{"id":105,"date":"2008-04-16T22:01:02","date_gmt":"2008-04-16T20:01:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.ultimatefatburner.com\/wordpress\/do-you-really-want-dr-suzanne-to-be-your-doctor\/"},"modified":"2015-12-02T10:42:03","modified_gmt":"2015-12-02T15:42:03","slug":"do-you-really-want-dr-suzanne-to-be-your-doctor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/do-you-really-want-dr-suzanne-to-be-your-doctor\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;Beauty and the Bleccccch!&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A few weeks back, one of the members of the \u201cBodybuilding Revealed\u201d forum directed me to <a href=\"http:\/\/topsecretfatlosssecret.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">this 4-alarm advertisement from \u201cDr. Suzanne\u201d Gudakunst<\/a>. In his query, he gave a quick rundown of \u201cfacts\u201d he learned from her site: how icky parasites and disgusting intestinal plaque are responsible for making us sick and fat \u2013 and how the powers-that-be are not only profiting from this situation, but are deliberately adding parasites to our food to make us worse!<span>\u00a0 <\/span>Apparently <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/search?hl=en&amp;q=Suzanne+Gudakunst+and+death+threats&amp;gws_rd=ssl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Dr. Suzanne has received death threats<\/a> for revealing this information \u2013 but, as a noble martyr to the cause of YOUR health \u2013 she\u2019s defiantly and bravely persisting, because she cares about you and wants to become <em>\u201cclose friends starting YESTERDAY.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Of course, you have to cough up $37.00 first ($57.00 if you choose \u201cOption 2\u201d) \u2013 but it\u2019s a small price to pay for the \u201ctruth,\u201d no?<\/p>\n<p>Well, it would be&#8230;if it\u00a0really is the\u00a0truth.\u00a0 Let&#8217;s take a closer look, and see if it passes the test.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->Dr. Suzanne\u2019s site is cleverly done:\u00a0\u00a0there&#8217;s the requisite \u201cSHOCKING PROOF!\u201d in eye-catching 72 pt. red \u201cImpact\u201d font, lurid photos of the\u00a0nightmarish crud and creepy crawlers infesting your body;\u00a0\u00a0and \u2013 best\u00a0of all\u00a0\u2013 a video clip of the lovely \u201cdoctor\u201d herself. She\u2019s a cutie alright: dark-haired and elfin&#8230;an internet Arwen in\u00a0camo capris.\u00a0\u00a0 I really liked how the vid was integrated into the site: there are no borders, so it looks like she\u2019s walking\u00a0straight into the ad. Neat.<\/p>\n<p>Ok, maybe I\u00a0shouldn&#8217;t pick on Dr. Suzanne \u2013 she has to make a living, after all, and Lord knows what protective body armor and bullet-proof glass cost these days. Her site, however, is practically a textbook illustration on how\u00a0to abuse people\u2019s trust in order to separate them from their money, so it\u2019s worth taking a closer look at Dr. Suzanne and her collection of \u201cfacts.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>To start, let\u2019s break Dr. Suzanne\u2019s\u00a0spiel down. In her ad, she lays out a pretty\u00a0shocking indictment.\u00a0 It&#8217;s not just that you&#8217;re unhealthy, it&#8217;s also that others are to blame for it!\u00a0 She proceeds:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>If you\u2019re fat, it\u2019s because you have <em>\u201cdisgusting plaque and horrible little \u2018CRITTERS\u2019 living in your guts!\u201d<\/em><\/li>\n<li>Worse, if you don\u2019t get rid of them ASAP, they will not only keep you from losing weight, they may kill you.<\/li>\n<li>Doctors, diet gurus and fitness experts are either liars or fools who don\u2019t know what they\u2019re talking about.<\/li>\n<li><em>\u201cDiets, diet foods, organic foods, healthy foods and medicines\u201d<\/em> not only don\u2019t work, but they were <em>\u201cdeliberately designed not to.\u201d<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Even\u00a0she realizes this last\u00a0point is a real stretch, so she\u00a0offers\u00a0up a &#8220;fact&#8221; to support it:<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;Here&#8217;s a fact that may shock the daylights out of you<span class=\"GramE\">!&#8230;<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Japan refuses to accept a single export from the United States in meat &amp; dairy produce! Now, what does that tell you? That Japan is snobby? Nope! That Japan citizens hate milk and meat? Come on, you know better than that!<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>What it REALLY tells you is that the Government of Japan is on to something few (if any) people really know about! &#8211; That our foods have been filled with &#8220;unnatural&#8221; things that they aren&#8217;t supposed to have!