Talk:Multiple chemical sensitivity

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Discussions here have repeatedly involved the same arguments and views.

Please review the recent comments below, or in the archives. New views and ideas on the subject are welcome; however, if your beliefs reflect already existing contributions, please consider withholding them.
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Archive 1 (through December 2007).


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[edit] Archive

All previous discussions (April 2004 through December 2007) have been moved to the first-ever archive of this talk page. If you need to refer to a previous discussion (for example, to make sure you're not repeating things that were discussed in detail already), please click on the archive link. Active discussions, however, belong here, on this page, so please don't edit the archive.

(Note to anyone who archives this page in the future: I used the page move procedure to create this archive.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:49, 13 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your work on this article. Cool Hand Luke 00:31, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Recent edits

Just a note to our new editors to say: It's not cool to delete properly sourced material just because you don't agree with it. If you want to present a different view, that's fine: This page will tell you what kinds of information should be included in an encyclopedia and how to list your sources (which need to be "reputable," not our favorite pro-my-personal-views activist websites).

Even if you find it personally offensive to suggest that some MCS-claiming people actually have an anxiety disorder instead of strictly chemical problem, that's what most docs believe, and our readers have a right to know that the docs think this and to know why the docs think this. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:45, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Gripe

I just want to say that the words "some" and "many" and "a subgroup" (and so forth) already mean not everyone. If "just" a quarter of people with MCS-related symptoms are helped by an anxiolytic, and "just" another quarter are helped by an antidepressant (even if it the first drug they try isn't a good match for them), then that's good news for the people who are helped -- and our readers are smart enough to figure out that "helps a quarter of people" means "doesn't help three-quarters of people." Wikipedia is not in the business of promoting one treatment over another; nor should we be in the business of denigrating options that have apparently helped half of the people with ongoing MCS-related concerns.

I'm reminded of a distinction that the EMF community makes between people who are EMF-anxious (nearly everyone) and people who are EMF-sensitive (extremely rare). People do not "choose" to have an EMF-related anxiety any more than they choose their skin color -- so there's no justification for blame here -- but ultimately it is in the best interests of the individuals who are EMF-sensitive that people with anxiety disorders get properly diagnosed and treated for their actual disease instead of being lumped in with EMF-sensitive people. Similarly, if antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs didn't help your MCS symptoms, that's your experience (it's also the experience of many people who have straightforward depression or anxiety: nothing's perfectly effective), but don't run down the treatment option for someone else. If you "really" have MCS, it's in your own self-interest to get depressed, anxious, and allergic people properly diagnosed and treated. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:08, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Recent edits redux

Alright, I'll concede the issue on creating an introductory section heading. But the opening sentence that administrator WhatamIdoing seems so attached to is, quite frankly, stylistically convoluted. As a longtime factual writing teacher I fail to see what it is about simplicity and lucidity that he finds so objectionable.

As for balance: Why eliminate a reference (with endnote) to the work of Prof. Martin Pall, school of molecular biosciences at WSU? And why insist on the loaded phrase at the end of the intro, namely "although these proposals have uniformly been rejected by critics." WhatamIdoing leaves us to conclude that the "critics" either have an ax to grind, or else that they are of one mind in opposing "clinical ecological" proposals in all forms. Elburts (talk) 09:45, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Since the introductory paragraphs are in dispute, I sectioned it off for easier access. The opening sentence preferred by WhatamIdoing was, imo, difficult to understand. Replaced it based on (rather than quoted from) the Michaels' article. Should be no copyright problems. Elburts (talk) 06:23, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

