The Vitamin Kid

Mental impairment following bypass surgery

2010-12-31T14:54:00.000-08:00

A study from Duke University, published in the New England Journal of Medicine in February, 2001, confirms what many doctors have suspected, but have been reluctant to discuss with their patients: A substantial proportion of patients after coronary artery bypass surgery experience measurable impairment in their mental capabilities.

...The impairment was not temporary, as many doctors have claimed (or at least hoped). The decrease in cognitive capacity persisted for 5 years.

-- from the article "Pump Head: Mental impairment after bypass surgery"

"Cheap safe drug kills most cancers"

2009-10-11T14:58:00.001-07:00

I missed posting this when I first became aware of it. New Scientist wrote about a "cheap and simple drug that kialmost all cancers by switching off their 'immortality'."

All the drug does is change the metabolism of the cancer cell, which reactivates its normal self-destruct mechanism.

TheNew Scientist report from 2007 is here. I'll try to find follow information on how research is progressing.

Possibly lifesaving? Vitamin D and flu immunity

2009-05-19T07:13:00.000-07:00

Americans suffer from an epidemic of vitamin D deficiency, especially in wintertime. Most people will be outdoors on a regular basis in the summertime -- possibly enough to make sufficient endogenous vitamin D. But what about next fall and winter?

J.J. Cannell describes his hospital days as a doctor in the midst of a flu breackout. His comments and subsequent research show that vitamin D may be vital as preventive and treatment for infections:

"As I am now a psychiatrist, and no longer a general practitioner, I was not directly involved in fighting the influenza epidemic in our hospital. However, our internal medicine specialists worked overtime as they diagnosed and treated a rapidly increasing number of stricken patients. Our Chief Medical Officer quarantined one ward after another as more and more patients were gripped with the chills, fever, cough, and severe body aches that typifies the clinical presentation of influenza A...

"I guess our hospital was under luckier stars as only about 12% of our patients were infected and no one died. However, as the epidemic progressed, I noticed something unusual. First, the ward below mine was infected, and then the ward on my right, left, and across the hall - but no patients on my ward became ill. My patients had intermingled with patients from infected wards before the quarantines. The nurses on my unit cross-covered on infected wards. Surely, my patients were exposed to the influenza A virus. How did my patients escape infection from what some think is the most infectious of all the respiratory viruses?

"...All of the patients on my ward had been taking 2,000 units of vitamin D every day for several months or longer. Could that be the reason none of my patients caught the flu? I then contacted professors Reinhold Vieth and Ed Giovannucci and told them of my observations. They immediately advised me to collect data from all the patients in the hospital on 2,000 units of vitamin D, not just the ones on my ward, to see if the results were statistically significant. It turns out that the observations on my ward alone were of borderline statistical significance and could have been due to chance alone. Administrators at our hospital agreed, and are still attempting to collect data from all the patients in the hospital on 2,000 or more units of vitamin D at the time of the epidemic."

Read more of his subsequent experience and research at Medical News Today.

"We have only recently learned how vitamin D increases production of antimicrobial peptides while simultaneously preventing the immune system from releasing too many inflammatory cells, called chemokines and cytokines, into infected lung tissue. "

In other words, vitamin D helps the body produce its own antibiotic, and it also helps protect against the body's excess inflammatory reaction against the flu virus -- a reaction that can be fatal. The effect of vitamin D on the new Mexican Flu virus (H1N1) has not been specifically studied, but there is no reason to think that vitamin D will not have the same effect on this flu as it has on other viruses and infections.

I am personally well-stocked on vitamin D. I think the easiest and least expensive way to take vitamin D supplements is Carlson Labs liquid Vitamin D drops. I will be buying these once I use up the pills I currently take. Three drops would provide the full 5000 IU wintertime physiological dose. For summer, depending on how much sun you get, you might not need any supplement at all. If any of us starts showing signs of flu, I will immediately start a 3-day course of 2000 IU/kilogram per day. Since I am approximately 60 kilos, that would be 60 x 2000 daily (sixty drops of the liquid). I am not a doctor, nor am I recommending this for anyone except my own family. Do your own research, make your own choices.

Vitamin D - annual supply for less than $12

2008-10-03T22:52:00.000-07:00

The Mayo Clinic summarized the results of studies on the benefits of vitamin D supplementation on their medical news pages.

Recommended dose is around 1000 International Units of vitamin D-3 daily. Currently $8.88 will buy you 300 capsules, which is an annual cost of less than $12.

Carlson offers a higher potency, 2000 I.U., in a 360 size bottle, very nearly an annual supply (one daily) for $11.09.

The protection of vitamin D doesn't need to be expensive. It's especially important if you live in Northern climates where you may not get enough sun exposure in the wintertime.

Eat Fish, Prevent Stroke

2008-09-24T20:48:00.000-07:00

From HealthGems Newsletter, Volume 11:

"Researchers reviewed data collected from 70,839 women who were free from diagnosed cardiovascular disease. The researchers found that higher consumption of omega-3 oils from fish was associated with decreased risk of total strokes, with a more protective decrease for thrombotic (blood clot) stroke. Women who ate fish 2 to 4 times a week compared to women with the lowest intake were 40% less likely to suffer from all types of stroke. Higher fish intake was not associated with an increased risk of hemmorrhagic (bleeding) stroke.
"Journal of the American Medical Association, 2001;285:304-12."

Your chance of benefitting from chemotherapy: 4%

2008-03-23T08:08:00.000-07:00

From an investment-oriented newsletter, The Growth
Stock Wire, March 7 edition:

Chemotherapy is one of the most grueling treatments in modern medicine, one that causes nausea, hair loss, infertility, and more. Even so, most cancer patients willingly face such harsh side effects in hopes of getting better.

But what if your doctor told you the chances of you getting any benefit from subjecting your body to such chemical warfare was only 4%? I'd pass on the chemo and advise my family members to do the same...

Yet doctors have had no way to determine who would and would not respond to chemotherapy. So the thinking has been treat first, ask questions later. But now, for the first time, doctors can pre-screen patients that will respond to chemo based on the results of a new test that probes their cancer's molecular "fingerprint."

Tissue samples are run through a 16-gene test panel to identify the small percentage of patients that will actually derive a clinical benefit from the physically and mentally taxing chemotherapy regimen.

How much does a test like this cost? About $3,650 a pop.

That's worlds away from your standard $10 cholesterol test. But the information provided in the test is much more valuable, too. The doctor doesn't have to guess whether the patient will benefit. The patient understands the risks and payoffs of such a nasty treatment beforehand. And the insurance company would much rather cough up a few thousand bucks up-front for the test in order to skip out on a $20,000–$50,000 course of chemo.

Biostatistician Ulrich Abel studied chemotherapy many years ago, and concluded that chemotherapy was beneficial in only 1% of the cases it was used (monograph: "Chemotherapy of Advanced Epithelial Cancer"). He wrote, "A sober and unprejudiced analysis of the literature has rarely revealed any therapeutic success by the regimens in question in treating advanced epithelial cancer." (For more information, Google this phrase: "Ulrich Abel chemotherapy study")
Draw your own conclusions. My conclusion is that most of the time, the doctors KNOW it will not help. But they push it on patients anyway.

New technology could save tens of thousands of lives, if doctors would use it

2008-01-07T22:28:00.000-08:00

This amazing technology of which I speak is the paper and pencil, used to make a checklist.

This New Yorker piece describes how intensive care was improved, revolutionized, in the state of Michigan, by the use of checklists to make sure doctors performed certain procedures correctly in the course of treating the most desperately sick patients.

About five million Americans will be in ICU this year at some time. The most dangerous thing that can happen in an ICU is an infection developing in one of the tubes ("lines") the doctors put into the body to deliver medicine, transfer blood in and out, or for drainage. "I.C.U.s put five million lines into patients each year, and national statistics show that, after ten days, four per cent of those lines become infected. Line infections occur in eighty thousand people a year in the United States, and are fatal between five and twenty-eight per cent of the time, depending on how sick one is at the start."

Yet, when doctors are routinely required to follow a strict checklist to ensure clean hands, proper disinfectants used on the body, the body draped fully during installation of the line -- at Johns Hopkins, line infection rates went from 11% to zero! In a single hospital, eight lives and 2 million dollars in costs were saved from the simple use of a checklist.

Next, checklists for installing lines and two other procedures done in ICU's were instituted as standard policy in all hospitals in Michigan. "Within the first three months of the project, the infection rate in Michigan’s I.C.U.s decreased by sixty-six per cent. The typical I.C.U.—including the ones at Sinai-Grace Hospital—cut its quarterly infection rate to zero. Michigan’s infection rates fell so low that its average I.C.U. outperformed ninety per cent of I.C.U.s nationwide. In the Keystone Initiative’s first eighteen months, the hospitals saved an estimated hundred and seventy-five million dollars in costs and more than fifteen hundred lives." This is for a single state.

Other states are not rushing to follow Michigan's example. Why? Does this remind anybody else of Semmelweiss?

Instead of using these virtually costless techniques that could save tens of thousands of lives annually, millions are spent on research that will save a fraction of that number, even if a drug or new medical gizmo proves successful. I am increasingly convinced that for-profit health care works at cross purposes to the desired endpoint of better health.

Vitamin E supplement for better absorption

2007-12-22T11:52:00.001-08:00

Certain health conditions, including cystic fibrosis, can impede the absorption of fat-soluble vitamins, including Vitamin E. Such individuals are often deficient in those vitamins (Vitamin A, Vitamin D, and Vitamin E, primarily).

A new liquid formulation that contains the whole family of Vitamin E compounds has been introduced by Douglas Laboratories. Because the vitamin E is surrounded by a water-solutble shell, the vitamin is absorbed more easily. The data sheet is here.

This liquid supplement would also be a benefit to those who have trouble swallowing capsules and tablets.

The goal is to reduce deaths, not cholesterol

2007-12-21T06:39:00.000-08:00

The NY Times reports today that unreleased data on the cholesterol-lowering drug Zetia, which earns $5 billion each year for its makers Merck and Schering, raises the possibility of liver damage, especially when the drug is taken in combination with a statin drug for lowering cholesterol.

New evidence shows that the drug makers Merck and Schering-Plough have conducted several studies of their popular cholesterol medicine Zetia that raise questions about its risks to the liver, but the companies have never published those
results.

Partial results of the studies, alluded to in documents on the Food and Drug Administration's Web site, raise questions about whether Zetia can cause liver damage when used long term with other cholesterol drugs called statins.

Most of the millions of people who use Zetia take it along with a statin like Lipitor, Crestor, or Zocor. Or they take it in a single pill, Vytorin, that combines Zetia with Zocor...

All drugs have potential risks and side effects, of course, and doctors and patients must weigh those against a drug’s medical benefits. But in the case of Zetia, despite its widespread use, there is no evidence proving that Zetia can reduce heart attacks and strokes, as cholesterol drugs are meant to do. There is extensive medical evidence showing that Lipitor and other statins provide such
protection...

One expert, Dr. Beatrice Golomb of UC San Diego, suggests that doctors are missing the purpose of prescribing cholesterol drugs. The goal should be about reducing deaths from heart attack and stroke, not merely lowering the cholesterol number on a drug test. And there is not sufficient evidence that Zetia can actually prevent heart attacks. The company even says so in their television ads for Zetia! Their online advertising states clearly, " Unlike some statins, ZETIA has not been shown to prevent heart disease or heart attacks. "

Why suffer the risk of liver damage without proven benefits? Why not look to one of the many non-toxic ways of lowering cholesterol that actually do reduce cardiac deaths, like fish oils, for example?

