Talk:Aromatherapy

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Ideal sources for Wikipedia's health content are defined in the guideline Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources (medicine) and are typically review articles. Here are links to possibly useful sources of information about Aromatherapy.

PubMed provides review articles from the past five years (limit to free review articles)
The TRIP database provides clinical publications about evidence-based medicine.
Other potential sources include: Centre for Reviews and Dissemination and CDC

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 20 January 2022 and 4 May 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Chocolataupain (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Linz36, Publicwriaz.

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 28 August 2019 and 6 December 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): BGarrett333. Peer reviewers: Emilygdeng, Kangw01, Roopeterson, PatDillard, Jaselleee, Andrianicole1.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 17:32, 17 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 7 January 2019 and 25 April 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Haleighj.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 14:44, 16 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Who actually thinks this works?[edit]

(Except as a placebo or calming the user down)

REDsEngineer (talk) 03:44, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

A lot of people mistakenly think this works. TylerDurden8823 (talk) 00:10, 14 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Surely that depends upon what you expect it to do? John2o2o2o (talk) 23:38, 26 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Aromatherapy: Not a Pseudoscience[edit]

Aromatherapy, when practiced in clinical settings, in particular, is a form of complementary medicine. A quick search of PubMed reveals numerous published articles from scientific journals carried out at respected medical institutions that demonstrate the positive effects of certain inhaled essential oils for the mitigation of symptoms including anxiety, stress, nausea, and insomnia. Legitimate aromatherapists do not claim to "cure" diseases with essential oils, nor do they reject medical science. Instead, they offer adjunct, first-line comfort care options to patients that do not carry the risks of many pharmaceutical interventions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.132.117.81 (talk) 17:07, 11 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

It's well sourced it's a pseudoscience, and that a lot of crap research is done into it. A quick search show that indeed, "out there" on the web wild claims are made for it, like that it cures herpes.[1] Alexbrn (talk) 18:37, 11 September 2019 (UTC)[reply]

No True Scotsman Fallacy aside, I find it incorrect to characterize it so strongly as a “Pseudoscience”, when there are actual laws regulating it as complementary medicine, for example in Germany and Austria, and none of the licensed practitioners there would ever even think of making pseudoscientific claims about it, let alone act like it’s a “science” in the first place. If I go on the Internet and spread rumors that going on a low-carb diet makes your skin smoother, does that turn low-carb into a “pseudoscience”, just because there’s now documented sources on the Internet of somebody making pseudoscientific claims about it? Personally, I would find it more unbiased to edit the article to say “Aromatherapy is a form of complementary medicine, which has gained pseudoscientific character in recent years because of unverifiable claims about its effectiveness.” 78.132.42.146 (talk) 13:13, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

We follow sources, not the special pleasing of editors. Alexbrn (talk) 13:26, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

In fairness, it could be just nonsense rather than pseudoscience, but the sources say the latter. Guy (help!) 18:06, 24 November 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The term pseudoscience is an opinion of the author of this article. The citation [1] does not support that opinion. A article of a reputable source should be used otherwise the word 'pseudoscience' should be removed.

If indeed a article is found then as Aromatherapy is linked to phytochemistry and aromatology, the term pseudoscience should be applied to these too.

Wikipedia entry on 'Olbas oil' which consists of essential oils, should be edited to state its method of action is placebo. ERP416 (talk) 08:17, 11 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

That source is used to support the fact that people actually do use aromatherapy, "... claims for improving psychological or physical well-being." not the pseudoscience factoid. That is supported by the rest of the article, and is obviously well sourced. Regarding your comment on other articles, well, WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS -Roxy, the PROD. . wooF 15:10, 11 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

ERP416, nobody claims that olbas oil cures cancer. The claimed mechanism of action of olbas oil is that eucalyptus oil and the rest can relieve nasal congestion. That's entirely plausible.

Olbas also claim symptomatic relief of sciatica, which is very obviously bollocks and - if the placebo effect were a thing - would be a placebo effect. In other words, it's due to biased reporting and/or biased analysis. Guy (help!) 09:39, 12 January 2020 (UTC)[reply]

@JzG and Alexbrn: There was another recent study at the University of California, Irvine that found a significant improvement in memory recall for users of aromatherapy. Jarble (talk) 18:03, 3 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

That's an extremely well-understood phenomenon tying multi-sensory experiences to recall. Music, smells and tactile sensations can recall specific things. It doesn'#t validate in any way the abject nonsense spouted by most aromatherapy shills. Guy (help! - typo?) 18:53, 3 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Quackery[edit]

The article is overly polite. I can understand the reasons to be polite and forgiving but quackery needs to be called out as such. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.93.233.24 (talk) 15:03, 4 December 2020 (UTC)[reply]

No, I think you're being extremely rude. It is a form of complementary medicine, not intended to replace traditional medicine. John2o2o2o (talk) 23:40, 26 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a form of medicine at all. Guy (help! - typo?) 18:51, 3 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Use of a odorant diffuser improves cognition/memory[edit]

A 2023 study at the University of California, Irvine, found that odorant diffuser therapy improved cognition in subjects over 60 years old by 226%. See https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnins.2023.1200448/full.

An earlier study with a more intricate protocol showed improvement in elderly patients with neurological problems such as dementia, Parkinson's disease, etc. See https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/ggi.14287 Waltwooton (talk) 18:50, 18 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Waltwooton, I agree with you. Actually the topic had been well-researched by the Japanese since years ago. Those are researchers and doctors working in reputated hospitals that train new doctors (I watched the information on TV). It seems that they are not very interested in sharing their findings in English journals or Pubmed though. I think that’s one of the reasons why the West is not so keen on that. I do believe one has to be careful when using aromatherapy though, since the constituents of oil vary with different manufacturers, and people are often confused between fragrance oil and essential oil, while the former can be quite harmful. Also, odourant diffuser can be a source of bacteria or pathogens. --Dustfreeworld (talk) 10:16, 19 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

In fact there are many reviews on Pubmed, but it seems that Wikipedia choose to ignore them. Here are some reviews about the antidepressant effects of essential oils:

--Dustfreeworld (talk) 10:30, 19 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

These all sound like great sources, albeit primary ones. If you can find a secondary source corroborating their claims I would recommend adding this info to the article (as always). In the meantime I’ll check the current page’s grammar. OverzealousAutocorrect (talk) 19:17, 2 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Goodness yes. Apologies. That looked so much like an article space edit I mistook it! Bon courage (talk) 16:51, 19 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It’s ok Bon courage, it happens :) --Dustfreeworld (talk) 19:06, 19 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]