I am amused by being called an administrator. You will not find my name on that list. I'm just a normal editor, like you. In fact, as far as I can tell, none of Wikipedia's 1500+ admins are involved in editing this page.
As for the other issues:
  1. I don't especially mind the current phrasing for the first sentence, except for the phrase "chronic state of illness," which is very likely to be misleading. I think it suggests to the average that all people with MCS are suffering, maybe even sick in bed, round the clock, day in and day out, when in fact nearly all of them figure out how to manage their issues and are in fact fine most of the time. You wouldn't describe my friend with the life-threatening Type 1 allergy to milk as having a "chronic state of illness," would you? He's perfectly fine 99% of the time because of environmental controls (milk avoidance). My major point was simply that the previous two attempts were either unnecessarily wordy or copyright violations, not that the 'original' one was perfect. The original one even has a grammar error (affects/effects), now that I look at it more closely.
  2. I have looked at the recent changes I made, and I see no evidence that I deleted any references to Martin Pall.
  3. I have looked at the recent changes I made, and I see no evidence that made any changes to the phrase "although these proposals have uniformly been rejected by critics." It is true that I think that some critics are irrevocably opposed to MCS. Not all critics, but certainly some of them. I also think that at least one MCS critic has rejected every single one of these proposals, so the statement appears to be accurate. However, I have made no changes relating to this phrase in any recent edits.
  4. Your dispute over the "Introduction" header is also with another editor (although I agree with OrangeMarlin's interpretation of WP:MoS here).
I'd be happy to discuss your proposals further here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:06, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Um...I'm an admin, but when editing articles we're all supposed to be equal, and I believe strongly in that.
And I'm not attached to the current intro, but the introduction cannot say flatly that MCS is caused by chemicals. That's the main controversy about MCS, which the article covers it in depth. If anything, the dominant view is that MCS is not caused by chemicals in the ordinary sense, although it's quite possibly triggered by the perception of chemical smells.
Also, your sentence about Social Security recognition is extremely misleading, as WhatamIdoing says below. Cool Hand Luke 19:30, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
Ok, how about after Easter I resurrect the introductory material in a form that hopefully we can all compromise on, as neither POV nor slanted toward the chemical causes side of this issue. As it stands, it strikes me as slanted toward the psychosomatic POV. A little literary improvement would be nice also. Elburts (talk) 22:15, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Government "recognition"

The recent sentence about recognition of MCS by the federal government is misleading at best. The Social Security rules, for example, say that MCS probably doesn't exist, that it's probably not caused by chemicals, but that if someone one claims MCS, they might still be disabled, so you evaluate it according to all the facts and circumstances. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:10, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Real People With MCS

I would like to know if WhatamIdoing and Cool Hand Luke have MCS or if they are just making assumptions without the experience of living with the illness.Carylred (talk) 21:53, 22 March 2008 (UTC)CarylredCarylred (talk) 21:53, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, that couldn't possibly be related to the article, but to satisfy your curiosity, no, I do not have MCS.
We don't root articles in personal experience, we just follow reliable published sources. The sources suggest that it's a terrible thing to have MCS, and my heart goes out to those who have it. They also suggest that most authorities believe the illness is not caused physiologically. That doesn't make the suffering less real, but in any case we have to follow the sources. Cool Hand Luke 22:23, 22 March 2008 (UTC)
I don't think it's possible to answer your question usefully without first agreeing on a definition for MCS. Instead, I will tell you that I do not self-identify with any condition as imprecise as MCS. I know several people who do, but I do not.
I also don't think that it makes the least bit of difference for editing this article, except that I might be somewhat less invested in promoting The Truth™ than a pro-MCS activist might. In this sense, we are not "real people" here: we are editors. Real people have blogs; "impersonal" editors have encyclopedias.
I'd like to know why you think that it matters (honestly). Wikipedia does not report personal experiences. We write what is verifiable. But even if I self-identified as having MCS, surely (for example) a person with MCS would be especially aware that mainstream science generally rejects MCS, and thus could easily understand why Wikipedia's standards wouldn't allow promotion of MCS as undisputed fact, no matter what I personally believed about my own situation. Do you worry that your friends will read this article and quit believing that their BBQ smoke or scented candles can make you sick? Do you find the stigma against psychogenic disorders so strong in your area that it's socially safer to claim something "physical" like MCS instead of something like "emotional" like panic attacks or depression? (I'm not saying that you personally have these particular problems, only that some people might reasonably think these were plausible diagnoses for a subset of MCS-claiming people.) In short, why does it matter to you that this article support your point of view, even though mainstream science clearly does not? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:16, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
I'd also like a list of the "assumptions" you think I've made. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:17, 23 March 2008 (UTC)



