Aromatherapy Products

Spa operator smells more success in China:

Nature Touch Aromatherapy Co Ltd, a leading operator of spas and manufacturer of spa products, will soon open two new spas in Shanghai and Guangzhou …The spas will cost Bt5 million each and each cover 200 square metres of space with five twin treatment rooms. They will open 24 hours a day and target local and foreign business people.

Add China to the list of countries where aromatherapy is getting popular. I think this is a sign of China’s growing affluence. I would imagine that only the more well to do in China can afford things like aromatherapy.

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Scotsman.com News – Opinion – Every penny promotes a healthy cause:

“Paying for these treatments, to help create a sense of well-being for a
vulnerable group of people, was not at the expense of one single operation or
treatment in our hospitals and clinics.
The treatments are being funded by
our long-standing Endowments Fund – a mechanism to invest donations and legacies
to provide non-clinical services and gifts to improve the lives of our patients
and their relatives. They are not being funded from money we receive from the
Scottish Executive. NHS Lothian recognises that huge responsibilities come with
receiving public funding and we relish the challenges of delivering identifiable
improvements to the health of people in the Lothians. “

To follow up on a story I commented on earlier, the government of the UK was not funding aromatherapy with government funding. The aromatherapy services were being funded through donations.

Regardless, it still shows a commitment to aromatherapy by conventional medicine.

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Telegraph Health New Ager: aromatherapy

This article gives a brief overview of aromatherapy and tells you how to find an aromatherapist in the UK. (You can go to www.aromatherapy-regulation.org.uk.)

In the UK, just as in the US, there is no national registration or licensing process. So anyone who wants to can call themselves an aromatherapist. In both countries though, there are efforts by industry groups to self regulate. However, being a part of these organizations, or following their suggested educational guidelines is completely voluntary.

I wonder how long it will be before there is government intervention in the field of aromatherapy?

Aromatherapy Guide

Telegraph Health New Ager: aromatherapy

This article gives a brief overview of aromatherapy and tells you how to find an aromatherapist in the UK. (You can go to www.aromatherapy-regulation.org.uk.)

In the UK, just as in the US, there is no national registration or licensing process. So anyone who wants to can call themselves an aromatherapist. In both countries though, there are efforts by industry groups to self regulate. However, being a part of these organizations, or following their suggested educational guidelines is completely voluntary.

I wonder how long it will be before there is government intervention in the field of aromatherapy?

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Aromatherapy on the go

Mood-affecting aromas have been around for centuries. So why hasn’t anyone
packaged and sold them?
Luke Vorstermans, a longtime small business advocate
and consultant, has been wondering that himself. In fact, he’s done a lot of
research on the subject

I would like to know just how this works. The article says that natural oils are mixed with a polymer in a plastic tube and that you shake it up and open it to release the scent.

I wonder if you could do something similar with a mixture of beeswax and jojba oil? This might end up being a weekend project.

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IOL: The full sensory experience at your cinema…:

Maybe a better word for this would be aromatainment…

Tokyo – Two movie theatres in Japan began offering a novel sensory experience to
audiences on Saturday: smells synchronised to a Hollywood adventure film.Seven
different aromas wafted from beneath the back-row seats during showings of the
The New World, synchronised with the on-screen action.”This movie depicted
nature a lot, so the aromas created the atmosphere of the forest and flowers
shown in the movie. It was nice,” said Asami Osato, who watched the film at
Tokyo’s Louvre Marunouchi theatre.A floral scent accompanies a love scene, while
a mix of peppermint and rosemary is emitted from special machines during a sad
portion of the film.

I couldn’t resist sharing this. I’m sure the scents are all synthetic and not essential oils, but it’s stil interesting that people are recognizing that smell is an integral part of experience.

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Aromatherapy in The Philippines

As my last few posts have shown, aromatherapy is a big business in the UK, where it is a £20million a year business. Aromatherapy is also popular in the United States.

It seems as though aromatherapy is truly a global phenomenon, as this article tells the story of a young entrepreneur in the Philippines who is developing her own line of aromatherapy and spa products.

