What is Helium

Is Iridology a real science?

Results so far:

Yes		44%	31 votes	Total: 71 votes
No		56%	40 votes	Total: 71 votes

Yes

1 of 2

I am an Iridologist and have used this technique for over 20 years to understand the condition of the body and to observe the inherent weaknesses which may lead to some disease undetected by the medical profession. I have helped many people to understand their own personal health issues. We do not name diseases as we are not Doctors. The term diagnosis is not or should not used by Iridologists in North America.

Iridology is termed as a Science in observation and an Art in the application of the interaction with clients.

My own personal reputation could be at stake here. And that is important as I have spent a long time establishing trust and have helped many people who had been unable to gain satisfaction from our medical profession. You certainly must be aware that many diagnosis there have been in error by mistake not because the profession. There is no perfection in this world.

I call to mind a woman who was my client ... crying in my office, as she was so weak and felt unable to go back to work but was informed by the medical doctors that she had no cancer left in her body ... therefore her option by her employer was that she would not be covered by insurance if she stayed off work. Within a few weeks she was dead... a mistake had been made ... as an Iridologist I had been able to observe the serious inactivity of her body in the area where the cancer was .. I knew the mistake had been made ... she wrote to me in a card : January 6, 1998 ... Thanks for saving my sanity. When I come home from medical doctor's appointments I feel very frustrated that they almost intimate that I am "putting on" feeling poorly; but when I come home from your appointments I feel, finally, someone believes me! Thank you .. She died March 9,1998.

I have been interviewed by a Geneticist with many positive comments as to how Iridology could be helpful in the diagnosis of genetic disease .

I have been called into intensive care by a Doctor to observe the iris to try to help him diagnose a problem.

I have helped terminal cancer patients be free of pain .... to the surprise of some doctors! (who acknowledge they would like to know how)

I have taught Iridology, anatomy and physiology as well as applied herbology to many health professionals over seven years of running an Academy of Natural Health. (Including many nurses, homeopathic doctors, chiMy courses were completed only after 88 weeks of intensive study. This is what is needed for anyone to be able to understand the information well enough to become professional in this area of expertise. Anything less was never acceptable.

There is nothing about Iridology that is a hoax and the only reason anyone could intimate this, would be that there is a lack of information and knowledge of the structure of the body, and of what Iridology really is. It is too bad that anyone would make a judgement call on such a helpful technique without first speaking to someone like me or reading accurate information.

I am sure that there are people out there who think they understand Iridology and make inaccurate statements and analyse the eye after taking a course for a short period of time. But this does not alter the fact that their are also good and bad in every profession and that does not make the profession wrong it makes the person who is the scammer wrong .

My hope for Iridology has been that it could be integrated into our medical profession as yet another tool to aid in the diagnosis of disease and to establish information about the patient . Not to be in competition with the doctors.

Learn more about this author, Barbara Ross.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.

No

1 of 2

by Alicia M Prater PhD

Iridology is the diagnosis of disease based on the appearance of the iris, the colored part of the eye. The practice is considered an "alternative" medicine in that it is not an accepted practice of the basic medical establishment. The reason for it's lack of acceptance is a lack of evidence that it works, which is easily understood if the role the iris plays in the body is known. These are also the reasons why it is not science.

The iris is a pigmented muscle that controls the size of the pupil, the entry point of the eye for light. The size of the pupil determines how much light enters the eye. The iris does not take part in disease and is a very small tissue to observe. These facts alone would make the practice extremely complex, if it was even successful. Actually, many iridologists now use computer programs to determine patterns because visual inspection of the eye is so difficult, though this is what the practice is based upon.

Iridology is believed to have been developed by a Hungarian physician in the 1840s. Over the years, the practice has been tested several times with no success in verification. Iridologists have failed to predict disease when presented with cases to confirm the field, and no controlled scientific studies have been done on the iris to determine what portions are associated with what disorders. Many charts used by iridologists were developed roughly 70 years ago with no scientific basis. The charts only indicate body area, and do not aid in indicating the exact disease or disorder, which would be necessary if the process worked. Physicians point out that many of the diseases attributed to iris appearance are questionable themselves, being debated syndromes that may not even exist, whereas known and serious conditions are not recognized. This ambiguity of iridology is due to the lack of information provided by the iris and the amount of guessing that is inherent in the practice. The less specific the guess, the greater chance of being somewhat correct over time.

According to QuackWatch, a site dedicated to uncovering pseudoscience and medical malpractice, both the earliest current technological era studies and recent studies have not cast iridology in a pleasant light. In 1979, three iridologists consulted 143 patients and were unsuccessful in discriminating between those who were healthy and those with kidney disease, misdiagnosing 88% of the healthy individuals with a disease they did not have. In 1980, an Australian iridologist and five Dutch iridologists were also tested, failing in a similar manner. It has also been shown repeatedly that cancers are missed or misdiagnosed when using this practice.

Medicine is based on science - an objective process by which observations are confirmed by experimentation while controlling for variables. In order for iridology to be a real scientific field of study that contributes to medical diagnosis, controlled experimentation would have to show that the purported visualization of the iris directly correlates with disease occurrence. In fact, the opposite has been shown. The rates of diagnosis are not even at par with what would be expected of random guessing - only 3 of 68 cancer cases were properly diagnosed in a 2005 study.

Flecks, streaks, and discolorations of the eye are indicative of eye problems - Research has repeatedly shown that the iris does not shed light on anatomical disorders. The practice is much like the humors approach of medical science centuries ago before anatomical exploration showed the causes of disease, but we are more advanced now, and iridology harkens back to 18th century quackery. Iridology is not science.

For more information:

The Skeptic's Dictionary

Quackwatch

Learn more about this author, Alicia M Prater PhD.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.