The reason I asked if you two had MCS is because typically, what is written about MCS is from people who don't have the illness. Many do not work hard enough to seek the newer information that is out there regarding MCS and how it has been found NOT to be a Psychological Illness. You can find more of this information by going into Google and entering Dr. Martin Pall. I have had MCS for eight years now and it is a devastating illness to have, but it most certainly is not Psychological. All mainstream science generally rejects illnesses that they do not understand, but it doesn't take away from the fact that MCS exists and the numbers of people who are sick with this illness are growing daily. Carylred (talk) 20:58, 23 March 2008 (UTC)carylredCarylred (talk) 20:58, 23 March 2008 (UTC)

At one level, my response is "So?" Most of what's written about cancer is not written by cancer patients. Most of what's written about heart disease is not written by heart attack patients. Everything written about promptly fatal congenital conditions is written by people without those conditions. That does not make their work any less accurate or verifiable.
At another level, I understand your complaint, and that's why the article is so careful about certain issues. For example, "people who talk to their doctors about MCS" is a much larger group that "people with MCS." Nearly all of the people who tell their primary care doc "I think I have MCS" do not, in fact, have MCS. Many have anxieties, depression, or plain old allergies. As I said above some months ago, people who "really" have MCS benefit strongly from getting non-MCS people properly diagnosed with their real conditions. Weeding out non-MCS people reduces the odds of "real" MCS cases being dismissed with "MCS is all in your head." This article helps do that by clearly stating that "More than half of the people who talk to their doctor about MCS have somatoform disorder or panic disorder." This is a documented fact. It doesn't mean that "real" MCS patients have this problem, but the fact is that most maybe-I-have-MCS patients do not have MCS.
To give you a different example, I reviewed the chart of a woman some years ago who was absolutely convinced that she had acquired AIDS from her ex-boyfriend. He was HIV negative (several tests). She was HIV negative (many tests). Her blood work was normal. And she was (still is, for all I know) absolutely, invincibly convinced that she had AIDS. Her proof: she was tired all the time, and it started one day right after she had sex with the boyfriend.
She self-identified as an AIDS patient. She strongly insisted on the accuracy of her self-diagnosis. She was utterly convinced that her experience reflected AIDS. She changed her lifestyle to accommodate her conviction that she had AIDS. She even found some other self-identified AIDS patients who agreed with her.
She produced just as much evidence for her AIDS claim as the typical MCS case produces to support a claim of MCS.
So do you think she had AIDS?
I don't. A self-diagnosis is not sufficient for AIDS.
I don't think a self-diagnosis is sufficient for MCS, either. I expect that it's reasonable to apply similar standards to MCS as you would any other disease. Because of this, I tend to ignore the "patient story" and "self-identification" systems of defining MCS. They are not reliable. Some of the I-have-MCS people are just as likely to have MCS in reality as the above-mentioned woman was likely to have AIDS. Furthermore, and pointfully for this discussion, they are not reliable sources, no matter how accurate you or I think they are.
Finally, I resent your implication that psychological disorders are not "devastating" and that people with psychological disorders are not "sick." People who have uncontrollable panic attacks (for example) can be every bit as sick as people who have (or claim to have) MCS. People with depression or anxiety or somatoform disorder may be fully disabled by it. They are certainly suffering, no matter what label they or their physicians put on it. I suggest that you not minimize other people's real suffering as a way of promoting the validity of your personal view of MCS's cause. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:36, 23 March 2008 (UTC)
I just had to say here, (even though we're very close to WP:NOT#CHAT), that this is beautifully written. My brother suffers from a variety of mental illnesses, and it's most certainly real and he has suffered greatly from it. For whatever reason, many people seem to think that people with mental illness are all weak-willed, or lazy, or reckless, or seeking attention, or faking it—the same things people arrogantly say about MCS sufferers. Those people are generally wrong.
MCS is real, the symptoms are often involuntary, but the evidence suggests it's not physiological. There's nothing contradictory about this. Cool Hand Luke 06:34, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

