Hi Gibo,
I think you are right to be concerned about your friend’s health when she has been told to only drink water for TWO weeks.
”Detox diet causes woman serious brain damage”
http://www.news-medical.net/?id=40197

The best thing to do if someone needs dietary advice is to talk to a GP or a properly qualified nutritionist.
Any Tom, Dick&Harry who receive training in the form of a short correspondence course from a dubious Health “Institute” can set up practice as a naturopath and claim anything they like.
Staying away from junk food, alcohol and processed foods for a while (as Poly said) etc would be enough to give your body a break to enable it to cleanse itself.

Having said that, I agree with Foxy, Bronwyn and Poly that some natural remedies can really work, such as a range of herbs and let’s not forget Aboriginal bush food and medicine.
Herbs can have healing qualities and cause positive reactions in the body, unlike useless homeopathic ‘remedies’, other snake oils and nonsensical diets based on pseudo-science.
Shame that herbs are probably impossible to regulate and control because of the natural variation in strength and quality between different lots.

Clients/patients always have to look at the practitioners’ qualifications. I was once handed a business card by a ‘natropat’- probably someone who bought a certificate off the Internet and couldn’t even spell her profession.
It’s quite risky that there is hardly any control or regulations when it comes to alternative medicine; it’s too easy an area for quacks to get into and present themselves as professionals.

We also have to keep in mind that, as I wrote elsewhere, all alternative medicine is questionable because as soon as it is proven to work it ceases to be classed as alternative and would be absorbed in the orthodox range of medicine.

Hilarious, TRTL about Jesus fasting!

Mac,
Expensive urine- funny!
You make total sense about the placebo effect.

I've had great success with alternative therapies - reflexology and ayurveda in particular - but I've found naturopathy to be a steaming crock of s--t.

The goal of naturopathy is to achieve the effects of allopathic medicine with natural substances. It's like saying the Sydney Harbour Bridge would be better made of sticks and mud because they're more natural than forged steel.

mac and Celivia

The improvement in health I've achieved under the guidance of a naturopath is very real. Many of the improvements are measurable and have nothing whatever to do with any placebo effect. I've overcome auto-immune disease and fluctuating blood sugar levels which were effecting my mental health. If I'd gone down the path of conventional medicine, I'd be on anti-depressants or some such drug for life. I'm drug free and symptom free. It's a considerable achievement and any suggestion it might all be 'in my head' is way off beam.

Bronwyn,

Who diagnosed the "auto-immune disease and the fluctuating blood sugar levels" and who said that you were "cured", a GP or the naturopath. I'm not trying to be sarky, but it is important that we consider the placebo effect in your case as well( or mine, or anyone's)

Bronwyn,

Is there a regulatory/accreditation system for Naturapaths?

Celivia makes an excellent point about alternative medicine. It is only alternative when it is not considered by the orthodoxy to be mainstream. Many herbs and other natural substances are used in modern day pharmaceuticals but like any substance should always be administered by someone with knowledge and training.

I suspect naturopaths are like doctors, some good some not so and the test is really in the outcome.

Fasting is not unhealthy as others have pointed out - like most behaviours and actions it is about moderation and commonsense.

As for witchraft - there is no such thing - it was a construct of Christianity to punish and in many cases kill those who held a contrary opinion. Many people who were labelled as witches in medieval times were merely herbalists or those who would not bend to the ways of the Roman Church. It beats me why some people still persist in these primitive thoughts. It smacks of extreme religious indocrtrination and ravings which are the realm of madmen.