Vitamin D deficiency may intensify chronic pain

2007-11-26T05:05:00.000-08:00

"Of the [chronic pain] patients tested, 26 percent had vitamin D inadequacy. Among these patients, the morphine dose was nearly twice that of the group with adequate vitamin D levels. In addition, the vitamin D inadequacy group used morphine for an average of 71.1 months versus 43.8 months. The vitamin D deficient group also reported lower levels of physical functioning and had a poorer view of their overall health. "

Full story

Mind NOT over matter: the placebo is overrated

2007-11-22T08:10:00.000-08:00

"...in a stunning 2001 article in the New England Journal of Medicine, two Danish physicians debunked the mighty placebo effect. Although most clinical trials include only active treatment and placebo groups, the researchers systematically collected all the studies in the medical literature (130 at the time) that also included a critical third group: patients who received neither active nor placebo treatment—just passive observation. The patients in placebo groups did report slightly less pain than the no-treatment groups; the analogy of a parent kissing a skinned knee comes to mind. But on almost every other objective measure of illness, the placebo-treated patients improved the same amount as the ones who got nothing at all. In other words, just believing you were getting treatment—the power of positive thinking—didn't really fix anything. It just made the patients hurt a little less."

-- from Slate, "Pill Popping: Debunking the Power of the Placebo Effect"

"No treatment" is the control group for the placebo-control group. In that context, the placebo effect actually seems very weak.

Cholesterol drugs cause cancer? (Do I hear an echo?)

2007-07-24T22:20:00.000-07:00

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article2127605.ece

A new study repeats the findings reported on this blog two years ago. "Lowering cholesterol with statins may slightly increase the risk of cancer, a study suggests," reports The Times Online.

"The team reviewed the results of 13 previous trials, involving more than 41,000 patients and all published before November 2005. They detected higher rates of cancer among the patients whose use of statins achieved the lowest levels of LDL cholesterol."

While they refuse to say the drugs are the direct cause of the increased cancer, it appears that the better the drugs worked to lower cholesterol, the greater the cancer risk.

Drugs are toxins. Anti-cholesterol statin drugs are toxic to the liver, and the higher doses that are often prescribed to aggressively lower cholesterol are more likely to cause serious liver damage. Approach with extreme caution.

Vitamin D supplements prevent cancer

2007-06-12T10:08:00.000-07:00

A recent study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that Vitamin D plus calcium supplementation can probably reduce the risk of all forms of cancer by about 75%. That is the conclusion of the Life Extension Foundation: "When subjects whose cancers were diagnosed during the first year of the study were excluded from the analysis, due to the possibility that their cancers were pre-existing upon enrollment, the reduction in risk associated with calcium plus vitamin D was further lowered to 77 percent less than the placebo group."

The study participants received 1100 I.U. of vitamin D3 and 1400 milligrams of calcium from calcium citrate.

The abstract can be read here. The evidence that most Americans aren't getting enough vitamin D for optimum cancer prevention is growing. I'll cover that in a future post. Sunlight in moderation can create a large amount of vitamin D in the skin. We have become so afraid of skin cancer, we may be inviting cancer by practicing extreme avoidance.

CoEnzyme Q10 relieves side effects of cholesterol drugs

2007-05-19T13:36:00.000-07:00

A new paper in the American Journal of Cardiology shows that patients on statin drugs, who often suffer muscle disease, specifically pain, as a side effect, may find relief by taking the nutritional supplement CoEnzyme Q10.

The drugs inhibit the production of an essential antioxidant, CoEnzyme Q10 (CoQ10), and it was thought this might be causing the muscle pain. Supplemental CoQ10 was tested as a way of reversing the deficiency caused by the drug, thus relieving the pain.

Patients taking 100mg of CoQ10 for 30 days experienced an average 40% reduction in severity of pain.

Another alternative would be to test a protocol of non-toxic supplements and dietary modifications that will lower cholesterol but will not suppress the liver's ability to detoxify and produce the essential antioxidant CoQ10. Or is that too obvious?

Worried about heart disease? Fish oil probably your best bet.

2007-04-30T12:30:00.000-07:00

A large study of other studies (called a metastudy) is reviewed at healthandage.com and reveals that for people without preexisting coronary heart disease, you will be better off taking fish oils than anti-cholesterol medicine. Why? Because fish oils, although they hardly lower cholesterol levels at all, they do reduce deaths from heart disease about as much as anti-cholesterol medication.

In addition, fish oils lower your mortality from other causes. Total mortality is lower in fish oil-taking populations than in those taking cholesterol medicine.

This begs the question of just how important cholesterol levels are in the first place, does it not? Few in the public and the media seem to understand that coronary heart disease arises from a combination of factors, cholesterol being only one, and not necessarily the most important factor. Additional factors are infection and inflammation. Cholesterol itself, unoxidized, is probably not nearly as much of a threat as oxidized cholesterol. The ratio of triglycerides to high density lipoprotein (HDL cholesterol) is a better predictor of death from heart disease than any single measure of cholesterol.

The numbers are clear, born out in many different studies. Taking cholesterol medication or fish oils alone does not alter mortality from heart disease that much. For people without pre-existing disease, you'd have to treat 855 people with cholesterol meds to save a single life, according to the authors' calculations. Even if you already have heart disease, treatment with omega-3 fatty acids (fish oils) would only save one life out of 155. The fish oils still have the advantage of being non-toxic to the liver and they also prevent mortaility from causes other than heart disease.

Lower cholesterol without drugs

2007-03-08T12:10:00.000-08:00

Suggestions from the Life Extension Foundation:

Cholesterol reduction
The following nutritional supplements offer synergistic benefits to assist dietary modification to reduce total serum cholesterol and elevate HDL cholesterol:

* Policosanol, take one tablet twice per day with meals: one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Or Sytrinol, one capsule twice daily.

* Fiber, 4 to 6 grams before any high-fat meal.

* Chitosan, three to six 500-mg chitosan capsules and one 1000 mg ascorbic acid capsule right before a high-fat meal.

* Niacin, 1500 to 3000 mg a day (if tolerable). Consider flush-free niacin (inositol hexanicotinate) to avoid a "red face."

* Artichoke extract, 300 mg, 3 times a day.

* Garlic, 600 to 48000 mg a day.

* Curcumin, 900 to 1800 mg a day.

* Gugulipid, 140 mg 1 to 2 times a day.

* Green tea, 750 mg a day of green tea, 93% polyphenol extract.

* Perilla oil, 6000 mg a day. We suggest taking six 1000-mg gel caps daily. If triglycerides are high, consider taking 4-8 softgels of fish oil (EPA/DHA).

* Vitamin E, 400 to 800 IU daily

* Soy protein extract, 2 heaping teaspoons (5 to 6 grams) of soy powder daily. Soy powder can be easily dispersed and has a light peanut butter taste. For those who want to avoid powders, consider taking one-five capsules of the Ultra Soy Extract (40% isoflavones) daily.

* Selenium, 200 to 600 mcg daily.

* Herbal Cardiovascular Formula, two-six capsules daily with food in divided doses.

Link

FLASH! Cancer Research Breakthrough

2007-02-01T08:37:00.000-08:00

This just in, from my mailbox. The writer is a biochemist who has been working to unravel cellular abnormalities in autism and chronic fatigue syndrome, and devise ways to normalize them. This could truly be a major breakthrough, because it works on one of the most basic problems with all cancer cells -- they cannot die through the normal God-designed process for eliminating cells, apoptosis. Apoptosis is a self-destruct feature built into all cells. Cancer cells subvert this process, becoming immortal, and the uncontrolled growth of immortal cells can kill the victim.

***

I want to let you know about what appears to me to be a major breakthrough in research on cancer treatment. I'm not selling anything, and I was not involved with the research, but I think it's very exciting! I hope you won't think I've parted company with my sanity when I tell you this.

I'm referring to work recently published by researchers at the University of Alberta in Canada. The full paper can be found at the following site:

http://www.depmed.ualberta.ca/dca/cancer_cell.pdf

I'm not exaggerating when I call this a major breakthrough.

Briefly, these esearchers have found that a relatively simple, non-patentable substance, namely dichloroacetate, which has been used in the past to control lactic acidosis in children with mitochondrial disease, is able to knock out a variety of types of cancer cells without causing systemic problems. They have demonstrated this by experiments in three types of human cancer cell cultures and in mice.

This substance works by blocking the enzyme pyruvate dehydrogenase kinase, ausing pyruvate to be converted to acetyl Co-A and be fed into the Krebs cycle, instead of being reduced to lactic acid as normally occurs in cancer cells, and thus forcing the cancer cells to change their metabolism from glycolysis to oxidative phosphorylation, like normal cells. As a result of this change, they are able to cause these cells to undergo apoptosis and die, rather than being immortal as cancer cells are. In the mice, they put this substance in their drinking water, and they began to see effects on their cancer within one week!

Because it operates on a feature that is common to all cancer cells (as shown by Otto Warburg in 1930, for which he won the Nobel prize), this substance promises to be a universal treatment for all types of cancers.

Because it is nonpatentable, it should be relatively inexpensive. This also means that non-pharma money will have to be found for the phase II and III clinical trials, and they've started a fund for that.

Because there is already a history of using this substance in humans to treat lactic acidosis in mitochondrial disease, it is already known that the side effects are mnimal.

I am fairly familiar with the biochemistry of the intermediary metabolism, and I can tell you that the paper looks good to me. I would invite comments from others on this. If this is what it looks like to me, the ramifications are huge to society, the economy, the cancer industry, and to all of us as individuals. I think this will make it even more imperative that we figure out what to do for Alzheimer's, because the average life expectancy is going to jump.

When futurists used to talk about the possibility of "a cure for cancer" being found, I always thought they were nuts! I don't think so anymore.

Rich Van Konynenburg, Ph.D.

*******

New Scientist article on the breakthrough here.

Donate for phase II and III trials here.

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Diabetes, part 3 - nutritional path to lower or eliminate the need for insulin

2007-01-20T10:44:00.000-08:00

Dr GP Todd gave a lecture in 1987 about the treatment of diabetes with diet, exercise, and some amazing nutritional supplements that allowed his patients to dramatically reduce their need to take insulin or other diabetic drugs. Dr. Todd was himself severely diabetic. His diabetes developed very suddenly following a viral infection. Todd saw many cases among his patients -- he was a practicing eye surgeon and clinical opthamologist, and we know that diabetes is a major cause of blindness. He consulted on other cases of diabetes.

From this clinical experience, Todd developed a list of supplements which can be helpful to the diabetic. One must constantly and carefully monitor blood sugar levels when beginning to use these supplements, because when a supplemennt improves the diabetic condition, insulin needs will fall, and excess insulin can lead to diabetic shock.

This lecture lasts about two hours. It is long, and quite frankly, boring. Dr. Todd is a plodding speaker. He lists one after another substances that he and his patients have tried, sometimes with success, sometimes not. Regardless, this lecture is a gold mine of information, and if a diabetic wants to be spared the complications that inevitably ensue from their disease, Dr. Todd gives him the weapons to combat it. Listen carefully, take notes, do a more internet research, and apply the information. You will be richly rewarded.

