Talk:Grape seed oil
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Two suggestions: I would explain the "Treatment" section better - are these folk remedies? Proven medical benefits? How are they applied? - and I would rearrange the sections, so that "Treatment" and "Medical Information" are together, and "Modern Uses" is listed first. Otherwise, very good stuff. Scooter 00:03, 4 Jan 2004 (UTC)
I am very concerned about this page - especially as it seems to be in Google's number two spot for "grape seed oil" AND medical
I arrived by a round-about route and know very little about the subject, but it sounded so much like an "infomercial" from the grape seed oil industry that I felt obliged to do a bit of Googling. Some of the medical claims do not seem to be supported in any medical references, although they are widely echoed on vendors' web sites. For example, the oligomeric proanthocyanidins (OPC) referred to are indeed found in grape seeds (but mainly in the skins), and are indeed considered valuable in the treatment of several conditions of the veins. However OPCs are polar molecules that are practically insoluble in nonpolar oil, so contrary to popular myth there isn't any OPC in grape seed oil! [1] If you want grape OPCs, viable sources include fresh grapes, grape seed extract, grape juice, and red wine; in fact anything except the oil.
Furthermore several of the other claimed medical uses just do not seem to be supported at all, either for GSO or GSE.[2] Breast cancer, for example: the closest to a supportive statement that I could find on any vaguely medical looking web site was on a few "complementary health" sites that recommended various antioxidants, including OPCs, to help prevent cancer. Even if GSO contained OPCs this is speculative - albeit a reasonable speculation - and contains nothing at all about treating the cancer after it has occurred. (Antioxidants prevent cancer by absorbing free radicals before they can attack DNA. Logically there is no reason why a material which works this way, would have any effect at all on the cancer after it was formed, and there doesn't seem to be any evidence that it does so.) Yet the article is written in such a way as to give the impression that it is standard medical practice to treat breast cancer with GSO.
However, I acknowledge that I am no expert in this area. Would someone who is please examine this article and determine if it is valid, or is Wikipedia being used to hawk snake oil?
Once we have sorted fact from fiction, we can start refactoring it; as Scooter points out, the article is also rather incoherent (e.g. 1/4 of the "Cooking" section is actually further medical claims). Securiger 10:35, 22 Feb 2004 (UTC)
The following has been removed from the article pending fact-checking:
BEGIN
[edit] Treatment for
Atherosclerosis, breast cancer, Constipation, hair disorders, hypercholesterolemia, hypertension, lung cancer, macular degeneration, pancreatitis, varicose veins.
Also softens dry skin.
Studies have shown that grape seed-derived oligomeric proanthrocyanidins (OPC) prevents cardiovascular disease and can counteract the negative effects of high cholesterol on the heart and blood vessels. OPC's are a set of bioflavonoid complexes that perform as free radical scavengers in the human body. These OPCs can help protect against the effects of internal and environmental stresses (that is, cigarette smoking, pollution, and suporting normal body metabolic processes). The effects are; depressing blood fat, emolliating blood vessels, lowering blood pressure, preventing blood vessel scleroses, dropping blood viscidity and preventing thrombus formation (a type of platelet clot).
END -- WormRunner 05:14, 9 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- I've NPOV'd the latter paragraph above and parked it at Oligomeric proanthrocyanidin. Mkweise 05:26, 9 Mar 2004 (UTC)
[edit] Nash and JACC article?
I can't find the paper in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology that this article cites. The number "925-116" in the citation doesn't make sense to me. No 1993 article in the JACC starts on page 925 or page 116. Google for several variations on the article title reveals nothing. Some Google hits have citations like "J Am Coll Cardiol 1993;21:318-20", but again, no such article exists. See for yourself. [3]
Medline and JACC searches for Nash DT, Nash SD, Grant WD, "grape seed", "grapeseed", and combinations of those terms reveal no articles fitting the citation. I found one Web page that cites something believable: Nash DT, Nash SD, Grant WD. Grapeseed oil, a natural agent which raises serum HDL-C levels. Presented at the American College of Cardiology 42nd Annual Scientific Session, Mar 15, 1993, Anaheim, Calif
I have a feeling that I'll find the abstract of the presentation here: 42nd Annual Scientific Sessions. Anaheim, California, March 14-18, 1993. Abstracts. Journal of the American College of Cardiology. 21(2 Suppl A):1A-578A, 1993 Feb.
Unfortunately, JACC doesn't have supplements from that far back online. I'm deleting the reference and modifying the text appropriately until I can get to the library.
Significant deleted text follows:
- D.T. Nash, S.D. Nash, State University of New York Health Science Center at Syracuse, W.D. Grant, Department of Family Medicine, State University of New York Health Science Center at Syracuse, Syracuse, New York: Journal of the American College of Cardiology, 925-116 Grapeseed Oil, A natural Agent Which Raises Serum HDL levels, 1993.
--Officiallyover 07:52, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
- I just wrote to the editor who originally put in this reference and asked him/her to check it. Badagnani 08:29, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