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>This looks like a good place to begin deconstructing her pitch.\u00a0It\u00a0doesn&#8217;t have\u00a0much to\u00a0do with your health, perhaps, but it says a lot about Dr. Suzanne\u2019s research skills and respect for the truth.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>To start: let\u2019s take a look at what the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.agmrc.org\/commodities__products\/livestock\/dairy\/dairy_products_profile.cfm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Iowa State University\u00a0Agricultural Marketing Resource Center<\/a> has to say about US dairy exports to Japan (June, 2008):<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;<strong>Primary markets for U.S. dairy exports are (in order) Mexico, Canada and Japan.<\/strong>&#8230;The demand for dairy products should remain strong in 2008, particularly in Asia.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Now, that\u2019s just dairy. What about meat?<\/p>\n<p>Feel free to take a look at the <a href=\"http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20071223125824\/http:\/\/www.fsis.usda.gov\/Regulations\/Japan_Requirements\/index.asp\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">USDA\u2019s Export Requirements for Japan<\/a>\u00a0concerning red meat and poultry. If you\u2019re curious about that \u201cJuly 27, 2006\u201d date in the first paragraph, there\u2019s a simple explanation. There was a brief, 2 year period that Japan had \u2013 in fact \u2013 banned the importation of US Beef (not &#8220;meat&#8221; &#8211; just beef). But it wasn\u2019t due to \u201cunnatural\u201d things being added to the meat. It was due to the discovery of BSE (bovine spongiform encephalitis or \u201cMad Cow Disease\u201d) in a small number of US cattle. Prior to the ban, Japan was <a href=\"http:\/\/www.foodproductiondaily.com\/Safety-Regulation\/US-to-Japan-beef-export-inspections-to-ease\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">one of the largest foreign markets for US beef.<\/a> And now that it\u2019s over, trade is picking up steam again: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.card.iastate.edu\/iowa_ag_review\/winter_07\/article5.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Japanese demand is now exceeding the supply<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Oh my.\u00a0 Looks like Dr. Suzanne isn&#8217;t quite on the level here.<\/p>\n<p>But&#8230;but&#8230;but&#8230;she said:<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;I promise as your new friend never to lie to you (like all the others) and to only give you the absolute truth (absolutely UNLIKE all the others!).&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Hmmmm&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>Well, c&#8217;mon,\u00a0you should\u00a0trust your\u00a0friends, right?\u00a0 So let&#8217;s\u00a0cut\u00a0the lady\u00a0some slack on this one\u2026maybe she had good intentions, but just didn\u2019t rely on authoritative industry and government reports.\u00a0We&#8217;ll look at some other\u00a0info instead\u2026stuff that a \u201cdoctor\u201d really ought to know about.<\/p>\n<p>About half way down her site (it\u2019s a looooong scroll\u2026), Dr. Suzanne has helpfully posted an illustration of a parasite life cycle + an accompanying caption. The parasite is Paragonimus westermani \u2013\u00a0sez so\u00a0right there on the pic. It&#8217;s a suitably\u00a0chilling name for\u00a0something living in your guts, isn&#8217;t it?<\/p>\n<p>Ummmm\u2026not really. The \u201cinformal\u201d name for Paragonimus westermani is \u201clung fluke.\u201d I\u2019m not sure how a diet program designed to clear out your colon will have any effect on something living in your lungs \u2013 but I\u2019m sure Dr. Suzanne must know what she\u2019s talking about.<\/p>\n<p>Or does she? Here\u2019s the caption\u00a0for the pic:<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cLife cycle. Infection with the adult worm is acquired by the ingestion of raw, poorly cooked, or pickled salmon, trout, perch, pike, whitefish, grayling, ruff, eel, etc., harboring the plerocercoid larvae. After five or six weeks, the larva matures to the adult worm. Both eggs and proglottids are passed in the stool. The eggs develop in 2 weeks, and hatch to become ciliated coracidium larvae, and are ingested by the first intermediate host, the copepod. The copepods, containing the procercoid larvae, are ingested by fish, the second intermediate host, contains the plerocercoid larvae.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Damn, that\u2019s a mouthful. Bet it doesn\u2019t make a bit of sense to you, either. But it does to me&#8230;this was covered in an epidemiology class I took in grad school. This caption is describing A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT PARASITE: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/parasites\/diphyllobothrium\/biology.