The main cause of the damage to the body caused by diabetes, the dreadful complications that lead to blindness, amputation, kidney failure -- are largely caused by free radical pathology. The standard care for diabetes recommended by most doctors does little to address out-of-control free radical pathology. Dr. Todd does.

Todd is no longer living. A decade ago, he was practicing in North Carolina. I personally know a patient of his, an older woman who was losing her sight from macular degeneration. Dr. Todd's supplement regimen stopped the deterioration and saved her sight. These techniques work. They are worth the time and trouble to investigate and carefully apply.

To download this lecture (in two parts) click on the link, choose the "free" download option at the bottom, wait for the timer to run down to zero, enter the security code (which will appear after the timer reaches zero), and then click to download.

Part 1:
http://rapidshare.com/files/8737799/diabetes1.mp3.html

Part 2:
http://rapidshare.com/files/8738840/diabetes2.mp3.html

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Diabetes, Part 2 -- blood flow (continued)

2006-12-02T08:18:00.000-08:00

Previously, we noted that red blood cells lose their proper shape and flexibility in diabetes, and this contributes to a reduced ability to pass through our tiniest blood vessels, the capillaries. The result of this is a loss of circulation at the cell level. This phenomenon is not unique to diabetes. It also occurs in Myalgic Encephalomyalitis (ME), also known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (or CFIDS), Lupus, multiple sclerosis, Huntington's Disease, and malaria.

Dr. L.O. Simpson documented these red cell defects. The Townsend Letter for Doctors reports: "When people become ill or physically stressed, a higher percentage of discocytes transform into the less flexible nondiscocytes. Simpson says that the blood samples of marathon runners show a higher percentage of cup-shaped nondiscocytes (somatocytes) after a race. This higher percentage soon reverts to pre-race, normally-low levels 'of abnormally-shaped cells. Similarly, researchers found that the percentage of nondiscocytes in people with a viral head cold' peaked on the fifth day and declined by the tenth day. "

What is the answer? Simpson suggests three things to try, which have reduced the cell defects in his experience. "Simpson found that vitamin B12 injections reduced nondiscocyte levels in some ME [Myaltic Encephalomyelitis] patients. These patients also experienced symptomatic improvement. Patients whose nondiscocyte levels remain unaffected by the B12 injections noticed no improvement. Research with diabetic patients found that omega-3 fatty acids can also reduce nondiscocyte levels and improve capillary flow; and omega-6, in the form of evening primrose oil, has improved blood filterability in cigarette smokers." (source)

Omega-3 and Omega-6 fatty acids are known as Essential Fatty Acids. It is known that many Americans are deficient in these essential nutrients, and those who are ill may have increased need for them. Vitamin B12 is also a possibility for reducing red cell malformations. One of the best ways to take B12 is in sublingual tablets. One of the best forms of B12 to take is methylcobalamin.

Combatting, or better yet preventing, the long term consequences of diabetes is a complicated process. There is no simple road map. However, these substances -- essential fatty acids and Vitamin B12 -- are part of the answer.

Next in the series you will have an opportunity to hear from a doctor on the front lines -- he treated those with diabetes using natural non-toxic non-drug methods, and lectured on the subject. This doctor himself suffered from a sudden-onset case of diabetes after an infection. More to come...

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Diabetes, part 1 -- blood flow

2006-12-01T15:13:00.000-08:00

"Diabetes is associated with several long-term health problems, involving many different areas of the body. Poor control of blood-sugar levels makes these problems more likely to occur, yet they can develop even in people who have perfectly managed diabetes." (source)

One of the problems diabetics face is increasingly poor circulation. This is a multi-faceted problem. One little-known facet, the subject of today's blog post, has to do with red blood cell shape.

Some of the tiniest blood vessels, called capillaries, are actually smaller in diameter than the red blood cells which must pass through! How is this possible? You can't fit a square peg in a round hole, and neither can you fit a blood cell through a blood vessel that is smaller in diameter. Or can you?

The shape of a normal red blood cell is biconcave. (I was told, but have not independently confirmed, that the shape of an "ideal" read blood cell can be described by a mathematical formula known as the Oval of Cassini. Now you can impress your friends at parties.)

That means a red blood cell is like a Certs breath mint, disc shaped, except that it has a central dimple in both sides like a SweeTart candy. Because the blood cell is flexible, not hard like a candy, and because the dimples in the cell help improve the cell's flexibility, it can bend slightly and squeeze through the capillary.

All well and good, unless you are diabetic. Dr. L.O. Simpson from New Zealand has been studying this problem for years. He said that the erythrocytes (red blood cells) of diabetics are less flexible, and this contributes to poor circulation. He took fresh blood, fixed it with a chemical, and looked at the cells under an electron microscope, counting and classifying the shape of the cells. He also performed microfiltration experiments, showing that diabetic blood took longer to pass through a micropore filter. He concluded that poor red cell "deformability" -- the ability of the cell to squeeze down a bit to pass through a tight space, impairs diabetic circulation.

Some Japanese researchers observed this directly.

Dr. Simpson said that diabetics had a high proportion of cells which were shaped like discs, with no dimples. Simpson took pictures of their blood cells with the electron microscope.

Here is a normal red blood cell with a nice dimple in the middle:

Here is a cell similar to the red cells seen in diabetics, with flat tops and bottoms -- no dimples:

Although I am not diabetic, I sent my blood to New Zealand and got an electron micrograph photo of my very own red blood cells. I also had a large number of flat cells, in addition to some other strange shapes. Is there any way to fix this problem and help get more blood flowing? Stay tuned...

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Antioxidants may help multiple sclerosis

2006-11-30T08:50:00.000-08:00

New research shows the potential of the powerful antioxidant alpha lipoic acid in treating multiple sclerosis.

ARTICLE HERE

Vitamin B3 Treatment For Multiple Sclerosis (MS)

2006-09-25T17:28:00.000-07:00

In a mouse model of MS, nicotinamide, a form of vitamin B3, was able to protect nerves from further damage. In other words, the disease was prevented from progressing. (Story at WebMD)

The scientists indicate that the sooner neurons are exposed to this vitamin, the more likely the disease can be slowed or arrested, because nicotinamide helps create an enzyme that protects the nerves from the immune attack that normall occurs in MS and eventually destroys nerve function.

Because of the low toxicity of nicotinamide, those already ill with MS may not want to wait for human studies to commence. This appears to be a case where risk is low and potential benefits are very great.

For the children - folic acid prevents neural tube defects

2006-09-09T08:50:00.000-07:00

Neural tube defects - http://www.merck.com/mmhe/sec23/ch265/ch265g.html - are birth defects creating brain or spinal cord damage. Such conditions include spina bifida, hydrocephalus, or even anencephaly (brain tissue fails to develop).

The story is a simple one, best illustrated by this timeline, presented in 2000 by Dr. Andreas Papas:

1950's - Link of diet and neural tube defects suggested.

1970's - Epidemiological studies: Folic acid deficiency causes birth defects.

1980's - Folic acid reduced neural tube defects 58% (Lancet study)

1991 - CDC (Centers for Disease Control) recommends women with one affected child take folic acid before conception.

1992 - US Public Health Service and CDC recommends 400mcg of folic acid daily for women of childbearing age.

1993 - FDA officially approves health claims.

1996 - FDA authorizes addition of folic acid to grain products.

1998 - FDA mandates addition of folic acid to grain products.

Follow up: Data from CDC, published in the Journal of the AMA, show a "19% decline in neural tube defects and 23% decline in spina bifida from October 1998 through December 1999, compared to births prior to mandatory folic acid fortification." (Source for this quote and the timeline above: Health Gems Vol 7, Issue 1, by John and Susan Carlson.)

The best medical research money can buy

2006-08-07T22:15:00.000-07:00

The New York Times opined July 23 on our conflicted medical journals. Too many researchers are on the payroll of the companies pushing the treatments being studied.

"Two disturbing cases were described in detail by The Wall Street Journal in recent weeks. One involved The Journal of the American Medical Association, or JAMA; the other an obscure journal known as Neuropsychopharmacology, which is published by a leading professional society in the field.

"The article in JAMA must surely have pleased all makers of antidepressant drugs. It warned pregnant women that if they stopped taking antidepressant medication they would increase their risk of falling back into depression. Hidden from view was the fact that most of the 13 authors had been paid as consultants or lecturers by the makers of antidepressants. Their financial ties were not disclosed to JAMA on the preposterous grounds that the authors did not
deem them relevant.

"An even more egregious set of events occurred at Neuropsychopharmacology, which recently published a favorable assessment of a controversial new treatment for depression resistant to conventional therapies. Left unmentioned was that eight of the nine authors serve as consultants to the company that makes the device used in the therapy. The ninth works directly for the company. Just to make things particularly incestuous, the lead author of the study is the journal's editor and a consultant to the company. He has been accused in the past of promoting therapies in which he had a financial stake."

This is par for the course. The new breed of "reps" -- those hired by pharmaceutical companies to pitch their products (drugs) to prescribing doctors -- are actually doctors themselves. But the main workforce of ordinary drug salesmen is a great investment for drug companies.

"Drug reps have been calling on doctors since the mid-nineteenth century, but during the past decade or so their numbers have increased dramatically. From 1996 to 2001 the pharmaceutical sales force in America doubled, to a total of 90,000 reps. One reason is simple: good reps move product. Detailing is expensive, but almost all practicing doctors see reps at least occasionally, and many doctors say they find reps useful. One study found that for drugs introduced after 1997 with revenues exceeding $200 million a year, the average return for each dollar spent on detailing was $10.29. That is an impressive figure. It is almost twice the return on investment in medical-journal advertising, and more than seven times the return on direct-to-consumer advertising. " (The Drug Pushers, The Atlantic, April 2006)

Drug reps are usually ordinary salesmen, not doctors, who call on doctors to give sales pitches and free samples. Sometimes they buy lunch for the doctor's staff. And at times they will spend exhorbitant sums to get the doctors to prescribe more of their companies' products. The finesse involves giving gifts that aren't perceived as bribes.

Increasingly, doctors themselves are being co-opted by industry to pitch drugs to their peers.

"Doctors are often the best people to market a drug to other doctors. Merck discovered this when it was developing a campaign for Vioxx, before the drug was taken off the market because of its association with heart attacks and strokes. According to an internal study by Merck, reported in The Wall Street Journal, doctors who attended a lecture by another doctor subsequently wrote nearly four times more prescriptions for Vioxx than doctors who attended an event led by a rep. The return on investment for doctor-led events was nearly twice that of rep-led events, even after subtracting the generous fees Merck paid to the doctors who spoke."

But it is a slippery slope.

"These speaking invitations work much like gifts. While reps hope, of course, that a doctor who is speaking on behalf of their company will give their drugs good PR, they also know that such a doctor is more likely to write prescriptions for their drugs. 'If he didn't write, he wouldn't speak,' a rep who has worked for four pharmaceutical companies told me. The semi-official industry term for these speakers and consultants is 'thought leaders,' or 'key opinion leaders.'

"Some thought leaders do not stay loyal to one company but rather generate a tidy supplemental income by speaking and consulting for a number of different companies. Reps refer to these doctors as 'drug whores.'

