Health Wanted: Fiber

The Episode

Everyone on the internet claims to have the secret solution to all your health needs, but has the answer been hiding in meemaw’s Metamucil this whole time? This week on Health Wanted: Fiber! How does it do so many wonderful things for health?

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The Listener Questions

How do I know who to trust for health information online?

A lot of people are getting medical information from social media, and it's important to make sure you’re getting it from good sources.

The first step should be a quick Google search. One would hope that if someone says they are a board-certified professional in some health field that they aren’t lying through their teeth, but a lot of scammy people really count on you not checking the most basic facts. Googling to see what their non-social media presence is like can be helpful.

Things to look out for:

• Are they listed as staff or faculty at a university or hospital?
• Do they have their own website?
• Is it easy to find information on that site about exactly what their training was and what their credentials are?

Unfortunately there are people out there who will use the title “doctor” hoping you’ll assume they are an MD or DO when their actual training is not within that scope of medicine.

The other big things that should give you pause are if they are constantly appealing to emotion (particularly when it comes to issues related to children) or trying to make you feel bad, or scared, or anxious about what they are saying.

Do they use a lot of really complex sounding scientific words without explaining what they mean? And, importantly, are they trying to sell you something? Supplements, cleanses, or detoxes are the obvious red flags, but I’m also suspicious of people who want to hide supposedly important health information behind a paywall.

People doing science communication deserve to be paid, and there are a lot of people with newsletters that give you additional information for a monthly fee. But if someone is claiming they have essential health information you can only get if you pay them for it, that would be a cause for concern.

What are the risks of hair dye?

When people dye their hair or have it dyed, some of the chemicals that change the hair color can be absorbed into the body in small amounts through the skin or inhaled from fumes in the air. For those who regularly work around hair dyes, like professional hairdressers, there is a higher likelihood of exposure to these chemicals compared to personal users of hair dye, so it’s important to consider the risks of exposure from both occupational and personal use. 

In terms of occupational use, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) released a report in 2010 that found that some of the chemicals professional hairdressers are exposed to are “probably carcinogenic to humans.” This conclusion was based on several different studies showing that, among hairdressers occupationally exposed to hair dye, there was an increased risk of bladder cancer. That risk becomes higher the longer someone works in the profession. 

More recently, a study of hairdressers in Sweden found no increased risk of developing bladder cancer. This suggests that modern hair dyes, which no longer contain aromatic amines, a known carcinogen, may not be associated with bladder cancer risk.

In terms of personal use, the IARC considers hair dye to be “not classifiable as to its carcinogenicity in humans” based on a review of existing evidence. This is because among the studies exploring the relationship between personal hair dye use and risk of cancer, small study populations, short follow-up times, and poor classification of exposure or hair dye type have led to conflicting findings that don't provide us with enough information to classify the risks hair dye poses to humans. 

So currently, it’s not clear how much personal hair dye use might raise cancer risk, if at all.

Aside from the risk of cancer, allergic contact dermatitis commonly occurs on the scalp, face, and hands of hair dye users, with some individuals experiencing hair loss as a result. That's why they tell you to do a test patch on a non-visible area of skin. 

The FDA also has some guidelines for using hair dye safely, such as not leaving dye on any longer than directed, rinsing your scalp thoroughly after use, not using hair dye on eyebrows or eyelashes, and wearing gloves when applying hair dye. Which is basically the same advice hair dye manufacturers give you on the box.

For those who interact with hair dye more often in a professional setting, things like ventilation, air filtration, and fresh air can all help dilute and filter out chemicals from hair dye. And while face masks may help filter out some of the chemicals in the air, they aren’t nearly as effective as adequate ventilation. 

Catch all the listener questions and Laurel’s answers on the full episode of Health Wanted by:

• Streaming at wabe.org or the WABE app
• Subscribing on Apple or Spotify
• Watching on WABE's YouTube channel