This has been happening for a long time. So long, in fact, that the term 'snake oil salesman' was coined back in the 1800's in an era where Chinese railroad workers were brought over to the United States.

The Chinese brought with them a plethora of exotic medicines including, yeah, you guessed it, actual snake oil.

Ironically, this oil derived from the Chinese water snake was surprisingly effective at treating things like arthritis due to the high amount of anti-inflammatory omega-3's it contained.

Chinese workers would rub and massage the oil all over their muscles and joints after a long grind on the railroads. This would alleviate any inflammation and pain from their body with amazing efficacy.

Unfortunately, it became a medicine associated with swindling, sleazy salesmen who saw the potential to line their pockets with other tonics under the guise of 'snake oil'.

The most famous being American entrepreneur, Clark Stanley, who sold snake oil that was famously found not to contain any snake oil at all.

This trend unfortunately continues today in the health and fitness industry. All the way from swindlers claims that putting a 300 calorie tablespoon of butter in your coffee helps you lose weight, to the thousands of ineffective supplements on the market pushed on us through million dollar marketing campaigns.

It's a ploy to separate the desperate public who want to get healthier, look better and feel better with their hard earned cash. There's a great example here too as an Odyssey Online blogger found when she bought a 'fit box worth $250' that clearly wasn't

Cue an unlikely hero; tech.

Long the victim of negative press for making us all unhealthy, tech is now fighting back the charlatans of the health industry and helping the public get fitter.

What time is it? Time to ditch that health guru

Online Calculators Doing the Thinking For You

In a bit to turn its reputation around, tech is being used for the good of our health, not to its detriment.

How? Well, there are free calculators online that can tell you exactly (down to the calorie!) how much to eat and what those calories should consist of to achieve your health and fitness goal.

These calculators can take into account your job, activity levels, workouts and even your preferred food types. Out of the other side of the calculator comes a crazy accurate target number for you to aim for to achieve your health goals. Whether that's weight loss, maintenance or even gaining a bit of healthy lean tissue.

One such calculator is the IIFYM macro calculator by LiftNLive. This calculator spits out an insanely accurate number of target calories and breaks down how much protein, carbs and fats you should eat. It doesn't forget your fibre either to keep on top of your health.

The great thing about it is that you can adjust your nutrients for your lifestyle. Do you have a wild sweet tooth? Then you can adjust carbs up and fats will automatically adjust down. Prefer the moreish fatty foods? Well then it will cater to your lifestyle by calculating fats up and carbs the other way to keep you on your target calories. Neat, huh?

Fitness Apps Keeping You on Track

Then you have apps like MyFitnessPal that track all of your foods and calories with a few clicks a day.

You can look through the entire database of foods it contains and even scan a barcode of the food packet you're eating to see what it's made up of.

Then you can track and see nutrient by nutrient, even down to micronutrients like vitamins and minerals, how close you are to your target and what you need more or less of. It doesn't get as accurate as that.

Oh, and did I mention with this tech that you don't have to hand over any hard earned paper to a sleazeball lying through his teeth about the remedy he has for your health?

Smart Watches Watching Your Every Move

It doesn't stop there - we even have access to smartwatches now that keep track of your steps, sleep, calories burned and heart rate. We really do now have a 360 degree view of our health.

Tech is enabling us to ditch the gurus and put all of the important health and fitness information we need in the palm of our hands.

Experts in the field will always be valuable, but if you're ever unsure of the basics, tech is doing an absolutely fine job of blocking out the noise and providing what you need on a plate.

At the very least, tech is beginning to keep these self-proclaimed health gurus in check and giving the power to take your health back into your own hands. And that's positive news for everyone.