"The seduction, whether by one company or several, is often quite gradual. My brother Hal explained to me how he wound up on the speakers' bureau of a major pharmaceutical company. It started when a company rep asked him if he'd be interested in giving a talk about clinical depression to a community group. The honorarium was $1,000. Hal thought, Why not? It seemed almost a public service. The next time, the company asked him to talk not to the public but to practitioners at a community hospital. Soon company reps were making suggestions about content. 'Why don't you mention the side-effect profiles of the different antidepressants?' they asked. Uneasy, Hal tried to ignore these suggestions. Still, the more talks he gave, the more the reps became focused on antidepressants rather than depression. The company began giving him PowerPoint slides to use, which he also ignored. The reps started telling him, 'You know, we have you on the local circuit giving these talks, but you're medical-school faculty; we could get you on the national circuit. That's where the real money is.' The mention of big money made him even more uneasy. Eventually the reps asked him to lecture about a new version of their antidepressant drug. Soon after that, Hal told them, 'I can't do this anymore.'"

And so it goes.

Costly eye drug challenged by cheap alternative

2006-08-02T20:34:00.000-07:00

"Wet" macular degeneration is a serious eye disease that can lead to loss of a great deal of vision. New treatments may be able to halt the vision loss and in some cases even improve vision.

NPR offered a news item this week about Lucentis, an FDA-approved treatment for "wet" macular degeneration that is being overshadowed by a drug that is chemically almost the same, and has the same effect (it prevents the proliferation of new blood vessels).

The second drug, Avastin, is not FDA-approved for this particular use, but it may cost as little as $50 for treatment, compared to $2000 for the first drug. Doctors often prescribe drugs for things other than their FDA-approved purpose. It is called an "off-label" use.

You can listen to the story here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5596931

The representative for the expensive drug is questioned about the pricing. He cites the cost of other drugs to treat wet macular degeneration, claims his drug is superior, and thinks $1950 per dose (with possibly multiple doses needed) is a cost the patient can afford, since most insurance companies will cover most of the cost. Additionally, the drug company, Genentec, set up a foundation to help poor patients with the exhorbitant price. The subtext of all this is that the drug company picks the highest price they think they can get away with.

In the NPR story, we listen in on a doctor consulting with a patient. Even when the more expensive option is covered by insurance, the patient chooses the cheaper alternative, because she would have to pay first, and be reimbursed by insurance later. She doesn't want to part with her 2 grand. Smart lady! "Clearly, Avastin is a better value," the doctor says.

Ya think so?

Normal Tylenol doses cause signs of liver toxicity in 2 weeks

2006-07-05T22:27:00.000-07:00

Tylenol (or the generic drug acetaminophen, often sold over-the-counter as "Non-Aspirin Pain Reliever") stresses the liver, inhibiting the production of the important antioxidant glutathione. Glutathione is vital in the body's processing of toxins in the bloodstream. After two weeks of Tylenol consumption at the maximum recommended "safe" dose, normal healthy adults had elevations of blood enzymes denoting possible liver disease.

As noted below, alcohol decreases the liver's ability to tolerate toxins like acetaminophen (Tylenol), so even the recommended doses might become unsafe. In addition, the commonly used drugs to lower cholesterol are toxic to the liver, making Tylenol a riskier choice.

ABC News reports:

"Healthy adults taking maximum doses of Tylenol for two weeks had abnormal liver test results in a small study, researchers found, raising concerns that even recommended amounts of the popular painkiller might lead to liver damage.

"There were no alarming liver test results among the people who took placebos. But nearly 40 percent of people [taking Tylenol at the maximum recommended dose] had abnormal test results that would signal liver damage, according to the study that appears in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.

"'I would urge the public not to exceed four grams a day. This is a drug that has a rather narrow safety window,' said a study co-author, Dr. Neil Kaplowitz of the University of Southern California.

"Heavy drinkers should take no more than two grams daily, Kaplowitz said. "

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory?id=2153599

Aspirin during pregnancy may lower child's I.Q.

2006-07-04T20:00:00.000-07:00

Granted, correlation is not the same as causation. But there is enough here to raise suspicion that aspirin is a neurotoxin for the developing brain. The "wonder drug" that works wonders? Perhaps we've accepted for too long that aspirin is "safe as milk."

http://www.chem-tox.com/pregnancy/aspirin.htm

"Children born to mothers who took aspirin during pregnancy were found to have lower intelligence scores and increases in attention deficit problems according to a study of 421 predominantly middle income families.

"The study, conducted by the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at the University of Washington, found that pregnant women using aspirin "several times per week" had children whose IQ scores were 10.1 points lower for girls, and interestingly, only 1.3 points lower for boys. The researchers took into account potential confounding factors such as alcohol, smoking, caffeine use and educational background of parents. The testing was done at age 4 using the Weschler Preschool & Primary Scale of Intelligence (WPPSI)."

FDA attempts to shield drug makers from liability

2006-06-24T08:11:00.000-07:00

New rules to be adopted by the Food and Drug Administration are set to redefine labelling requirements for pharmaceutical drugs. The new rules will go into effect on June 30. At the last minute, language was inserted into the new rule to attempt to limit liability of drug companies for the harm their faulty products might cause patients -- eliminating a patient's standing to bring lawsuits.

One might argue that the FDA has no legal authority to make such sweeping rules, and that may be the case. At the very least, this should leave no doubt in anyone's mind who the FDA is representing, and it is not the general public. Probably the agency should be renamed the Bureau of Pharmaceutical Industry Shelter and Sales. You can work an appropriate acronym yourself.

Here's what the June 8 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine had to say about the FDA's latest move:

"The most troubling aspect of the FDA's
new plan, however, has nothing to do with
providing information to prescribers. In
an unusual move after the end of a five-year
period of comments on the initial rule, the
agency used the passage of the new labeling
regulations to quietly add a new section to
its preamble that will make it extremely difficult
for anyone to bring legal action against a drug
manufacturer for harm caused by one of its
products. For years, the pharmaceutical industry
had sought to pass legislation that would prohibit
litigation over adverse effects as long as the
medication was approved by the FDA; Congress
has consistently rejected this idea. But after
the comment period for the new labeling regulation
had closed, language was added to the final rule
stating that any FDA-approved label, 'whether
it be in the old or new format, preempts . . .
decisions of a court of law for purposes of product
liability litigation.'

"Beginning at the end of this month, the new
regulations would preempt nearly all action by
patients in state courts against drug manufacturers
for unanticipated injuries resulting from the use of
their products. This immunity would apply even
if a company failed to warn prescribers or patients
adequately about a known risk, unless a patient
could prove that the company intentionally
committed fraud — a very hard test to meet.
Several members of the House and Senate have
vigorously objected to this provision, as well as to
the fact that there was no opportunity to debate it
before the regulations were made final; court
challenges are likely.

"Ironically, this low-profile aspect of the new
rules could have an effect on the health care system
that is much more profound than the small-scale
improvements of the new labeling rules themselves.
'It will make it impossible to file liability claims,' said
a former FDA general counsel who is now in private
practice."

As a conservative, I don't like judges legislating from the bench. I especially do not like career bureaucrats legislating by fiat from inside the executive branch -- that is equally unconstitutional.

Let your voice be heard in Washington. You have only about seven days of freedom left to file a lawsuit for damage a negligent drug company has caused. [LINK]

Drug mixups kill 40,000+ every year

2006-06-21T06:05:00.000-07:00

"In November 1999, the Institutes of Medicine released a report that focused public attention on widespread medical errors. Quite often, these errors are drug related and are fairly mild and resolve. Unfortunately, some adverse reactions are severe. Researchers had found that each year some 44,000 Americans die as a result of such errors. "

"Although not every possible mishap is within your control, there are plenty of ways to help keep yourself safe from harm — both in and out of the hospital..."

For a list of precautions you can take to minimize the chance of this kind of tragedy, see this page:

intellihealth.com

Actually, there are studies estimating the death from improperly administered pharmaceuticals at much higher levels than 44,000 annually. In perspective, this makes the number of deaths in the Iraq war seem puny by comparison. Why is so little attention given to these casualties of a health care system that is making these deadly (and largely preventable) mistakes at an astounding rate?

Also, consider this: If 44,000 Americans are killed outright by drug errors every year, probably an even greater number were permanently injured.

arthritis pain relief from magnets

2006-06-19T05:24:00.000-07:00

Most people probably find it odd, but I have used magnets for pain relief for many years. I use permanent magnets, mainly ceramic magnets that are flat, with the north pole on one face and the south pole on the opposite face. A double blind study of permanent magnets and their effect on bursitis pain was done several years ago. Apparently there is little interest in studying this type of magnet, but I find them effective.

The medical establshment has been more diligent in exploring the effects of pulsed or alternating magnetic fields -- electromagnets that are switched on and off at different frequencies. In this type of device, the magnetic field is delivered in pulses. A friend of mine whose child had a non-healing leg fracture told me that there is extensive literature on pulsed magnetic fields for bone healing. This began several decades ago when it was discovered that a small electrical current could stimulate bone growth and healing around a fracture. Since an electrical current produces a magnetic field, it was only natural to start testing magnets as well.

A recent study probed the effect of pulsed magnetic fields on fibromyalgia and rheumatoid arthritis pain. This double-blind placebo-controlled study found statistically significant lower levels of pain in those exposed to a low frequency pulsed magnetic field for thirty minutes, compared to patients who received a sham treatment. [Pain Res Manag. 2006 Summer;11(2):85-90]

The effects of magnetic fields on biology are real. I can't vouch for all of the products being sold in the alternative health field. Many of them may be ineffective. The concept, however, is sound. I haven't tried any of the products that create a pulsed field. Permanent magnets give me benefits, and they avoid the added complication of electronics, wires, etc.

Gary Null has written a book about magnetic healing, and he also sells some very odd and very expensive products on his website (a magnetic sports bra?!), none of which I have read, or used, or endorse. There is an old article on Gary Null's site that serves as an excellent introduction to the use of magnets for health, and it may be all you need to know to begin using magnets for pain relief, allergy relief, and other purposes.

http://garynull.com/node/11537

My only caveat would be to suggest finding an industrial source for the magnets, instead of paying the hugely inflated prices charged by companies selling them on the internet as health products. The magnets I use are 4" x 6" x ½" and have a field strength of 4000-5000 Gauss at the surface. They can be stacked for extra power -- which means the field can penetrate deeper into your tissues.

The 6¢ pill that prevents cancer

2006-05-11T08:40:00.000-07:00

From The Independent, online edition, December 28, 2005

[LINK]

A daily dose of vitamin D could cut the risk of cancers of the breast, colon and ovary by up to a half, a 40-year review of research has found. The evidence for the protective effect of the "sunshine vitamin" is so overwhelming that urgent action must be taken by public health authorities to boost blood levels, say cancer specialists...

Vitamin D is made by the action of sunlight on the skin, which accounts for 90 per cent of the body's supply. But the increasing use of sunscreens and the reduced time spent outdoors, especially by children, has contributed to what many scientists believe is an increasing problem of vitamin D deficiency.

After assessing almost every scientific paper published on the link between vitamin D and cancer since the 1960s, US scientists say that a daily dose of 1,000 international units (25 micrograms) is needed to maintain health. "

Countries around the world have begun to modify their warnings about the dangers of sunbathing, as a result of the growing research on vitamin D. The Association of Cancer Councils of Australia acknowledged this year for the first time that some exposure to the sun was healthy.

In the latest study, cancer specialists from the University of San Diego, California, led by Professor Cedric Garland, reviewed 63 scientific papers on the link between vitamin D and cancer published between 1966 and 2004...

