:29
Speaker 2: we would say, and I say generally speaking in every
9:32
Speaker 2: sort of medical situation, we would say, listen to your doctor,
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Speaker 2: assuming they're a real doctor.
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Speaker 1: Of course that's important.
9:37
Speaker 2: You could use this as a supplement if you want.
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Speaker 2: You might get a placebo effect if nothing else, but
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Speaker 2: don't replace other evidence based interventions with this, Like this
9:44
Speaker 2: shouldn't be a replacement. This should be a supplement if
9:47
Speaker 2: you're going to use it.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, So that's essentially what there is a know about
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Speaker 1: red light therapy. There does seem to be some evidence
9:53
Speaker 1: for some minor effects for some of the things that
9:56
Speaker 1: they claim a couple a handful really not very many.
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Speaker 1: This feels like that's one of those things where if
10:02
Speaker 1: there was an effect worth exploiting, we would have caught
10:05
Speaker 1: it by now.
10:06
Speaker 2: Sure.
10:06
Speaker 1: And again, maybe you get a little bit of a
10:08
Speaker 1: bump out of hair growth, if that's the thing you're
10:11
Speaker 1: trying to do, I would say that I, for one,
10:14
Speaker 1: am very skeptical. This has red flags all over it.
10:18
Speaker 1: Anything that promises that many things is usually a lie.
10:21
Speaker 1: Anything that has that's trying to like sell you on
10:25
Speaker 1: some new like you don't have to do anything, it'll
10:28
Speaker 1: just magically happen. Like that's a that's a big red flag.
10:31
Speaker 1: That's like, yeah, we have some intervention that all you
10:34
Speaker 1: have to do is shine a light at your body
10:35
Speaker 1: and you'll become You'll look like Chris Evans. I'm like,
10:40
Speaker 1: that's not how things work. Like, yeah, it'd be wonderful
10:44
Speaker 1: if they did for a lot of us, but that's
10:46
Speaker 1: just not how things work. So no, So anyway, you know,
10:51
Speaker 1: and I and it's not even just the fat thing
10:53
Speaker 1: like all the other stuff. At least, this is one
10:55
Speaker 1: of those that like it's probably not going to hurt you.
10:57
Speaker 1: It might you might be spending money on something that
11:00
Speaker 1: you could otherwise be spending your money more effective areas,
11:02
Speaker 1: and maybe the research I could be wrong, Like maybe
11:05
Speaker 1: the research will eventually support some of these things and say, oh, actually,
11:08
Speaker 1: if you do it this way, then it's super effective
11:10
Speaker 1: for these people. I didn't see from any of the
11:12
Speaker 1: studies whether they ruled out other confounding variables that might
11:15
Speaker 1: have contributed to things like healing time, for example. I'm like, well,
11:20
Speaker 1: that probably has to do at least in part with
11:22
Speaker 1: your overall level of fitness, with your diet, with your sleep,
11:26
Speaker 1: with your your telomeres in terms of like how old
11:29
Speaker 1: you are probably affects how quickly you heal them. Like
11:32
Speaker 1: did you rule those things out? Because I doubt that
11:34
Speaker 1: you did. I really doubt that you did. Like, there
11:37
Speaker 1: are a lot of factors that do this. I'm like,
11:39
Speaker 1: how do you do you like cut someone and then
11:42
Speaker 1: like cut them later and put them under red light
11:44
Speaker 1: and see how quickly a heels, Like if you cut
11:46
Speaker 1: them in the same place, do different parts of your
11:48
Speaker 1: body heal at different speeds. I'm ninety percent sure that
11:50
Speaker 1: they do. It's like a cut on your tongue will
11:53
Speaker 1: heal a lot faster than a cut on your foot, sure,
11:55
Speaker 1: But anyway, those are just some considerations I had that
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Speaker 1: I feel like there's little here that has me think
12:02
Speaker 1: that there is much here, right, So I am just
12:06
Speaker 1: very skeptical as possible that I'm wrong, but I just
12:09
Speaker 1: wanted to leave my note on that.
12:12
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I think this is one of those
12:14
Speaker 2: things where the trend will maybe quiet down and turn
12:18
Speaker 2: into the kind of relative background noise. Specifically because this
12:21
Speaker 2: falls in line with a lot of wellness treatments that
12:23
Speaker 2: are out there, and I don't think that we'll be
12:24
Speaker 2: talking about it in the next couple of years because
12:26
Speaker 2: I don't think that anything that's happening from it is astounding,
12:30
Speaker 2: and I think it's harder to market than something like
12:32
Speaker 2: a consumable product too, Like they're asking you to do
12:36
Speaker 2: something that is part of a routine. That is, if
12:40
Speaker 2: you're not seeing benefits from it right away, like immediate benefits,
12:43
Speaker 2: because you are just shining a light on yourself, like
12:45
Speaker 2: you're probably not going to continue to do it. But
12:47
Speaker 2: like something like I feel like in the wellness space,
12:51
Speaker 2: kombucha was one of those things that came up a
12:53
Speaker 2: lot and people were like, you should drink kombucha for
12:55
Speaker 2: da da Da da da, And that's kind of persisted.
