The Scam of Skin Antioxidant Testing
A while back, a friend of mine asked me about this product:
It's a biophotonic scanner made by a company called Pharmanex. This product measures carotenoid levels in the skin. Carotenoids are antioxidants found in many fruits and vegetables. Beta-carotene is one carotenoid that you may be familiar with. Other carotenoids include lutein and lycopene, to name just a few. Many scientists believe that carotenoids may be partly responsible for the observed associations between increased fruit and vegetable intake and lower risk of many diseases.
The company claims that this scanner can give you an "accurate and reliable biomarker of your overall antioxidant health status". They further state that, "Getting your Skin Carotenoid Score makes you aware of the antioxidant levels in your body-and gives you the push you need to improve your overall antioxidant health." To appear scientific, their website is complete with a scientific advisory board, a list of scientists, and even a list of studies that they claim supports their product.
Well, it's B.S.
OK, it's not complete B.S. The product does do what it claims to do....it measures carotenoid levels in the skin using a technique called Raman Spectroscopy.
While that's fine and dandy, what is B.S. is their claim that it is a reliable biomarker of your overall antioxidant status. There is simply no evidence that carotenoid skin levels reflect the overall antioxidant status of your body.
Carotenoid skin levels do correlate with fruit and vegetable intake, so the test can tell you if you eat a lot of fruits and vegetables. But do you need an expensive scanner to tell you if you're eating a lot of fruits and vegetables?
And what do you think the company recommends you do if you have a low skin carotenoid score? Buy their antioxidant supplements, of course.
This isn't the first time Pharmanex has spread outlandish claims. In 1997, they were fined by the Federal Trade Commission over claims they made about two supplements they sold.
The fact is that this scanner is nothing more than a fancy way to take your money and to get you to buy things that you don't need. There is no evidence that skin carotenoid status is a reflection of overall antioxidant status. You do not need an expensive test to know if you're consuming a lot fruits and vegetables. Also, there is little scientific evidence that supplemental antioxidants have any health benefits. In fact, too many antioxidants can have a pro-oxidant effect, and may also reduce your own body's antioxidant defense systems. We are a bit too antioxidant crazy in our society....a topic that I will get to in another blog post.
Yes, it might help people by motivating them to eat more fruits and vegetables, but at what cost! My frined has litterally spent thousands of dollars to get the company’s supplements, which I think is the motivator behind the scanner not really the science part.
The anger is about the scam, not about motivating people to eat healthier.
Backed exclusively by science, the antioxidant scanner has saved thousands of people as it motivates them to change behavior.
PS: There is a lot of anger on this forum.
The product, Dave is backed by SOME science, not “exclusively by science” as you claim. Whay annoys me most is the sleight of hand being used to twist the science – in full awareness that most people – and that includes medical practitioners – don’t know enough about cell biochemistry to meaningfully evaluate the carefully-selected information. All this gadget does is to measure colorimetrically the quantity of fat-soluble carotenoids being lodged in cell membranes; in this case, visible in the skin. Given that the primary continuous source of reactive oxygen species in human cells is in the mitochondria and cytoplasm… Read more »
Thank you so much. This is what I’ve been looking for, a critical analysis.
What’s interesting about the Pharmanex device is that you could eat nothing but sausages smothered in tomato sauce and this would give you a ‘favourable’ reading! Having carotenoids in the skin tells us absolutely nothing about the true redox potential of your cells! As a motivator to eat more plant foods, it may have a part to play – but for an indicator of redox balance, it is useless! What annoys me most is that the MLMers who get reeled into such nonsense, typically dont know enough (if any) biochemistry to see that it is junk science at its worst… Read more »
I just had a skin antioxident test done. The test showed that I was off the scale — on the negative side, less than 10,000. I eat lots of fruits and vegetables with every meal, I drink green tea with lemon every noon, I take eye vitamins daily that have 14,320 IU Vitamin A and 226 mg of Vitamin C, and take 3600 mg of fish oil daily. Now what is the explanation of my bad results? I guess, I am not a convert of this measuring device, especially since the recommendation to up my antioxident level was to buy… Read more »
One third of the population has the genetic trait for APO E4. People with this trait should not take fish oil because it raises LDL and lowers HDL (just the opposite of what it should). If you have a family history of Parkinson’s Alzeihmer’s or heart disease, you may want to consider getting tested. With cancer, there is a TH1 or TH2 dominance. Green tea makes one of these better, one worse. Also, I don’t know if you are getting good quality vitimins, or getting them from Walmart (sorry Walmart). It sounds like there is something else going on since… Read more »
But this company Pharmanex is based in China – do you really trust them? I don’t! And I will not take any supplements that were produced in China either!
Thanks, Tranz4mer
By the way, the advice is free and I don’t get any compensation or reach any pin levels for giving
sensible advice. No taking advantage of anyone here…
Buying a Vitamix and putting in lots of veggies and fruits makes great way to increase your antioxidant level. I was tested with AntiOxidant machine. I said thank you and I headed out the store to buy the Vitamix. It keeps the fiber fresh.
Thanks for the testing and I’m going to increase my antioxidant level the healthy way.
No more monthly subscription to the “pills” and “drinks”.
JaimeE,
Now your talking my language. There is no better way to feed your Temple (body) than with the food put here on earth. There is still a tremendous argument being waged, as to how efficiently our bodies absorb laboratory designed pills. The simple answer is, “Eat to Live” rather than “Living to Eat.”
As a distributor in MonaVie, I have just received my scanner and have begun to use it. People have been excited and really want to know their score. When they score low, they ask, ” What can I do to improve my score?” I tell them the many factors that cause free radicals like too little sleep, too much sun, stress and pollution. While its more difficult to control those things, we can control what we eat. We need to be eating 10-12 servings of fruits and vegetables every day, but that is hard to do in this fast-paced world… Read more »
Lisa,
What a wonderful way to approach this testing.
It will go up because the testing is thrown off initially. How do I know. They scanned me. Guess what. I have a friend that has a scanner – they can trip it up to scare people. You can eat too many fruit sugars.
I have been in the Health and Wellness industry for nearly 30 years now. I specialize in helping individuals transform their lifestyles and lifestyle choices. Although I do not agree with all the company says or insinuates about the testing and its validity, I do agree with many on this thread. Used properly and ethically, this device can be used to motivate and to, in some degree, quantify a person’s effort to living a more healthy lifestyle. If you understand anything at all about habit formation or behavioral change, you realize that habits are mere loops of behavior. A cue,… Read more »
Hi Vicki,
This one looks different. MonaVie’s scanner might use a different method and measure more different antioxidants. It’s cool!
Let me know if I can help you get access to MonaVie’s scanner, or anything else MonaVie offers.
-Fred Kunkel
scam or not will it help diabeticis
The Products are excellent for Diabetes….
Cheers
The company guarantees the nutrition will help or your money back. I was told that if your numbers don’t improve, it is because of diabetes or heart disease, so I’m thinking it doesn’t help with diabetes as much. I haven’t bought it yet, so I don’t have any physical data on it.
So does Mona vie use this scanner?