Professor Garland said: "A preponderance of evidence from the best observational studies... has led to the conclusion that public health action is needed. Primary prevention of these cancers has been largely neglected, but we now have proof that the incidence of colon, breast and ovarian cancer can be reduced dramatically by increasing the public's intake of vitamin D."

In addition to its impact on cancer, a lack of vitamin D can mean increased risk of multiple sclerosis, osteoporosis, insulin resistance, and through its impact on insulin resistance, heart disease.

A 1000 I.U. supplement of vitamin D costs about 6 cents per tablet from online stores like www.vitaminshoppe.com.

Advancing medical science on the backs of the poor

2006-04-16T21:01:00.000-07:00

Now we are outsourcing guinea pigs. Few US patients want to participate in controlled studies of new drugs. Pharmaceutical companies have found it easier to conduct trials overseas by paying what appears to some as a bribe to doctors in India, who enroll their poor, mostly ignorant, and very compliant patients in programs to test untested drugs for safety and effectiveness.

"The drug regimen, known as Aggrenox, was being tested for its ability to forestall a second stroke. S. P. Kalantri, the doctor tapped to lead the trial in Sevagram, quickly grasped the offer's appeal. Patients in Sevagram are poor enough that the benefits of taking part in the study would amount to a health care windfall; among other things, Boehringer Ingelheim guaranteed participants two physicals during each of the three years that the trial would run. For each person enrolled, moreover, the hospital would receive 30,000 rupees (about $665)
- no small amount, given the puny budget of the center's stroke ward, a single room of eight pallet beds. Kalantri talked the matter over with the chair of the hospital's ethics committee, and the two concluded that the trial drug itself, with its possible side effects and limited efficacy, would provide little benefit to their patients. Then they went ahead and signed up. "

Read the rest of the article HERE.

test

2006-03-06T08:29:00.000-08:00

testing the test

New thoughts on cancer and AIDS

2006-02-23T23:24:00.000-08:00

http://www.lewrockwell.com/miller/miller18.html

Dr Donald Miller, MD, introduces the controversial molecular biologist Peter Duesberg. Duesberg's research could revolutionize the understanding of AIDS and cancer.

Duesberg originally worked on the problem of oncoviruses -- viruses which are suspected causes of cancer. He became one of the world's authorities on retroviruses.

His expertise in retroviruses led him to examine the phenomenon of AIDS, which was is said to be caused by HIV, which is a retrovirus. Duesberg found that the evidence for this connection was circumstantial, and proposed his own explanation: AIDS is a result of a weakening of the immune system from a number of toxic and behavioral factors.

Duesberg's position on AIDS has earned him nothing but scorn in the media and most of the scientific establishment. If he is right, millions will likely die before vested interests will admit they were wrong.

His funding cut off, Duesberg moved back to the study of cancer, this time without a focus on viruses as the cause.

Duesberg noted the trait of cancer cells to have more chromosomes than normal. A human cell normally has 42 chromosomes, but cancer cells might have 60 or 70, or even as many as 90 chromosomes -- duplicates, extras, which as much as double the normal number of chromosomes. This phenomenon is known as aneuploidy.

The hunt is on to find the causes of aneuploidy, with hopes of finding better prevention and treatment methods. Peter Duesberg is blazing the trail in aneuploidy research. After many tens of billions of federal dollars spent on cancer research, with only incremental improvements in survival rates for most cancers, we need a new approach.

It is said that when one keeps trying the same thing in the face of repeated failure, that's called insanity. Yet, most cancer researchers continue to plow old ground. It is high time for something completely different.
*

NutraSweet + Food Coloring can poison nerve cells?

2006-02-17T13:08:00.000-08:00

UK's The Guardian reported last December 21 that combining the artificial sweetener aspartame (NutraSweet®) with flavor-enhancer monosodium glutimate (MSG) and two food dyes produced toxic effects on nerve cells in the laboratory.

The levels used in the study were said to be comparable to those obtained by a child eating a snack and drink containing these chemicals.

Nerve cells ceased growing and the signaling factors cells use to communicate with each other were inhibited by small amounts of these food additives.

The study was published in the journal Toxicological Sciences, and the abstract can be read at this link.

The dose makes the poison -- but increasingly science is finding more examples of combinations of low-dose chemicals in our food and environment that are much more toxic than expected.

"MSG," according to the Guardian article, "is banned [in the EU] in foods for young children." MSG "is found in some pasta with sauce products, a large number of crisps, processed cheese, and prepared meals. Aspartame is found in diet drinks, some sweets, desserts and medicines."

Candies, processed peas, soft drinks, desserts, and pickles are some sources of the food dyes in the study.

Natural versus drug treatment of arthritis

2006-01-29T16:11:00.000-08:00

Nutraceutical Interventions in Arthritis, an excellent overview of natural, non-toxic treatments for arthritis, can be downloaded HERE.

Though a bit technical, it also devotes a section to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS), a group that includes aspirin, ibuprofen, and the more expensive prescription drugs like Vioxx and Celebrex, which have been overprescribed (see article HERE).

The modern beriberi epidemic

2006-01-17T10:06:00.000-08:00

So you thought scurvy (vitamin C deficiency) and beriberi (vitamin B1 deficiency) -- diseases of malnutrition -- were a thing of the past? Not so.

One in three patients hospitalized for heart failure had below-normal levels of thiamin (vitamin B1), compared to 12 percent of "healthy people." Read the study here.

*

Reversing osteoporosis without drugs

2006-01-13T15:08:00.000-08:00

New medical studies on the mineral strontium show that when taken with calcium and vitamin D, bone growth is enhanced. It can help increase bone mass density in the hip, spinal column, and the neck of the femur.

"'Strontium ranelate is the first compound to simultaneously decrease bone resorption and stimulate bone formation,' co-investigator Dr. Jean Yves Reginster, director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Center for Public Health Aspects of Rheumatic Diseases, said in a prepared statement." http://www.hon.ch/News/HSN/521834.html

"Strontium is a naturally occurring element which is well tolerated when complexed with ranelic acid. Unlike some existing therapies for osteoporosis, strongtium ranelate actually promotes the net formation of bone by preferentially activating osteoblasts." http://www.osteofound.org/wco/2004/press_releases_files/pr_2004_05_17c.pdf

Supplements used in one study: 2 grams daily of strontium ranelate (the amount of elemental strontium would be less, probably around 600 mg), 800 IU vitamin D, and 1000mg elemental calcium. Strontium ranelate is not readily available but organically bound strontium can be purchased through distributers of Advanced Orthomolecular Research products. The product is Strontium Support.

Vtamin K is also supportive of bone mineralization, and whenever calcium is taken, magnesium should also be taken, in a 2:1 ratio (for example 1000 mg calcium with 500 mg magnesium).

________
References:

New England J Med 2004; 350: 459-468 (Double blind randomized study demonstrating the efficacy of strontium ranelate in spinal osteoporosis in postmenopausal women.)

J Clin Endocrinol Metab 2002; 87:2060–2066

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Dangers of aspirin / natural alternatives II

2006-01-09T21:15:00.000-08:00

Is there a way to get the benefits of aspirin without the risks? Aspirin is based on plant compounds -- natural salicylic acids. Plants containing these substances have been used medicinally for literally thousands of years. Actually, many foods contain abundant salicylic acids and other natural anti-inflammatory chemicals.

Vegetables and fruits contain natural salicylic acids. In one study, some vegetarians had salicylic acid levels as high as non-vegetarians who were taking daily aspirin. Organically grown produce may contain higher quantities of salicylic acid -- research published in the European Journal of Nutrition found that soups made from organic vegetables were six times higher in salicylic acid than ordinary soups. Red and white wines are both high in salicylic acid. Most berries, cherries, prunes, dates, apricots, and grapes are also good sources.

High fruit and vegetable consumption will provide anti-inflammatory effects from the natural salicylic acids and other plant compounds without reducing the clotting capacity of the blood -- which leads to the dangerous risk of stroke and bleeding in those who take aspirin.

Can aspirin extend lifespan? The studies say it is questionable. On the other hand, the benefits of making vegetables and fruits the major part of your diet are well-established. If prevention is the goal, diet should be the focus, not drugs.

For more details, see Dr. David G. Williams' April 2004 Alternatives newsletter, available from www.drdavidwilliams.com. Back issues are available at 1-800-718-8293 for $5 each.

Dangers of aspirin / natural alternatives

2006-01-04T17:52:00.000-08:00

Dr. David G. Williams, in the April 2004 issue of his Alternatives newsletter, raked aspirin over the coals. The immediate and potential preventive effects of aspirin are widely touted. Many of the statistical risks ordinary people run by taking this drug daily are rarely mentioned. Here's a summary of Dr. Williams' findings:

The FDA recently reviewed 55,000 aspirin-takers in 5 different studies. In the next five-year period, 3 percent of "moderate-risk individuals" could expect to have a heart attack. With low dose daily aspirin therapy, that risk could be reduced to 2 percent. But the death rate from heart attack would not be reduced by aspirin. The risk of a stroke caused by arterial blockage would not be reduced. On the other hand, risk of stroke from a ruptured blood vessel in the brain would increase.

The US Preventive Services Task Force looked at the same five studies and concluded that in a group of 1,000 moderate-risk men and women taking daily aspirin, in a five-year period, eight non-fatal heart attacks might be prevented, but one stroke and three cases of major gastrointestinal bleeding would be caused. Again, the effect on mortality would be nil. Nada. Nothing. Zip. Zero. Get the point?

In a large study of 88,000 female nurses, those taking at least 2 aspirin tablets per week developed 58 percent more cases of pancreatic cancer, which is virtually incurable by conventional means. This is by no means insignificant. It is the fifth most common cause of cancer death in the United States.

Long-term aspirin use is associated with a 44 percent increase in posterior subcapsular cataract. (Opthamology Vol 98, No. 105, p. 1751-1758)

Aspirin is a common trigger for asthma attacks. (Chest Vol. 118, No 5, p. 1420-1476)

72 percent of older people taking from 1/4 tablet to 1 full tablet (325mg) aspirin daily had a measurable decrease in kidney function, which began to appear in as little as two weeks after starting to take aspirin. (American Journal of Medicine Vol 115, No 6, p. 462-466)

Aspirin in combination with alcoholic beverages (even moderate consumption) increases the risk of liver disease and gastrointestinal bleeding.

Are you beginning to doubt the unquestioned "wonder drug" status of aspirin?

Can we get the benefits of aspirin without the risks? That will be the subject of part II of this report.

Dr. Williams newsletter can be ordered here (a subscription for current issues or individual back issues, including the April 2004 issue, from which this information is taken): http://www.drdavidwilliams.com

Bipolar disorder, ADHD: in your head or in your diet?

2006-01-01T10:41:00.000-08:00

Discover magazine, May 2005, features an article by Susan Freinkel, "Vitamin Cure." Frankel tells the story of two Canadian hog farmers who formulated a vitamin and mineral cure for irritable pigs who bite the tails and ears of other pigs when confined in crowded pens. The same formula was refined for human consumption and is now being offered for sale. It is also being tested in the laboratory to determine its effect on the brain and nervous system. A variation on the hog farmers' formula, EMPowerplus, was fed to rats, who developed bigger brains and more synaptic connections than rats fed only normal rat chow. Clearly nutrition can affect brain structure.