12:57
Speaker 2: People aren't talking about it quite as much, but it
12:59
Speaker 2: has persisted because I think it's more consumable, and I
13:02
Speaker 2: think what you're going to find in this space, in
13:03
Speaker 2: this wellness space, is that consumables are more likely to
13:06
Speaker 2: persist than something that's going to be like an activity
13:10
Speaker 2: towards wellness.
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Speaker 1: And implication of what you just said is actually, as
13:14
Speaker 1: we were talking about this, an idea that I kind
13:17
Speaker 1: of had that it might be kind of fun to
13:19
Speaker 1: inventory some of the wellness trends that have come and
13:22
Speaker 1: gone that were like really all the rage for a
13:26
Speaker 1: hot minute, and then they kind of just quietly faded
13:29
Speaker 1: into you can still do this, like you'll find it.
13:32
Speaker 1: It exists, But this isn't like everyone's talking about it
13:35
Speaker 1: as the next big thing, because there have been so
13:37
Speaker 1: many of them. Like cupping actually stands out to me
13:41
Speaker 1: as like I know, a few years ago, like cupping
13:43
Speaker 1: was all over the news and people were talking about it,
13:46
Speaker 1: and you'd see people at the Olympics who were just
13:49
Speaker 1: covered in these dots all over their body hickeys. Yeah,
13:52
Speaker 1: that looked like little the gigantic hickeys, and they're actually
13:56
Speaker 1: pretty damaging for your skin and pretty bad for you.
13:59
Speaker 1: Athletic TA, which is just pretend water the same same thing. Like,
14:05
Speaker 1: there's so many of these that are out there that
14:08
Speaker 1: the twisted that actually that one might I think that
14:13
Speaker 1: one might still be around. But anyway, all of these
14:16
Speaker 1: are still around. It's kind of the point is like
14:18
Speaker 1: they exist, they're just not the rage anymore.
14:22
Speaker 2: Sure. Yeah, Yeah, that's kind of the thing with wellness,
14:24
Speaker 2: Like you know when we talk about it, like it's
14:26
Speaker 2: always a moving goalposts, like yeah, not that there's not
14:30
Speaker 2: value in the wellness space. I think that's like that's
14:32
Speaker 2: why that self care book, like the Real Self Care
14:34
Speaker 2: Book that I mentioned before on the show, where she
14:37
Speaker 2: talks about that, she's like she got so worked up
14:39
Speaker 2: into the wellness space and found that none of it
14:41
Speaker 2: was working. And that's because it's an industry. It's capitalism
14:44
Speaker 2: and it's finest.
14:45
Speaker 1: Yeah. They it's funny because like they'll tell you, they're like, oh,
14:49
Speaker 1: don't trust doctors, they're just trying to take your money.
14:51
Speaker 1: And while that person is actively trying to take your money, yeah,
14:55
Speaker 1: like yeah, it's wild. The hypocrisy remarkable. Yeah, there was
14:59
Speaker 1: a smo maen and like the fifties, I think that
15:02
Speaker 1: they would like put like a little band around behind
15:04
Speaker 1: you and shake your body and we're supposed to have
15:06
Speaker 1: you lose weight, and.
15:09
Speaker 2: Oh is it different. It's just you stand on it
15:11
Speaker 2: now instead of like instead of like wrapping around your waist,
15:13
Speaker 2: you just stand on it and it shakes your gebrates
15:16
Speaker 2: your body.
15:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, uh huh okay, yeah, maybe we might have to
15:19
Speaker 1: do a mini where we inventory past wellness fads just
15:23
Speaker 1: just for the fun of it. But yeah, yeah, anyway,
15:25
Speaker 1: we're kind of starting to run long, which we were
15:28
Speaker 1: on track to not run long, but here we are.
15:30
Speaker 1: So yep. Thank you for listening. Thank you to my
15:33
Speaker 1: team and people. Thank you for recording with me today.
15:35
Speaker 2: Shane anytime.
15:36
Speaker 1: If you'd like to support us, you can join us
15:37
Speaker 1: on Patreon. If you do, I will read your name
15:40
Speaker 1: at the end of full length discussions as a giant
15:42
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15:44
Speaker 1: Patreon and we appreciate their contributions and support and it
15:46
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16:07
Speaker 1: you like us, then those reviews are very helpful. But
16:10
Speaker 1: I think that's what I have to say about this.
16:12
Speaker 1: Is there anything that I forgot it you'd like to
16:13
Speaker 1: add before we say goodbye to this episode?
16:16
Speaker 2: Nope, I think that covers it.
16:18
Speaker 1: Goodbye, Red Light Therapy, Abraham. This is Shane Why We
16:22
Speaker 1: Do what we Do? Mini is out.
16:23
Speaker 2: Bye. You've been listening to Why We Do What We Do.
16:27
Speaker 2: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
16:30
Speaker 2: going to wwdwwdpodcast dot com. Thanks for listening and we
16:36
Speaker 2: hope you have an awesome day.