Civil Pooch - Positive Dog Training by John Buginas, San Francisco Bay Area

Based on an open letter to Whole Dog Journal. (Sent, not yet published). Recently revised with more numbers showing the absurdly small quantities of stuff you are buying.

Leave home without it!

Regarding "Don't Leave Home Without It,"  Whole Dog Journal June 2006, page 9,hich discusses the use of Arnica Montana 30 for the treatment of strains and bruises. In the article, Gregory Tilford claims that there is "no harm in exercising precaution with a harmless, yet potentially effective homeopathic remedy."There may be no immediate physical harm in giving your dog a tiny piece of sugar with provably undetectable active ingredients selling for $6/bottle.Nothing bad will happen, aside perhaps from dental cavities. The same goes for Bach Rescue Remedy, selling for $14.99/20ML and containing little more than brandy. 

The harm in homeopathic remedies, such as Arnica Montana 30 or Bach's Rescue Remedy is that people may avoid conventional treatment and that their money maybe better spent elsewhere. These are very expensive ways to buy sugar and brandy.

There is also the issue of credibility. Positive reinforcement trainers have ENOUGH trouble selling our scientifically proven training methods in the age of Cesar Millan. We MUST be careful about what we claim in front of our clients. Talking about the benefits of homeopathy will NOT lend credibility to our cause. In fact, printing of such articles in Whole Dog Journal dilutes the value of every issue as we question the validity of EVERY article.

Searching http://scholar.google.com reveals several studies showing the failure  of homeopathic remedies to prove better than placebos in double-blind placebo-controlled studies. 

Searching for studies on Arnica Montana 30 SPECIFICALLY shows studies that show this compound ineffective for pain and bruising:  "Homeopathic Arnica 30x Is Ineffective for Muscle Soreness After Long-Distance Running: A Randomized,Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial." (Clinical Journal of Pain.14(3):227-231, September 1998) and "Homeopathic Anica for prevention of pain and bruising: randomized placebo-controlled trial in hand surgery," (J R SocMed. 2003 February; 96(2): 60–65.  The Royal Society of Medicine).

 "Robert L. Park, Ph.D., a prominent physicist who is executive director of The American Physical Society, has noted that since the least amount of a substance in a solution is one molecule, a 30C solution would have to have at least one molecule of the original substance dissolved in a minimum of 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 molecules of water. This would require a container more than 30,000,000,000 times the size of the Earth." (from Quackwatch)

And searching for Bach Rescue Remedy, a review of literature shows that there is no evidence that Bach Rescue Remedy is any more effective than a placebo:"Flower remedies": a systematic review of the clinical evidence." (Wien KlinWochenschr. 2002 Dec 30;114(23-24):963-6.).

Gregory Tilford has published his opinion. My opinion? I'd take my $5.99 and buy a pound of sugar and make cookies. And $14.99 will buy a pint of brandy or a couple of gallons of gasoline.

Your money is better spent elsewhere.

I'm not here to debate the efficacy of the "law of similars." Bach Rescue Remedy is a 5X dilution, which is 1/100,000 dilution. You are buying a solution that is 99.999% brandy. In the 10ML size, you are buying about .00001 ML of cure and 9.99999  ML of brandy. Each 4 drop dose is made up of about 0.000000266666666666667 ML (0.0000000933333333333333 ounces) of the remedy. (assuming 15 drops per ML).

If anyone can prove to me in a placebo-controlled double-blind study published in a peer-reviewed publication that diluting anything at homeopathic doses of 30x(1/1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times) is effective for ANYTHING, I'll gladly submit myself to the treatment.