How do you know that almost all people who tell their doctor that they have MCS....do not? Do you know these people? It appears that you are generalizing way over the top. Why do you think anyone would want to say they have MCS if they didn't? That's presuming a lot to say that. I guess you are quoting only what you believe from old readings, but I urge you to further educate yourself on this subject. I wouldn't and haven't made light of people with psychological disorders. I agree that they are devastating. I simply said that people with MCS do not have Psychological problems because of the illness. In fact, if they do at all, it's because they constantly have to disprove the ridiculous information out there negating this illness. Carylred (talk) 00:59, 24 March 2008 (UTC)carylredCarylred (talk) 00:59, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Look, it's all about the sources. Can you produce a source that says every person, or even nearly every person, who says "I think I might have Multiple Chemical Sensitivity" to any healthcare provider actually has the disease? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:58, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
WhatamIdoing apparently thought you were denigrating psychological illnesses because you say that MCS is "NOT...a Psychological Illness," then you conclude with "MCS exists." The implication is that if MCS were a psychological illness, that wouldn't exist somehow. That's simply false. Psychological illnesses are quite real, and so is MCS. Cool Hand Luke 06:44, 24 March 2008 (UTC)
"How do you know that almost all people who tell their doctor that they have MCS....do not?" Occam's razor. —Ben FrantzDale (talk) 23:41, 25 March 2008 (UTC)
Occam's razor is the principle of not postulating unnecessary plurality. It does not apply here. And the answer to your question is: because that's what all the sources say. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:26, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
I meant Occam's razor in the sense that the simplest explanation is often right. As in, for each person who thinks he or she has a rare and somewhat mysterious condition, the simplest explanation is that the person is experiencing a much more common condition. But I agree, "that's what all the sources say" is also a good reason. —Ben FrantzDale (talk) 00:39, 27 March 2008 (UTC)

I would like to make a suggestion. I noticed someone named Elburts recommended reading up on Dr. Martin Pall, a doctor of Molecular Sciences. He has done some of the most recent scientific studies about MCS and is well worth the read. He puts to rest the misconceptions that have abounded in the past. Please look at molecularbioscienceswsu.edu./faculty/pall.html Go to the Multiple Chemical Sensitivity headline. Also, please read www.mcs-america.org/pall.pdf Multiple Chemical Sensitivity-toward the end of controversy. I hope that by reading these, you will see that the tide has turned away from the old mind set of what MCS has been thought to be. Because of the new information coming out about MCS and it's etiology, many more people are able to be diagnosed correctly instead of being tossed around for years in a seemingly endless sea of misinformation.

Cool Hand Luke, I do agree Psychological illnesses are quite real. They do exist. I was merely trying to say that MCS is not, in of itself a Psychological illness. Because of living with this illness for the past eight years, I continually study and keep up with all the new information that is available out there on this subject. I realize that many others may not have the kind of time to devote to this that I do. I would still like to change the first part of the sentence about MCS at the beginning of Wikipedia and hope that if I do, you will see by reading the sites that I have cited here, that it will be justified. Carylred (talk) 17:41, 24 March 2008 (UTC)carylredCarylred (talk) 17:41, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Both me and WhatamIdoing have been working on this article on and off for months. I've read Pall, and his POV is covered in the article because many clinical ecologists do in fact think that he has the answers. Most scientists do not, and they're the majority. It's moreover easy to understand why they don't.
Provocation studies suggest that symptoms are linked to the detection of smells. Incidentally, the vast majority of MCS sufferers are not former chemicals workers (as one might expect by reading Pall), but women from non-industrial backgrounds, who in fact have a superior sense of smell. This squares well with psychological etiologies, but not with Pall's hypothetical mechanism. But at any rate, what I think about the debate doesn't really matter. WP:NPOV matters, and this article covers both the mainstream and clinical ecology POV—as it should. Cool Hand Luke 13:22, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Planned edit

