SuperScout,
you wrote:

"Sad thing is my friend Sally went to a place in Colorado and they charged her $430 for this cute trick."

I am sorry your friend Sally was a victim of scam.  If that happened to my friend, I would ask her to write down her story with all details, with names of the clinic, address, phone, names of doctors ... and to post it here inside this forum.  That message, like any other, would be picked up by search engines, and other people interested in that clinic, would be able to read her experience, and save money.

The real cost of liver flush is $0.

Yes, you may spend up to $5 for oil, grapefruit and other ingredients, but you will save at least $5 on food, considering that you are suppose to stop eating from 2PM one day until noon the next day.  24h of not eating will, in most countries, result in saving money .. so  liver flush costs nothing and actually saves money.

But, if you are suppose to take a colonic before and after a liver flush ... then you will spend some money ... but majorty of people who tried colonic consider it well spent money (I never tried it, so I can't argue here.).

What are those stones?

I believe, if stones are soft, it is cholesterol colored by bile pigments.
It is hardened bile.

It is important to separate 2 questions here:

1. What are those stones?
2. Are there any possible health benefits of liver flushing.

Question #1   What are those stones?

If they are soft, it could be cholesterol. (over 90% of stones are soft)
If they are hard, it is most likely cholesterol and protein.
If they very hard (can not be cut with a knife), it is most likely calcium with some protein.

Where are those stones formed?

This is the real question.

Some people believe "stones" are formed inside biliary tree (inside intrahepatic bile ducts and gallbladder).
Sure, some stones are formed there.

Indeed, small chaff and sand like stones could be coming from liver and gallbladder.

(My definition of "small" is: any object that can pass through bile ducts and reach intestines. For one person it could be 3mm across, for another it could be 15mm across.
Why so much difference?  Look at your nose. and then compare it with other people. Some people will have a nose 3 times larger then yours ...   others will have it one third size of yours.  Just like our nose ... so can other parts of human body be of different size and shape.)

My grandmother passed calcified stones, smallest diameter being over 1 cm.
So, I can safely assume that some people can pass stones as large as  1 cm or larger.

But, more likely is that majority of people are passing smaller "sand"-like-stones mixed with bile.

Once bile and "sand" hits intestines, it somehow precipitates from liquid into solid, binding some "sand" and smaller "stones" into larger objects, and then those objects come out.

People have passed objects as large as 5 cm across.

In this case ... there is hardly any doubt. This object was not inside biliary tree .. not in this shape.  It was most likely many smaller objects or liquid that clumped together inside intestines.

But, it is not uncommon for smaller gallstones to clump together inside gallbladder.
Next stones have been taken out from gallbladders (surgically removed, post surgery):

Click on the images to enlarge and see more details.

There is no doubt that those stones were formed from large number of smaller stones, by clumping smaller cholesterol stones into larger objects or by binding smaller stones with newely hardened cholesterol or protein.   On many of those images you can actually see those smaller stones embedded inside larger objects. Gallbladder is a muscle, and has ability to compress smaller objects.

Where do your stones come from?

If you found pieces of grapefruit embedded inside stone, then there is no doubt that the last size and shape have been formed inside intestines, cause that is the only place where grapefruit pieces are.

So, your stones formed inside your intestines, overnight, from bile .. and possible from bile sludge ... if any.

A quote from this message:
http://curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=757387#i

Every stone starts it's life as a microscopic crystal of cholesterol. Very few gallstones ever get a chance to grow larger then 2mm. Most are expelled while small as sand.



cholesterol = chole + sterol
The name originates from the Greek chole- (bile) and stereos (solid)

cholesterol = Greek for solid bile



How do we know that some gallstones can exit gallbladder?

Medical science! Obstruction of the common bile duct is often caused by gallstones that were expelled from the gallbladder:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&...
In patients with chronic Pancreatitis, common bile duct obstruction is reported in 3.2-45.6% of patients; however, only 5-10% of all patients with chronic Pancreatitis require operative decompression of the bile duct.


http://www.virtualgastrocentre.com/diseases.asp?did=191
Passage of gallstones into the common bile duct occurs in approximately 10-15% of patients with Gallstones. The incidence is thus related to the presence of gallstones, which are very common (10-20% of population).

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=1119388
Jaundice occurs in patients with gall stones when a stone migrates from the gall bladder into the common bile duct...

This answers some of your questions.

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