A small clinical study of the supplement by Dr. Bonnie Kaplan at the University of Calgary found EMPowerplus helpful in bipolar patients for whom conventional medication had proved ineffective. Harvard's Dr. Charles Popper tried the supplement in a similar group of drug-resistant bipolar patients, with 80 percent responding favorably. Often the response was faster than that usually obtained with pharmaceutical drugs.

The British Journal of Pharmacology published a study in 2002 demonstrating that a vitamin and mineral supplement plus fish oil and evening primrose oil (to provide essential fatty acids) could clearly reduce antisocial acts in a prison population.

Harvard psychiatrist Andrew Stoll found that Omega-3 fatty acids (found in salmon and flax seed) were helpful in improving the mental health of bipolar patients, decreasing symptoms and apparently guarding them against relapse. Other studies suggest that Omega-3 oils are also helpful for depression, schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

The standard treatment for bipolar disorder is lithium -- a simple mineral. Other nutrients which may prove helpful for mental illness include folic acid for depression, magnesium for mood disorders, chromium for depression, and inositol for depression, panic disorder, and OCD (obbsessive compulsive disorder). Details are in the Discover magazine article, the text of which can be read here.

More bad news on Tylenol/Acetaminophen

2005-12-04T19:32:00.000-08:00

Not only can it destroy your liver, regular users have 50% greater chance of developing kidney cancer. But hey, it's the doctor's choice!

This article suggests ways to make Tylenol/acetaminophen less toxic by taking a cocktail of detoxifying nutrients to support the liver:

CLICK HERE

Vitamin C kills cancer cells

2005-12-04T19:26:00.000-08:00

UPI reports (September 12):

Studies during the 1970s first suggested administration of high doses of ascorbate might provide a clinical benefit for treating cancer, but later studies using the same high doses found no benefit.

However, researchers now say the original studies used intravenous and oral ascorbate, while subsequent studies used only oral administration. Recognizing those differences might account for the disparate clinical outcomes, Mark Levine and colleagues at the National Institutes of Health reexamined intravenous ascorbate therapy in cultured cancer cell lines.

The researchers found ascorbate killed cancer cells at concentrations that would only be achievable through intravenous infusion. Normal cells were not affected by ascorbate at any concentration.
--

My comment: This is something known from experience by doctors treating cancer with unorthodox methods in Mexico and elsewhere. The orthodox research establishment is only 30-50 years behind holistic medicine.

Does megadose vitamin C cause kidney stones?

2005-12-01T18:11:00.000-08:00

From Linus Pauling's book, Cancer and Vitamin C:

There has been much discussion in newspaper articles about the possibility that a high intake of vitamin C may cause the development of kidney stones. This suggestion is largely based on a misunderstanding. It is known that some kinds of kidney stones (the less common ones) tend to form in acidic urine, and others tend to form in alkaline urine. Physicians sometimes recommend to certain patients that they keep their urine either alkaline or acidic, in case that it is known that the patient may develop kidney stones of one kind or the other. Large doses of vitamin C as sodium ascorbate keep the urine alkaline, whereas large doses of this vitamin as ascorbic acid make it acidic. This question really has nothing to do with vitamin C, because any other alkalinizing agent, such as potassium citrate, can be used to make the urine alkaline, and any acidifier, such as ammonium chloride, can be used to make it acidic. Some people, of rare genotypes, such as those who convert most of the ascorbate to oxalate, may be unable to tolerate large doses of vitamin C, but the very small number of the cases reported in the medical literature indicates that there are not very many of these unfortunate individuals. The risk of kidney stone formation as a result of high ascorbate intake is very remote indeed.

Natural Ways to Lower Cholesterol and Triglycerides

2005-10-25T18:29:00.000-07:00

I have been meaning for some time to write a summary article on policosanol, a natural rice-based waxy substance which has shown itself not merely equal, but superior to cholesterol-lowering drugs in head-to-head comparison studies. Well, I had the best of intentions. :-(

Until then, you can research policosanol on your own. You would also be advised to explore this article from Willner Chemists, which covers natural therapies other than policosanol:

Natural Alternatives for Lowering Cholesterol and Triglycerides

Cancer Patients Can Increase Survival Time Ten-fold+

2005-10-13T14:27:00.000-07:00

In 1990, The Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine published an article by Abram Hoffer, MD, and Linus Pauling, Ph.D., which analysed the differences between a group of cancer patients who took a regimen of vitamins and minerals and a similar group of patients who did not.

These were patients of Dr. Hoffer, terminal cancer patients who had been referred to him for psychiatric care. In addition to counselling or treatment of depression and anxiety, Dr. Hoffer recommended a vitamin/mineral regimen and a dietary plan. Some patients complied, and some did not. The two groups were compared.

I have a basic knowledge of statistics, and it is true that statistical manipulation can sometimes make black seem like white, or vice versa. But I think it would be hard to explain away the results as mere artifacts of playing with the numbers. The magnitude of the effect is simply too large.

Thirty-one patients who did not follow Dr. Hoffer's protocol had a mean survival time of 5.9 months.

Of those who followed the protocol, response seemed to be divided in to two groups. About 20% of the patients responded "poorly" -- which is to say that their survival nearly doubled, to 10 months on average. That response would be considered poor only by comparison to the larger part of the group, the remaining 80%, who saw survival time jump up to 20 times that of the non-compliant patients. Even lumping the "poor" responders and the good responders together, survival time was 16 times longer than patients who refused the vitamin/mineral and diet advice.

Patients were advised to take 12 grams of vitamin C daily, in divided doses, plus niacin or niacinamide at 1.5 - 3 grams daily, vitamin B-6 250 mg/day, vitamin E 800 I.U. daily, beta carotene 30,000 I.U. daily, selenium 200 - 500 mcg/day, and other vitamins and minerals in large amounts. Advice about selection of nutritious foods was also given (emphasizing, I believe, basic principles like eating whole grains, the importance of green and yellow vegetables, reduction of sugar and empty carbohydrates, etc.)

Doctor Hoffer's current recommendations can be found at this web page:

http://www.islandnet.com/~hoffer/

The page is poorly formatted, but the information is there. Look for the heading "Anti Cancer Nutrition" approximately two thirds of the way down the very long page.

This simple protocol can have dramatic effects in some patients. By dramatic, I mean they did not die as expected. All of the patients who refused the protocol died quickly or were still ill 49 months into the study. (Actually, only one patient out of 31 survived that long.) Among the group who followed the dietary advice and took their vitamins, many were alive and actually well, up to ten years after starting the treatment. Vitamins and diet are not a sure cure for cancer. Many of those taking vitamins died, though with extended survival times compared to their non-vitamin taking peers.

Reference:
Hoffer A, Pauling L: The Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine 5(3):143-154, 1990.

Older Women:Cut Cardiovascular Disease Death in Half

2005-09-27T20:16:00.000-07:00

Last summer, headlines announced that a large study in the Journal of the AMA found that taking vitamin E conferred no protection from major cardiovascular events (i.e. heart attack and stroke) or cancer.

What the data actually demonstrated -- at least for older women -- was quite different.

The study followed 40,000 women of all ages over a period of ten years. 4,000 of these were women over the age of 65.

For these older women, "supplementation with 600 IU of natural source vitamin E every other day" resulted in "a 24 percent decrease in major cardiovascular events, a 34 percent reduction in heart attacks, and a 49 percent reduction in cardiovascular death."

For more information: http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/new/vitewhs05.html

Decline in food's nutrient content since 1930

2005-09-19T20:21:00.000-07:00

From Discover magazine, May 2005, page 56:

"In 1997 a British study compared the mineral content of fruits and vegetables grown in the 1930s with the mineral content of produce grown in the 1980s. It found that several nutrients had dropped dramatically, including calcium (down nearly 30 percent), iron (down 32 percent), and magnesium (down 21 percent)."

One of my earlier posts showed how nutrients in food had declined from 1975 to 1998, according to US Department of Agriculture surveys. Putting those study results together with the British study, it is likely that the nutritional decline of fruits and vegetables from 1930 to the present is quite dramatic, by any standard.

It has become increasingly hard to get adequate nutrition from food, even if a healthy diet rich in fruits and vegetables is consumed. But we are not all the same. Persons at the end of the Bell Curve requiring greater than normal amounts of nutrients to maintain good health may find it not merely hard, but impossible to obtain the nutrients they need from diet alone.

Take Tylenol -- and gasp for breath???

2005-08-07T19:41:00.000-07:00

A new study in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine finds that Americans taking acetaminophen (Tylenol) from 6-29 times per month were much more likely to suffer asthma or chronic pulmonary obstructive disease (COPD). In fact, your risk of COPD was nearly doubled if you took Tylenol/acetaminophen frequently. Asthma was 40% more frequent in acetaminophen users.

Acetaminophen lowers the level of an important antioxidant, glutathione, and the epithelial tissues of the lung are especially sensitive to damage from oxidation when glutathione is deficient.

Be careful -- read the fine print. You may not be taking Tylenol-brand acetaminophen. But generics are available in every drugstore, usually labelled "non-aspirin pain reliever" or a similar name.

Antioxidants like glutathione, vitamin E, vitamin C, CoEnzyme Q10, and SOD (superoxide dismutase) are important parts of the body's defense system. Any drug that lowers levels of these substances compromises your long-term chances of staying healthy. That's why statin drugs to lower cholesterol have such a poor record of reducing overall mortality -- because statin drugs lower CoEnzyme Q10. With this new study, we can add acetaminophen/Tylenol to the list of pills that probably do more harm than good.

Studies, schmudies: one third of study results don't hold up

2005-07-23T09:39:00.000-07:00

July 13, 2005

CHICAGO, Illinois (AP) -- New research highlights a
frustrating fact about science: What was good for you
yesterday frequently will turn out to be not so great
tomorrow.

The sobering conclusion came in a review of major
studies published in three influential medical journals
between 1990 and 2003, including 45 highly publicized
studies that initially claimed a drug or other
treatment worked.

Subsequent research contradicted results of seven
studies -- 16 percent -- and reported weaker results
for seven others, an additional 16 percent.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/HEALTH/07/13/contradictory.studies.ap/

Even research in the New England Journal of Medicine, the Journal of the AMA, and Lancet -- the prestigious journals reviewed in this research -- were prone to error about one third of the time.

Why? Because scientists fudge data inadvertently, and sometimes purposely. And because the results of a study are closely related to who pays for the study. Scientists may release only the studies that provide results favorable to their interests, while a study with contrary results may be shelved.

Medical breakthroughs reported in the mainstream media may or may not be real breakthroughs. Keep a realistic attitude when you read medical news. It ain't necessarily so.

National Institutes of Health -- ethics compromised

2005-07-19T08:22:00.000-07:00

How many of those working in the NIH are really working for John Q. Public, and how many are secretly working for the drug industry? Too many, according to one internal survey. The ethical violations appear to be rampant.

Check out the details.

Nutrient content of our food is declining

2005-06-23T21:17:00.000-07:00

The front page of the June/July Carlson Laboratories newsletter has some troubling news for people who are trying to eat a healthy diet. Even healthy foods -- fresh fruits and vegetables -- may not be as healthy as they once were. The nutrient content of our groceries is apparently in decline.