What I found most interesting was her account of how in her first store she had a limited number of products that were all made by hand. It reminded me of the story of Olivier Baussan, the founder of L’Occitane who made all of his products by hand in the beginning.

I wish the young entrepreneur, Vanessa Mondragon the best of luck.

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Skeptics sense victory as study dismisses alleged benefits of aromatherapy – Britain – Times Online

I did some more digging about the research I mentioned in my last post. The researcher was Dr. Neil Martin, a psychologist from Middlesex University. It turns out that his research was presented at the annual British Psychology Conference in Cardiff.

Why is this significant? Research presented at a conference is not peer reviewed the way research submitted to a journal for publication is. So the research he presented at the conference was not reviewed rigorously by other scientists before it was presented.

It also means that it will be more difficult for anyone else to review it. I can’t go to Pub Med and look up an article. Even if the conference has published a summary of the research presented, it’s going to be tough to get a copy of it.

Sadly, this situation points out some of the problems with traditional media. Not all reporters are trained in scientific methods and so are not prepared to objectively evaluate research. So they take a piece of questionable research and use it to write sensational headlines that write off the entire field of aromatherapy.

As I said in my last post, all this piece of research says is that smelling the scent of lemons does not take away the sensation of discomfort you feel after plunging your arm into ice cold water for 15 minutes.

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Aromatherapy: Nice smell, but no health benefit the Daily Mail

The growing popularity of aromatherapy in Britain has led to a £20million-a-year
industry in oils bought over the counter, plus a booming business in spas and
health farms. Surveys show three out of four people believe the treatment
works. But a psychologist who specialises in the power of scent says his
experiments expose a massive marketing exercise which has no scientific basis.

The study was designed by a psychologist to test if aromatherapy could reduce a person’s pain level. Subjects put their arms in cold water for 15 minutes and then either were exposed to the smell of lemon, or machine oil. The study’s results said that people who smelled either lemon or machine oil experienced more pain than people who smelled nothing. The author concluded that aromatherapy did not work.

I’d like to get a hold of the original article to take a look at the methods of this study, because I can see some issues right off the bat.

First, did the study use real essential oils, or a manufactured synthetic lemon smell?

Second, in the aromatherapy books I have read, I have not seen lemon listed as a pain reliever. In fact, some books list it as a stimulant to the nervous system. This could potentially be a reason the people in the study felt worse.

Third, how much lemon did they smell and for how long? A dosage that is too high or too low might have different effects.

Fourth, inhalation is not the only method used in aromatherapy. Would the study have had different results if the lemon essential oil had been applied to skin, or massaged in? (You could have had controls where water was applied to the skin and the test subject was massaged with no essential oil.)

Fifth, how was bias controlled for? If the study was not blinded, it’s possible the peopleadministeringg the test could have been subtlycuingg the test subjects.

I would like to have seen a different essential oil, one that is more calming such as lavender, used instead.

It’s unfortunate that a study like this is out there, because at most, all it can say is that smelling the scent of lemons does not relieve the pain caused by putting your arm in ice cold water for 15 minutes. There are some though that will try to say that the entire field of aromatherapy does not work and is a waster of money.

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Aromatherapy on NHS for patients with brain injuries

PATIENTS recovering from strokes and brain injuries are to receive aromatherapy
on the National Health Service.
NHS Lothian has agreed to fund the
aromatherapy after patients said their health improved after receiving
treatment.

I think this is a a very interesting article on aromatherapy. The fact that the British government is funding aromatherapy in hospitals shows that aromatherapy is gaining more mainstream acceptance.

SNP health spokeswoman Shona Robison added that aromatherapy was now regarded as
a mainstream therapy.
She said: “I would say there is a limited role for the
NHS to fund recognised complimentary therapies in some cases but I think there
has to be some evidence of them working and their use would have to be monitored
carefully.”

It seems that initially a charity group was providing aromatherapy to patients on a volunteer basis, but the results were so positive that the goverment has agreed to continuing funding the work.

We’ll have to see if hospitals in the United States will take a similar atance on aromatherapy.

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