Hemocode Food Intolerance test

Non-Pharmacological Treatment Diet
21

Interesting discussion you have going on here. I will also disclose that I represent CanLabs and the YorkTest food intolerance test here in Canada.

Knowing that this is an evidence based forum for Migraine supporters, let’s start there.

YorkTest is an IgG self administered finger prick blood test, which has clinical evidence (yes links to follow) to support our results. We have 2 controlled studies done, one for Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), and the other for Migraines. I will fully admit that the Migraine study did not meet clinical significance as it was conducted over a 3 month period of time, thus having the burden of non compliance and poor nutritional follow ups.

The IBS study was published in 2004 in ‘Gut’ - gut.bmj.com/content/53/10/1459.full.pdf

Also, and very much more relevant is the study done for Migraines - nutritionj.com/content/10/1/85

As you can see, we did have an impact in the reduction of Migraines for the first 4 weeks, than at the 12 week mark there was no clinical significance. The underlying reason is compliance in diets with no consultations or dietary monitoring. I can speculate that if there were tighter guidelines for the trial, it would have been stronger, regardless it wasn’t, and we are not afraid to mention that.

Scott - I appreciate you allowing us to stand on your soap box for a moment, and respect the fact that you are looking out for your members. Being sceptical of tests/programs like this is always best, and knowing the landscape, it’s required. We will stand behind our science in IBS as around ~90% of our patients have stomach related issues, something we have strong science to back. As far as Migraines, we think we can help there too, but as I clearly point out, don’t have the science to support it… yet! In fact, we are willing to put our money where our mouth is. If you find me 2 long-term, great standing Canadian members of your form, and put them in touch with me, I will offer them each a free program. We offer 2 nutritional counselling sessions with our program (something the Migraine Study did a poor job at), and I assume we will make an impact. If not, then we will stick to our bread and butter of stomach ailments, sound fair?

I would love to offer everyone a free program, but unfortunately, we need to pay the bills, and we are a business. Scott, please feel free to PM me, and we can then exchange emails and work out the details. Again, they will need to be Canadian patients as that’s as far as our reach extends.

Again, thanks very much for allowing me to take the time to respond, and I hope we can make an impact for your forum members.

CanLab Inc.

EDIT - Spelling, Grammar and content changes.

22

If the York Test is the same York Test done here in the UK, I had it done for food intolerances years ago and out of many foods was shown to be intolerant to eggs and yeast. I certainly do have a problem with eggs, not sure about yeast. Unfortunately there are more foods that cause my migraine plus chemicals etc. so it didnt help me. I told a friend about the York Test whos daugher had a multitude of health problems (not migraine) and she did the test, eliminated certain foods and my friend (who is not into any of this sort of thing) said it has helped her daughter immensely, she is a whole lot better.

Christine

23

— Begin quote from “CanLabs”

Interesting discussion you have going on here. I will also disclose that I represent CanLabs and the YorkTest food intolerance test here in Canada.

Knowing that this is an evidence based forum for Migraine supporters, let’s start there.

YorkTest is an IgG self administered finger prick blood test, which has clinical evidence (yes links to follow) to support our results. We have 2 controlled studies done, one for Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), and the other for Migraines. I will fully admit that the Migraine study did not meet clinical significance as it was conducted over a 3 month period of time, thus having the burden of non compliance and poor nutritional follow ups.

The IBS study was published in 2004 in ‘Gut’ - gut.bmj.com/content/53/10/1459.full.pdf

Also, and very much more relevant is the study done for Migraines - nutritionj.com/content/10/1/85

As you can see, we did have an impact in the reduction of Migraines for the first 4 weeks, than at the 12 week mark there was no clinical significance. The underlying reason is compliance in diets with no consultations or dietary monitoring. I can speculate that if there were tighter guidelines for the trial, it would have been stronger, regardless it wasn’t, and we are not afraid to mention that.

Scott - I appreciate you allowing us to stand on your soap box for a moment, and respect the fact that you are looking out for your members. Being sceptical of tests/programs like this is always best, and knowing the landscape, it’s required. We will stand behind our science in IBS as around ~90% of our patients have stomach related issues, something we have strong science to back. As far as Migraines, we think we can help there too, but as I clearly point out, don’t have the science to support it… yet! In fact, we are willing to put our money where our mouth is. If you find me 2 long-term, great standing Canadian members of your form, and put them in touch with me, I will offer them each a free program. We offer 2 nutritional counselling sessions with our program (something the Migraine Study did a poor job at), and I assume we will make an impact. If not, then we will stick to our bread and butter of stomach ailments, sound fair?

I would love to offer everyone a free program, but unfortunately, we need to pay the bills, and we are a business. Scott, please feel free to PM me, and we can then exchange emails and work out the details. Again, they will need to be Canadian patients as that’s as far as our reach extends.

Again, thanks very much for allowing me to take the time to respond, and I hope we can make an impact for your forum members.

CanLab Inc.

EDIT - Spelling, Grammar and content changes.