The USDA periodically surveys, samples and analyzes foods for nutrient content. Comparing the 1998 survey to the 1975 survey for 12 fruits (apples, apricots, bananas, cherries, grapefruits, lemons, oranges, peaches, pineapples, tangerines, strawberries, and watermelons) shows a decline in vital vitamins and minerals. These fruits had 29 percent less calcium, 16 percent less iron, 16 percent less vitamin A and 24 percent less phosphorus.

New food production techniques are failing in the basic goal of delivering nutrition to the customer. We need to increase consumption of fruits and vegetables for better health. However, we may not be getting the benefits we ought, because of depleted soils and new plant species.

Is organic produce superior? In some respects, yes, but there are no guarantees.

I consider this one of the most important public health issues of our time. Our government pursues many useless goals, but testing the food supply and promoting ways to grow more nutritious foods would be a very practical service to the American people.

The problem with national health care

2005-05-16T16:10:00.000-07:00

Discover magazine reports, on page 59 of their January issue, the scope of the astonishingly bad American diet:

After crunching dietary data gathered from more than 4700 adults, researchers at the University of California Berkeley found that soft drinks provide more than 7 percent of the average daily intake of calories--the largest single source. Soft drinks, alcohol, and sweets, including pastries, account for more than 25 percent of adults' calories. Add fruit drinks and salty snacks and the figure rises to 30 percent. Nearly one-third of our calories come from junk food and alcohol.

Even jaded nutritionists, long inured to the public's atrocious dining habits, were taken aback by the study. "The dose really does make the poison," says epidemiologist Gladys Block, the study's lead author. "We knew people ate a lot of this stuff. But that much?"

Not only do these foods fuel the nation's obesity epidemic, says Block, they are displacing the nutrient-rich fruits and vegetables necessary to fend off disease. The result, Block says, is an unappetizing paradox: a nation of people simultaneously overfed and undernourished.

Since these are average figures, and some people are actually eating healthy diets, that means that many Americans are eating more than 30 percent of their calories as junk food.

It is unfair to put people who take care of themselves and eat their veggies in a risk group with those who are abusing their bodies, trying to commit suicide by Twinkie.

We need a system that economically incentivizes prevention, both from the standpoint of the patient and the standpoint of the doctor. We want to be compassionate, but to avoid consuming all available resources on health care, there does need to be some form of direct or indirect rationing. At the most basic moral level, a child sick with a heart defect is more deserving of resources than a smoker who smoked 3 packs a day for 30 years and now needs a heart operation.

There are no easy solutions, but economic incentives for healthy eating need to be part of the mix.

Maddening deception of the public

2005-04-19T21:59:00.000-07:00

I am rereading Thomas J. Moore's seminal article from The Atlantic Monthly, "The Cholesterol Myth." It may not be good for my health. So much money has been spent chasing blind alleys in the search for ways to blame cholesterol for heart disease, cancer, stroke, and other maladies.

Once a well-funded group like the Heart Institute invests a lot of time and money in an idea, they are not about to simply give it up, no matter how damning the evidence. Here's a quote about the largest ongoing heart study of all time:

"Four decades after the Framingham study began, the research team examined the question of total mortality and cholesterol. Again the results showed that for those with low cholesterol levels deaths from other causes mostly offset any reduced incidence of coronary heart disease. The researchers found 'no increased overall mortality with either high or low serum cholesterol levels' among men after age forty-seven. There was also no relationship among women after age forty-seven, or among women younger than forty, who very rarely have coronary heart disease. Furthermore, the researchers said, people whose cholesterol levels are declining may be at special risk. 'After age 50 years the association of mortality with cholesterol values is confounded by people whose cholesterol levels are falling -- perhaps due to diseases predisposing to death.' Left unanswered was how a spontaneous decline might predispose one to death while non-spontaneous response to [drug anti-cholesterol] treatment would not."

After fifteen years, there is little I can find to justify changing this assessment. Lowering cholesterol has minimal potential to extend life.

Please take the time to look at "The Cholesterol Myth" in its entirety here. Sometimes learning the truth makes you joyful, and sometimes it can just make you angry. Many things can be done to substantially enhance health and extend life. Unfortunately, for most people, reducing cholesterol levels is not one of those things. The Heart Institute has been successful in dramatically inflating the risk of cholesterol in the public's mind, and exaggerating any benefits of taking drugs to lower cholesterol (and minimizing the risks of those drugs).

A non-drug cholesterol treatment -- better than drugs

2005-04-08T21:08:00.000-07:00

Several studies have tested a non-drug cholesterol treatment head to head against cholesterol lowering drugs. The cheaper non-drug alternative came out on top. But it would be best to let the results of these studies speak for themselves.

A study by Castaña, et al published in 2001 by the Journals of Gerontology Series A, Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences tested a group of elderly patients with high cholesterol and high risk for coronary heart disease.

Half of the study patients were assigned to take policosanol, a natural nutritional supplement, and half took a dummy pill, i.e. a sugar capsule. The patients taking policosanol received a 5mg daily dose for 12 weeks, followed by 10mg dose for the next 12 weeks. At the end of the study, those taking policosanol had lowered their LDL cholesterol (the bad cholesterol) by 24%. Amazingly, their good cholesterol (HDL) levels had increased by 29%. Those taking policosanol had improved cardiovascular capacity. No side effects were reported by users of policosanol.

Patients taking the sugar pill and patients taking policosanol were all following a fat restricted diet. But only the patients taking policosanol had these positive benefits. I do not believe there is a prescription drug on the market that can match the positive effects of policosanol in this study.

Was this a fluke? By no means. Several studies have reported similar drops in bad cholesterol and gains in good cholesterol levels. These authors concluded simply, "...policosanol is effective, safe, and well tolerated in older [patients with high cholesterol]." What more could you ask?

What is policosanol? How does it work? Where can you buy it? Exactly how does it stack up against cholesterol lowering drugs? That is what I'll attempt to answer very soon in this space.

Cipro? Uh-oh. Disability due to antibiotics

2005-03-22T08:05:00.000-08:00

A recent experience with a family member who had a bad reaction to a single half-dose of antibiotic (Levaquin) prompts me to call attention to this warning from Jay S. Cohen, MD:

"Since the December 2001 publication of my article in the Annals of Pharmacotherapy, I've received hundreds of e-mails from people suffering from devastating, long-lasting side effects associated with Cipro, Levaquin, Floxin, and other fluoroquinolone antibiotics. Most of these people are young and had been healthy and active.

"These antibiotics have legitimate uses in treating infectious diseases, but they are overused for minor conditions such as sinusitis, prostatitis, and bladder infections. My stance is that Cipro, Levaquin, and similar antibiotics should be used only when other, safer drugs are ineffective, or for organisims that are only sensitive to fluoroquinolones.

"As I said on National Public Radio in October 2001, I strongly believe that all people placed on these antibiotics should be warned about infrequent yet serious reactions that may cause joint, muscle, or tendon pain or rupture, nerve pain (burning, electrical sensations, tingling), muscle weakness, thinking or memory problems, heart palpitations, rapid heart rate, gastric problems, skin rash, or many other unusual physical or psychological symptoms. These reactions can occur quickly and suddenly, and patients should alert their doctors immediately.

"Doctors, for their part, must recognize that these symptoms can lead to severe, long-term pain and dysfuction, and should stop the antibiotics immediately if at all possible. Because adverse reactions may increase in severity and duration with each exposure, patients with these reactions should not receive fluoroquinolones again. I'd hoped that my article would accomplish this, just as it prompted the U.S. Centers for Disease Control to alter their guidelines for treating anthrax. But it hasn't had the same impact on the medical system."

Dr. Cohen's paper, "Peripheral Neuropathy with Fluoroquinolone Antibiotics," was published in the December 2001 issue of the Annals of Pharmacotherapy. Cohen emphasizes that nervous system reactions to these drugs are not rare, and can be permanently disabling. On his website, www.MedicationSense.com, the doctor suggests some medications and nutritional supplements which might help alleviate the suffering of those who have been injured by Cipro, Floxin, Levaquin, etc.

The Cholesterol Myth 3: "Meta-analysis"

2005-03-16T11:50:00.000-08:00

The problem I have defined as cholesterol mania has many facets. Obviously cholesterol plays some part in the process of coronary heart disease and vascular disease. A common perception is that it is the most important factor, but studies do not bear this out. Some die young with normal cholesterol levels. Some live beyond the normal lifespan with high cholesterol. The famous Atlantic Monthly article, "The Cholesterol Myth," states that elderly persons with high cholesterol tend to live equally as long as those with normal or low cholesterol!

Some studies have suggested an increased risk of cancer in those medicating with anti-cholesterol drugs. Some studies have not.

In spite of billions of dollars of related research since 1993, I believe we have learned little of significance beyond the conclusions of a literature review (a "meta-analysis") published in the British Medical Journal twelve years ago, titled "Cholesterol lowering and mortality: the importance of considering initial level of risk". The authors of that study, from the University of Glasgow Department of Public Health, wrote, "Currently evaluated cholesterol lowering drugs seem to produce mortality benefits in only a small proportion of patients at very high risk of death from coronary heart disease. Population cholesterol screening could waste resources and even result in net harm in substantial groups of patients."

The bottom line is that cholesterol lowering drugs are of no net benefit or even increase the death rate in "substantial groups of patients." And what of those at very high risk who might see a slight reduction in mortality? If drugs were the only means of lowering cholesterol, perhaps the risks would be warranted for this select group. Again, quoting from the study, "Raised mortality from causes other than coronary heart disease was seen in trials of drug treatment (1.21; 1.05 to 1.39) but not in the trials of non-drug treatments (1.02; 0.88 to 1.19)."

The implication is clear. Lower your cholesterol with non-drug methods.

I will repeat the first principle of Hippocrates, upon whose philosophy medicine is supposed to be based: First, do no harm. It is clear that the drugs used to lower cholesterol do cause harm, sometimes very serious harm to the liver and muscles. They have side effects that mimic and exacerbate the symptoms of old age. They may increase your risk of cancer, and they consistently, in study after study, increase the rate of death from causes other than coronary heart disease.

There is a cheap alternative to these toxic drugs. A substance exists which is readily available, non-toxic, inexpensive, and which has been proven in head-to-head trials against cholesterol drugs to lower LDL cholesterol with equal effectiveness. Furthermore, this substance also raises HDL cholesterol levels -- the good cholesterol. Most people haven't heard of this substance. Most people think the only answer to "high cholesterol disease" -- which is only part of the cause of heart disease -- is to take the drugs they see advertised on television.

My next entry will identify this substance and review some of the scientific studies done to prove its effectiveness. Also, I will list sources.

Cholesterol Myth 2 -- Lipitor failure hailed as success

2005-03-10T20:54:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the New York Times online had an article about the latest attempt to justify the highest doses of cholesterol-lowering statin drugs. The Times featured a new study, just released by the New England Journal of Medicine. A large population of heart patients was divided into two groups. One was given a low dose of atorvastatin (Lipitor), and the other group was given a large dose -- eight times higher, in fact -- in an attempt to push down LDL cholesterol levels as low as possible. These two groups of patients were monitored for five years.

The study is being hailed as a great success. Patients taking the higher dose of statins had 2% lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease or stroke. (A relative reduction in risk of about 20%.) Unfortunately, they also had a higher death rate from non-cardiovascular causes. "There was no difference between the two treatment groups in overall mortality." Somehow the New York Times omitted that information.