I ran across this today, and wanted to discuss it here. IMO, the single biggest problem with getting acceptance for "real" MCS cases is getting all of the non-MCS people properly diagnosed. Study after study by mainstream scientists and physicians says that the vast majority of self-labeled MCS sufferers do not have MCS. So it's refreshing to see that Grace Ziem's pro-MCS organization has taken the importance of accurate diagnosis on board. There's a large orange box on the front page of their website that says "Over 90% of the people who contact us about Multiple Chemical Sensitivity actually have Multi-Sensory Sensitivity." (This is their name for overreacting to strong stimuli, like loud noises, and they blame it on carbon monoxide.)

One of my primary goals for this article is to have it acknowledge that just about everyone, whether strongly pro-MCS or virulently anti-MCS, agrees that merely thinking you might have MCS is not sufficient for a diagnosis. So what I'd like to do is add a new paragraph under "Misdiagnosis" that says something like this:

"MCS Referral and Resources, an organization that supports MCS patients,[1] states that more than 90% of the people who contact them about MCS do not have MCS. Instead, they believe that most of them have a kind of sensory processing disorder. One hallmark of such a disorder is reaction to non-chemical exposures, such as bright lights, loud sounds, or temperature changes."[2]

What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:08, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I went to that site to see the sentence you mentioned. I don't think it's viable all on it's own because it doesn't go on to really explain much about the why's and wherefore's. It sounds like another denigration of people who have MCS. People with MCS, usually start with very little but strange symptoms that grow and get worse with subsequent toxic exposures. Meaning, if someone believes that they have MCS symptoms or sensitivities, most likely they do and it may not have yet gotten to be full blown MCS. I appreciate your asking and hope that my opinion really counts here.Carylred (talk) 20:53, 25 March 2008 (UTC)carylredCarylred (talk) 20:53, 25 March 2008 (UTC)

I've been following this give and take discussion with nearly as much interest as the back and forth between Clinton and Obama. I'm a little surprised at the extent to which the psychosomatic school puts so much weight on their perceived majority among researchers. A majority of Marie Curie's colleagues at the University of Paris would, I suspect, have perceived no danger in the way she kept radioactive isotopes in her pocket and in her desk. Similarly, J Harlan Bretz was overwhelmingly outnumbered by most archaeologists in his early career who scoffed at his theories on a cataclysmic flood. (See the Bretz quotation in his biography) MCS is a relatively new field, where good research will put no great stock in majority opinion.

Accordingly, as promised earlier, I am making some edits to the introductory material in the MCI article. Among my targets, the phrase, "these proposals have uniformly been rejected by critics." Elburts (talk) 03:07, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Carylred, I'm surprised that you don't think it's a good source. Grace Ziem founded and runs that organization. Martin Pall names her as the source of all of his MCS patients. So we pretty much either have to accept that she knows how to differentiate MCS from non-MCS people, or we have to reject all of Pall's research. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:29, 26 March 2008 (UTC)

Still too much reliance, imo, on the authority of this school or that school. Perhaps as editors of this encyclopedia, we should recognize controversy when we see it, acknowledge the division of opinion, and await further developments in the research -- in the meantime being reticent about taking sides. Elburts (talk) 03:43, 26 March 2008 (UTC)


WhatamIdoing, You are right about Grace Ziem being a great source for MCS. The problem I have with the statement is that the Muses syndrome was so named by Albert Donnay (executive director of MCS Referral and Resources)http://www.mcsrr.org/resources/biomarkers.html, to discuss the effects of carbon monoxide poisoning. While carbon monoxide is a true problem for most people with MCS, and a likely component among the many pollutants that harm us, it doesn't comprise the majority of MCS patients. It is more measurable and treatable, but does not rule out the harm caused by other sources. Carylred (talk) 00:30, 27 March 2008 (UTC)carylredCarylred (talk) 00:30, 27 March 2008 (UTC)