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Diphyllobothrium latum \u2013 the fish tapeworm<\/a>. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.atlas.or.kr\/atlas\/alphabet_view.php?my_codeName=Diphyllobothrium%20latum\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">She even provides the link for the text<\/a>, so you can see for yourself.<\/p>\n<p>The caption and pic don\u2019t belong together at all. But the life cycle illustration on the page she links to\u00a0is pretty dull, while the Paragonimus pic is in color and is much prettier.\u00a0 So why not put the two together? Who\u2019s going to bother to check?<\/p>\n<p>The photo of bladder tissue infected with <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/parasites\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Schistosoma haematobium<\/a> is just as deceptive. Do schistosomes infect human bladders? You betcha they do. But this parasite <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/parasites\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">isn\u2019t found in the US at all<\/a> \u2013 so unless you live in Africa, Southeast Asia, or the Caribbean, you don\u2019t have a whole lot to worry about.<\/p>\n<p>This is pretty lame &#8211; and totally unnecessary.\u00a0\u00a0Dr. Suzanne&#8217;s sales pitch\u00a0is just a collection of random, scary\u00a0stuff about parasites designed to creep you out and keep you from thinking critically.\u00a0 It&#8217;s really not\u00a0hard to\u00a0get it\u00a0right&#8230;if you know what the hell you&#8217;re talking about.\u00a0 Honestly, you\u2019d think a medical doctor \u2013 especially one who wants to be YOUR doctor &#8211; would be a little more scrupulous about her &#8220;facts.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Hold on a sec\u2026Dr. Suzanne IS a medical doctor\u2026isn\u2019t she? I mean, she writes things like \u201c<em>As a doctor I&#8217;ve seen far more than my fair share of people who were alive one day and then dead the next.<\/em>&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>I wonder\u2026What med school did she attend? What\u2019s her specialty? What professional organizations is she an accredited member of? The ad doesn&#8217;t say.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Isn\u2019t this important information that you\u2019d want to know about someone who wants to be YOUR doctor?\u00a0 Just askin&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Fortunately, the American Medical Association <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ama-assn.org\/ama\/pub\/patients\/patients.page\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">keeps the largest database (814,000) of licensed physicians in the US \u2013 both for member and non-member doctors<\/a>. And it just so happens they have a <a href=\"https:\/\/apps.ama-assn.org\/doctorfinder\/disclaimer.do\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">\u201cDoctor Finder\u201d that anyone can use<\/a>. I checked it out by putting in the names and states of a couple of docs I know, and they came right up. Dr. Suzanne lists Arizona as her state of residence at the bottom of the page \u2013 but when I typed &#8220;Gudakunst,&#8221; &#8220;S&#8221; and &#8220;Arizona&#8221; into the search engine, I drew a blank. Next, I went through every single state\u00a0\u2013 and non-state \u2013 location in the drop down box, just in case she practices somewhere else. I got exactly two hits on the last name for a couple of non-AMA members (Craig Gudakunst and Jane Gudakunst) in Pennsylvania, but as Porky Pig used to say: &#8220;Th-th-th-that&#8217;s all folks!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Now maybe Dr. Suzanne is unknown to the AMA \u2013 they are part of the vast conspiracy to keep you fat and ill after all. Maybe they\u2019re even the ones issuing the death threats \u2013 lol.<\/p>\n<p>Is\u00a0Dr. Suzanne really an accredited health\u00a0professional?\u00a0 If she was, you&#8217;d think she&#8217;d be in that database.\u00a0 It&#8217;s not up to me to disprove it, however&#8230;IMHO,\u00a0the burden of proof is on her.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>I got a hyoooge laugh over this one:<\/p>\n<p><em>\u201c\u2026But then they found out the TRUTH about foods poisoned by dangerous chemicals that resulted in Plaque, and how food companies actually put in Parasites deliberately designed to make you fat and to make you sick\u2026\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Food companies deliberately put parasites in their products? Who knew? After all those years I spent\u00a0in the <a href=\"http:\/\/foodscience.ucdavis.edu\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Food Science and Technology Department at UC Davis <\/a>\u2013 makes you wonder how I missed it.