#2897: Jimmy John Girouard, Cynthia Pitre, et al.

Colonic irrigation is quackery and has no place in prevention or treatment of any medical issue. And although the case of Jimmy John Girouard et al. is so old that we’re unsure what they’re up to these days or if they’re even around, colonic irrigation is still being offered as an altmed regime for people with genuine health problems, so we decided they deserve an entry nonetheless. Girouard, his business partner Alice Coudrain, and his company, Colon Therapeutics, built equipment for and pushed such treatments on victims through the Years to Your Life Health Centers (officially run by one Cynthia Pitre), despite FDA warnings, until the government took action back in 2003; it took at least one dead patient for them to do so.

 

The Years to Your Life Health Centers had until then advertised colonic irrigations as a “painless” procedure that would boost your immune system, increase energy and help with “indigestion, diarrhea, constipation, weight loss, body odor, candida, acne, mucus colitis, gas, food cravings, fatigue, obesity, diverticulosis, bad breath, parasitic infections, and premenstrual syndrome”; Cynthia Pitre even claimed that colonic irrigations were key to her successful battle with breast cancer.

 

Neither Girouard nor Coudrain had any medical training, of course, and Pitre received her certificate as a “certified instructor” (signed by Coudrain and Girouard) after a training course held in a trailer behind Girouard’s house, which of course failed to inform Pitre about the dangers associated with colonic irrigation (another Years to Your Life and later defendant, Candace L. Stowers, had similarly deficient training).

 

Diagnosis: Fraudulent, malicious and negligent shitfucks. And although this particular case is old, similar fraudulent, malicious and negligent shitfucks are running wild today and should be called out whenever and wherever they’re encountered.