— End quote

Hi,

I read your study (the one for migraine, the IBS one does not concern us here) and think it has a few weaknesses. I will make my own disclosure that I am a lay person so can only comment in that capacity.

First of all you don’t know for sure that your subjects are migraineurs – they have self reported. There are any number of other conditions which can cause migraine-like symptoms. In addition, as your study also focussed on pain/headache symptoms you may well have had subjects who suffer no condition at all and simply use the word ‘migraine’ interchangeably with ‘bad headache’ (many people do).

I would be very cautious about putting too much faith in the reduction of symptoms noted at the four week mark. That could very likely be a placebo affect. In the beginning stages of a study there would be an expectation of success which would begin to wane moving along to week 12.

Your explanation for no clinical significance at week 12 is that there was poor compliance with the diet however I couldn’t find that in the study itself (I may have missed it of course) so is that mere speculation on the part of the researchers? As compliance with the diet is also self reported how do you know with any certainty how accurate those reports are?

You also mention the many other variables which can trigger migraine however I could not see if/how these were controlled for in your study. Such variables include hormonal fluctuations, stress, changes in weather patterns and spontaneous migraines as well as spontaneous reductions.

As well as a diet group and a sham diet group it may have been helpful to have a third group which did no diet at all – you can test them for food intolerances and have them report on their diet but they simply eat whatever they please.

Can you confirm if you are inviting two Canadian migraineurs from the forum to participate in a clinical trial or are you offering them a free trial of your program? If the latter then the best you can hope for are testimonials, you will be no further advanced in terms of establishing evidence for your program.

24

— Begin quote from ____

I wouldn’t waste my time with Hemocode for 30 seconds.

— End quote

You already did, posting this. lol! Just teasing you. :slight_smile:

K

25

One more question for Can Labs,

Is the poster DDarling (see below and earlier in this thread) an employee of yours - either directly or through a third party (e.g PR/marketing/advertising agency)? It is EXTREMELY suspicious (and does your company no favours in terms of candour and credibility) when a person joins this forum, doesn’t provide any medical history relating to their migraine and makes a single post singing the praises of the YorkTest (Proven! With actual studies! Covered by insurance!), available with the Can Labs company.

Anyway, DDarling is due to report back (as promised) so perhaps he/she will let us know.

— Begin quote from “DDarling”

Hi there!
With all that said, I did not take the Hemocode, instead I looked further and found another Program in Canada. It is called the YorkTest program (Google it - Can labs is the company). It is an actual proven IgG test with studies done on it, something I was more comfortable with. Although it is a little higher priced ($700), I still had most of it covered with my health plan. I did the test last month and got my results back. I am on week 2 now. I will let you know how I do over the next few weeks as I too wanted to know if food was causing my Migraines as I have suspected for a while now.

— End quote

26

Oh, the delicious synchronicity. Look what just came out tonight on Science Based Medicine - Hemocode and YorkTest - both BUSTED :lol: .

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/index.php/igg-food-intolerance-tests-what-does-the-science-say/

27

CanLabs,

I read the migraine study you posted just then myself and agree with all of the shortcomings that Victoria highlighted. There were some major issues with self-reporting of diet – and this is a BIG problem in many clinical trials focusing on weight loss. When I was running studies at the University of Sydney we always had hassles just getting reliable 3-day food diaries returned let alone trying to record everything people were eating in the sort of study your example describes. I think this speaks for itself:

“Within the current study only 52% of the participants in the true diet group returned their daily food diary … Consequently, we were unable to assess the impact of adherence with the diet within the present study.”

The lack of control for other migraine triggers is a big problem as is the recruitment of the subjects:

“Because the participants were recruited through advertisement and through the completion of a postal questionnaire we could not be certain that all of them had a clinical diagnosis of migraine. Consequently, those recruited to the study did have self reported headaches that were ‘migraine like’. Whilst most of the participants are likely to have had migraines it is possible that some did not.”

Lastly, I just don’t find the results of this study to be at all compelling. There was a reported effect at 4 weeks but it was gone by 12 weeks.

Incredibly, Science-Based Medicine – as Victoria pointed out – has just published a very comprehensive review of the evidence on Hemocode and its validity. Serendipity? As I suspected, it just doesn’t stack up and I’d encourage you to read it yourself (link above).

If you are offering this to anyone here for free and I mean free, then they have nothing to lose and that’s fine with me and they should be fully aware that there is no evidence base for this (read the SBM article folks if you’re even thinking about this) but I will not support you promoting these tests here at hundreds of dollars a pop. You’ll have to advertise elsewhere.

Thank you for respecting this wish.

Best … Scott

28

— Begin quote from “Victoria”

Oh, the delicious synchronicity. Look what just came out tonight on Science Based Medicine - Hemocode and YorkTest - both BUSTED :lol: .

http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/index.php/igg-food-intolerance-tests-what-does-the-science-say/

— End quote

That’s a brilliant article. Says it all really.