<\/p>\n<p>Sorry, this one doesn\u2019t pass the smell test. Think about it for a moment: if food companies were adding parasites to their products, there would have to be sources \u2013 right? Just like for any other food \u201cingredient.\u201d Are there really suppliers out there who are mass producing\/harvesting parasite eggs and larvae for their \u201ccustomers?\u201d If so, what &#8220;critters&#8221; and hosts are being used?\u00a0 Are they &#8220;super bugs&#8221; designed to survive retort sterilization, flash freezing, extrusion, baking, and dehydrating?\u00a0 And how would you keep something like this a secret? Do you have any idea how BIG the major food companies are? Can you imagine how many employees that Kellogg\u2019s has? Cargill? Pillsbury? Archer Daniels Midland? PepsiCo? Thousands of people would know about it \u2013 not just Dr. Suzanne.<\/p>\n<p>This is just silly: it\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/zapatopi.net\/afdb\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">real tin-foil hat stuff<\/a>. Cheez Whiz, Coke and Twinkies aren&#8217;t good for you, but we don\u2019t have to invent\u00a0goofy conspiracy theories to explain why.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Sorry: I know that this is a lonnnnnnng post.\u00a0 But if you&#8217;re still with me, then you should realize that the claims made by\u00a0Dr. Suzanne simply\u00a0aren&#8217;t credible:\u00a0there&#8217;s little evidence that parasitic infections are making people fat (in fact, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cdc.gov\/parasites\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">weight loss<\/a> may be a symptom in some cases).\u00a0 Sure, people can get parasites: and if you think you have this problem, then you should schedule an appointment with your doc: intestinal parasites are easily found under the microscope.\u00a0 Parasitic infections can be serious: do-it-yourself cures are no way to go about getting rid of them.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Fine then&#8230;but maybe all this is just a sales tactic. Even if the worm and plaque stuff\u00a0are a bunch of s**t (no pun intended) \u2013 surely Dr. Suzanne must know something about how to get into good shape. I mean, just LOOK at her\u2026She\u2019s gorgeous!!! So maybe her program is worth it, anyway.<\/p>\n<p>Well, I may not be eligible for a job at \u201cHooters\u201d \u2013 but I\u2019m no slacker in the bod department either. You know what they say: \u201cA picture is worth a thousand words\u201d \u2013 so here we go\u2026<br \/>\n<img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/files\/2014\/06\/IMG_0072c.jpg\" border=\"0\" alt=\"Happy Birthday to Me!\" width=\"184\" height=\"198\" class=\"aligncenter\" \/><\/p>\n<p>This is a pic I posted on the\u00a0BBR forum\u00a0for my last birthday \u2013 so I posed in my birthday suit: get it? And I\u2019m the mother of two teenagers, one already in college, so I\u2019m not a sweet young thing like Dr. Suzanne, either.<\/p>\n<p>So what\u2019s MY secret?<\/p>\n<p>Sorry kids, I don\u2019t have one: no magic pills, no superfoods, no fantastical secret formula translated from ancient papyrus texts. And despite Dr. Suzanne\u2019s insistence that \u201ceverybody\u201d has this horrible plaque stuff and parasites in them that\u2019s making them fat \u2013 they seem to have missed me \u2013 I\u2019ve never done a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/do-i-need-to-detox\/\" target=\"_blank\">\u201cdetox\u201d program<\/a> or anything else to get rid of them.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s the real truth: anything and everything I do is really quite basic and freely available, so you don\u2019t need to pay me \u2013\u00a0 or anyone else \u2013 to discover it. Most of it\u2019s\u00a0covered right here on the Ultimate Fat Burner site already. What I do and how I do it will be included in the things I blog about, so all you have to do is check back here every once in a while.<\/p>\n<p>And no, I\u2019m not writing about this stuff because I want to be your doctor, best friend or guardian angel. I\u2019m just someone with a background in genuine science, who\u2019s sick and tired of seeing it abused by self-styled\u00a0internet \u201cexperts\u201d trying to make a fast buck.<\/p>\n<p>Like \u201cDr. Suzanne.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few weeks back, one of the members of the \u201cBodybuilding Revealed\u201d forum directed me to this 4-alarm advertisement from \u201cDr. Suzanne\u201d Gudakunst. In his query, he gave [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3,15,24],"tags":[1850,633,642,808,1242,1288,1595,1663,1867],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10134,"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105\/revisions\/10134"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ultimatefatburner.com\/ufb-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}