This might be one of those cures that works like the old T-Gel shampoo (ie: carcinogenic coal tar that turned out to be immune-suppressing enough to prevent dandruff eventually caused cancer).
Though, at the ages when Osteoarthritis shows up, it might be better to take on a smaller risk of monitor-able extremity cancer than the pretty large QoL reduction of severe arthritis.
That's not why coal tar works.
Coal tar is technically carcinogenic, yes, but no study has found any association with cancer when used topically in low doses [1].
Coal tar's mechanism of action is thought to be carbazole, an aryl hydrocarbon. It is assumed to work through binding to the aryl hydrocarbon receptor, a relatively newly discovered immune cell regulator. Tapinarof (Vtama) is a new medication that also works on ArH and is really effective at reducing inflammation.
Coal tar was also used together with UVA light and psoralen (a light-sensitizing medication) to treat skin diseases like psoriasis, a protocol called Goeckerman therapy that's no longer commonly practiced. This combination does carry the risk of cancer, but it's probably due to the UVA and not the coal tar.
[1] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022202X1...
There is a theory (theory! very theoretical) that the risk from radiation does not scale linearly and that low doses of radiation might actually be protective. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiation_hormesis
There is absolutely no reason to think that radiation damage should be linear. In fact, we can objectively say that isn’t the case because we KNOW about damage correcting pathways. The linear model, used for public safety limits, is picked as a conservative method because we don’t have a better model (and collecting data to make a better model would be unethical).
The “small dose radiation is actually beneficial” part is pure conjecture, and almost certainly wrong. But unrelated to the issue of the validity of the linear model.
It's probably reasonable to say that radiation actually being beneficial is very theoretical, but the linear no-threshold model of harm from radiation is definitely in the theoretical category too. It's used because it's very conservative, but evidence supporting it for low radiation dosages is very weak.
There is the alternative observation that sometimes the effect of harmful things is based on the frequency and length of exposure, not so much its magnitude.
Compare with the CTE, where a few bone-crushing traumas do not seem to cause it, but chronic long-term low grade impacts is more likely to cause it.
Another example, I probably could eat a massive amount of processed meat a few times without much ill effect, but years of eating moderate amounts might do you in.
I bet there's overlap there with conditions that aren't directly caused by external damage... but by the body's dysregulated reaction to it.
Like sunlight on skin?
Perhaps the word you are looking for is "conjecture that the risk from radiation ..." ??
So we are going full circle now?
Radiation is good for you now, a little bit, as a treat.
Ra-di-a-tion. Yes, indeed. You hear the most outrageous lies about it. Half-baked goggle-box do-gooders telling everybody it's bad for you. Pernicious nonsense. Everybody could stand a hundred chest X-rays a year. They ought to have them, too.
J. Frank Parnell (from the movie Repo Man).
The residential radon mitigation industry does not like this.
radon radiation is primarily alpha. That is never good in any dose.
>In this multicenter trial, researchers enrolled 114 patients with moderate-to-mild knee osteoarthritis across three academic centers in Korea. Participants were randomly assigned to receive one of two radiation regimens — a very low dose (0.3 Gy) or a low dose (3 Gy)
This is gamma. Those doses are "low" because delivery here is localized. If given full-body the 3Gy has something like 25-50% mortality.
The cancer patient are delivered like 20-80Gy into the tumor and surrounding tissues which just kills cells outright.
The point is that "radiation" is multiparametric.
It's not really the radiation from radon itself which is the problem, but rather radon's daughters. Radon is a noble gas, so it's not going to accumulate in you and doesn't get much chance to do damage to people even if they inhale it; they'll just exhale it moments later before barely any of it can decay. But radon's daughters, the chain of atoms which are produced from the decay of radon and each other, aren't gases, so if stagnant air with radon sticks around it's going to 'rain' an atomic dust of radioactive isotopes which can accumulate and, if disturbed, can be inhaled and stick with people.
On the other hand, the radon health cave industry is overjoyed and vindicated. And people with radon in their basement can start hosting "wellness sessions".
The age-related risk is an excellent comment. There are illnesses that progress slowly, and the age should always be taken into account when going for a cure.
I am in my 50s and wonder from time to time what I would do if certain health-related events strike. For some, I have a well-defined solution (such as suicide for Alzheimer or ALS; or an active cure for cancers that have a fair chance of being fought). The more problematic ones are the ones fatal in long(er) term, with an aggressive and diminishing cure.
Wow! I've actually used T-Gel because I used to get dandruff really bad as a teen and it was pretty effective. It's horrifying to know what it really was.
It says coal tar right on the bottle. And it smells awful. And it can be pretty effective.
I used it briefly and then researched it and it seemed like at the time (mid-2000s), nobody could say which of the menagerie of components of the coal tar was actually the effective one.
I stopped pretty much at that point.
Try using something mild like baby shampoo, use tiny amounts of it, and less frequently. Works a lot better in my experience.
It's not true, fortunately. See my reply to the grandparent.