In a word, no: The hoodia diet patch is essentially a far-flung attempt at leveraging the hype around hoodia, an herbal supplement purported to help in weight loss, and the hype around patch-delivered substances at the same time. Frankly, the result is one silly product.
The Ugly Genius of Hoodia Diet Patch Marketing
There's a form of twisted brilliance in the marketing of the hoodia diet patch. It's revealed in an entry at ezinearticles.com. The writer goes to great lengths to say that using the hoodia diet patch is not a good idea. Why? Here's his chief reasoning:
We have yet to find one real, scientific, clinical study showing the hoodia patch works better than other hoodia products on the market.
It's rather unethical to suggest in an underlying way -- as some of these sellers try to do -- that the hoodia patch is going to be as effective as similar patches on the market, such as the famous nicotine patch or birth control patch.
It's true that "patch" does not equal "effectiveness," and this might be a great argument...if hoodia had been shown to work in the first place. The implication of the article is that other forms of hoodia do work. But this hasn't been proven.
Hoodia Diet Patch Seems to Employ Double Misdirection
A simple investigation of hoodia reveals that we have zero studies that substantially indicate that hoodia works to suppress appetite or promote weight loss. That kind of gets lost in the marketing blitz. As I was looking for studies that supported marketing claims, I found the following:
- From Prevention magazine: "Its efficacy is unknown, and some hoodia products may not even contain the substance."
- From Consumer Reports: "There’s no good clinical evidence for supplements promoted for weight loss, including chromium picolinate and hoodia. To their credit, the books we evaluated did not recommend any of those products."
- Philip Gregory, Pharm.D., writes in Consumer Reports on Health: "By the way, there is no such thing as a truly safe, effective weight-loss supplement, including hoodia."
- From Nutrition Action Healthletter: "But not a single good published study has tested whether hoodia curbs hunger or helps people lose weight."
Hoodia Patch: Worthy of Enshrinement
For the clever way in which the marketers of this product (and perhaps unwittingly, some writers) attempt to blow by the available evidence and get us to buy their weight loss aid, I hereby add the hoodia diet patch to the growing list of entrants in my Eating Disorder Hall of Sadness.
Even when diet plans work, they tend to lead to weight gain in the future. A shiny new weight-loss substance always carries a powerful attractiveness that is likely to outshine its actual usefulness. Delivering one such substance in the form of a patch only stirs up false excitement and obscures the real issues a person may have with food and body image.
Sources:
Ho D. 3 reasons to not use the hoodia diet patch." ezinearticles.com. Accessed 22 July 2008.
Hoodia: Miracle weight loss herb? Prevention 59 (2007): 36.
New diet winners. Consumer Reports 72 (2007): 12-17.
Safe supplements. Consumer Reports on Health 19 (2007): 6.
Schardt D. The world's most powerful DOCTOR-RECOMMENDED patented now available without a prescription AS-SEEN-ON-TV SUPPLEMENT. Nutrition Action Health Letter 34 (2007): 9-11.