Two weekends ago, Jean Carper reported in her Sunday newspaper column that a Finnish study showed that daily consumption of 700mg of vitamin C (tablets, not in food) for ten years would cut the relative risk of death from heart attack by 25%. This is actually a greater reduction in the death rate than those taking the higher, more toxic dose of statin drugs in the study above.

So, you can have your choice. Take a non-toxic vitamin and reduce your risk of death by heart attack by 25%. Or take a toxic drug and reduce your risk of heart attack death by 20%, while at the same time increasing your risk of death from other causes. A no-brainer? I'd say so.

The "duh" file: Vitamin C boosts immunity

2005-03-06T21:18:00.000-08:00

After all these years, there are still some who argue against large doses of vitamin C. After all these years, studies are still being done supporting the use of large doses of vitamin C -- to enhance immune function.

Here's another one: http://www.immunesupport.com/library/bulletinarticle.cfm?ID=6304

That's not to say you shouldn't eat bell peppers, oranges, and kiwifruit to get generous doses of natural vitamin C and its nutrient partners. But the refined pills (or powder) do some good too.

The Cholesterol Myth

2005-02-24T05:35:00.000-08:00

Personally, I think the United States is in the grip of a cholesterol mania. Since reading a cover story in The Atlantic Monthly (September 1989, "The Cholesterol Myth") over a dozen years ago, I've known that cholesterol is hardly the best predictor of heart attack. It certainly is a poor predictor of overall mortality. (Serum albumin is probably one of the best predictors of mortality from all causes, but that is a story for another day.) Statistically, high cholesterol is associated with cardiovascular disease. But association is not the same as cause. A large percentage of those who die from heart attacks do not have elevated cholesterol. In one trial of a cholesterol-lowering drug, those with very low cholesterol levels after treatment also seemed to have a higher death rate than patients with extremely high levels.

Cholesterol is not only food for the endocrine glands, but it can act as an antioxidant -- which means that if you have excess free radicals, cholesterol might offer some protection. (In this case, cholesterol can easily become oxidized, and oxidized cholesterol can be a much greater threat to your health. Keeping levels of other antioxidants high can help keep oxidized cholesterol in check. In other words, eat your fruits and vegetables!)

But cholesterol testing and treatment is now a major industry, with well-funded means to promote the theory of cholesterol-as-evil and treatment with cholesterol-lowering drugs as the "lifesaving solution". We must keep the drug profit machine rolling.

There may be a cholesterol drug scandal brewing akin to the Vioxx scandal. You see, it appears that cholesterol drugs may cause cancer. So far it has been conveniently been kept under the radar of the major media. It seems they missed a 1996 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association showing that all types of cholesterol-lowering drugs cause cancer in mice.

OK, causing cancer in mice may not be a big deal, but it should have raised a warning flag. Usually when testing carcinogenicity in mice, the animals are fed a dose hundreds or thousands of times an equivalent human dose. In the case of cholesterol drugs, mice get cancer from the equivalent of a normal human dose.

This still proves nothing, however, unless we have evidence that humans are also more susceptible to cancer when taking cholesterol lowering drugs for the long haul. Most studies tracking the mortality of those taking anti-cholesterol drugs last no longer than five years. But cancer often takes longer than five years to develop to a detectable stage. It might be unusual for most studies to detect increased cancer in the test group, even if the drugs are carcinogenic.

There are at least two longer term studies that show an increase of certain kinds of cancer in those taking cholesterol lowering drugs -- the drugs known as "statins," which happen to be the most popular anti-cholesterol drugs in the United States. Need I say they are also among the most profitable? (Greed is good. Amen.)

The bottom line question is this: We know that statin drugs are effective in lowering cholesterol levels, but do they actually reduce your risk of death? Overall, the answer seems to be no, except in very high risk patients (those with very high risk of death from coronary heart disease). For doctors to be prescribing these drugs to the average patient with high cholesterol is probably not helpful, and may be harmful, on balance. But don't take my word for it. I'm going to identify the articles in medical journals showing the dubious benefits of cholesterol-lowering drugs.

Obviously there is much more to be said, so stay tuned.

Have a cuppa tea: hope for the caffeine-sensitive

2004-12-10T21:46:00.000-08:00

Tea is good for you. Period. I mean, one billion Chinese can't be wrong, can they?

If you want to delve into the scientific details, go to the Life Extension Foundation website, and type "green tea" in the search window. Try this article for a start.

Green tea contains antioxidants that are 25 times more powerful, milligram for milligram, than vitamins C and E. In other words, it can combat the free radicals -- destructive molecules that cause tissue damage and aging -- that are created by toxins, stress, and illness. Cancer patients drinking large amounts of green tea have lower rates of recurrence.

Whoever invented the tea plant must have been a genius. He designed helpful chemical compounds into the tea leaf, and it even tastes good. Well, it tastes good until you decaffeinate it. That's a problem for those of us whose nervous systems don't tolerate stimulants.

The processes that remove caffeine also seem to remove flavor, and even worse, almost half of the antioxidants! I looked at the Lipton teas on the grocery shelf. Green tea has the highest level of antioxidants per cup. In second place is black tea. Decaffeinated green tea is much reduced in antioxidant level, and worst of all is decaffeinated black tea, with perhaps only about half as many antioxidants as caffeinated green tea.

Lately I've tried making a cup of (Lipton) decaffeinated black tea using two teabags at once. With two bags per cup, you can get nearly the same level of antioxidants as caffeinated green tea, and as a plus, it almost begins to taste like real tea. Steep no longer than 3 minutes or it will get bitter. Each teabag contains about 5mg of caffeine. Two bags in one cup will yield close to 10 mg of caffeine, about one-fifth the amount in a cup of ordinary caffeinated black tea. Also, black tea isn't chemically the same as green tea, but still has many health benefits.

This isn't a perfect solution. It is possible to take green tea supplements, but I'm loathe to take tea in a pill. Call it a personal prejudice.

I used to scorn Lipton tea. I thought it was the bottom of the barrel. Actually, it tastes quite good to me, but it absolutely must not be oversteeped. That must have been my problem -- oversteeping. Green tea gets astringent when oversteeped. Black tea gets bitter.

For green tea, I think 2 minutes steeping is probably too much. Lipton recommends 1½.

For black tea, maybe up to 2½ minutes, maximum. Decaffeinated black tea can go up to 3 minutes.

Another great tea is Celestial Seasonings' Victorian Earl Grey Decaffeinated. In fact, their decaffeinated Earl Grey tastes better to me than the caffeinated variety. Naturally, the company has decided to discontinue their Earl Grey decaffeinated tea. Thank you, Celestial Seasonings! The hunt is now on for an alternative. Choice brand makes an organic decaffeinated Earl Grey tea. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm hopeful.

My favorite tea drinking song is "Have a cuppa tea" by the Kinks, from their Muswell Hillbillies album. It's a cure for hepatitis, so they claim. This statement has not been reviewed by the FDA, however.

Rising Drug Costs: The Nexium Rip-Off Part II

2004-11-25T19:08:00.000-08:00

Last week I told the story of Nexium, the redundant but very expensive replacement for Prilosec. There isn't a lot more to tell about that drug, except that it encapsulates (a little pharmaceutical humor there) everything that's wrong with drug development and marketing in the United States health care system.

Any need for Nexium could be filled by the out-of-patent and much cheaper Prilosec. There are other drugs for acid reflux like H2 blockers, which are also inexpensive, out-of-patent, and effective. There is no excuse for doctors writing prescriptions for Nexium in large numbers. Nor should consumers take this kind of hit in the wallet for a new drug which is not really new and does not offer substantially better performance.

Why are we spending so much more on expensive drugs that aren't usually more effective for people than much cheaper generics? Because doctors prescribe them, and the insurance companies, government assistance programs, and individual patients who pay the bills don't protest often enough. It is hard to blame drug companies for trying to maximize their profits by selling the same thing at a higher price, if their customers are dumb enough to pay for it.

In a November 14 New York Times article, Eduardo Porter writes, "The Food and Drug Administration has classified only about 20 percent of the drugs developed over the last 10 years as qualitative breakthroughs. Even though they spend more on research, pharmaceutical companies are finding fewer new drugs. In a report this year, the F.D.A. said that the way drugs are developed 'is becoming increasingly challenging, inefficient and costly.'"

Translated, that means 80 percent of the new drugs coming on the market are not breakthroughs. They are marginally better, if at all. Some are probably a step backward, as the Vioxx fiasco illustrates.

What is the solution to excessive drug cost? Mainly, the government, insurance companies, and individual patients have to get very hard-nosed about what is being prescribed. When a patient has a condition that can be treated with drugs, generally the generics should be tried first, gradually working up to the more expensive patented medicines if necessary.

Of course, it wouldn't hurt if people focused more on disease prevention so they wouldn't need so many drugs. That is the other part of the crisis in drug costs. More people are taking more drugs than ever before. Even without inflation in drug prices, our costs would be rising simply due to increased use.

With the aging of the population, drug use will be on the rise. Guaranteed. And costs will continue to go up until society sensibly starts putting its collective foot down, throwing their pills out the window, and screaming, "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take these blanking pills any more."

Defying death, I continue to ingest vitamin E

2004-11-18T10:07:00.000-08:00

This morning, as I have done for years, I took a 400IU capsule of vitamin E. This is in addition to the 400IU contained in my full dose of daily multivitamin-mineral tablets. My total daily consumption then, is 800 IU. Both of these, by the way, are natural-source vitamin E, not synthetic.

"The results of at least five large observational studies suggest that increased vitamin E consumption is associated with decreased risk of [heart attack] or death from heart disease in both men and women." So states the Linus Pauling institute. Since heart disease is a major killer in the United States, well... you can do the math. Read what vitamin E can and can't do for you here.

Additional information on the study showing increased risk of death in users of vitamin E supplements: The recent meta-study mentioned in yesterday's entry "reported that adults who took supplements of 400 IU/day or more were 6% more likely to die from any cause than those who did not take vitamin E supplements. However, further breakdown of the risk by vitamin E dose and adjustment for other vitamin and mineral supplements revealed that the increased risk of death was statistically significant only at a dose of 2,000 IU/day..." (Linus Pauling Institute, at the link above.)

Vitamin E almost certainly works best in partnership with a wide spectrum of other vitamins and minerals. And the best way to ensure you're getting those is to eat many many servings of fruits and vegetables, organically grown if you can get them, and as fresh as possible. In addition, a good multivitamin-mineral supplement will provide not only vitamin E, but the vitamin and mineral partners each nutrient needs to work efficiently.

Will Vitamin E be the death of you?

2004-11-17T03:27:00.000-08:00

A recent "meta-study" which pooled the results of many other vitamin E studies claims that people taking the highest doses of vitamin E had a 10% greater risk of death. Before we go soft at the knees and throw out our vitamin E supplements and multivitamins, let's review some other studies about vitamin E.

Pearson & Shaw's classic book Life Extension reports several facts:

Fruit flies' average life span was extended by 8-15% by feeding a diet containing 0.25% vitamin E.

Vitamin E is able to reduce the rate of spontaneous deaths from cancer in Irish Wolfhounds from virtually 100% to zero.

Animals given injections of cancer cells live longer when given large vitamin E doses.

The authors write, "Large doses of vitamin E have been shown to increase resistance to cancer, bacterial and viral infections, stroke, arthritis, heart attack, and even smog."

When there are hundreds of studies showing benefits of vitamin E supplementation, and one study showing harm, perhaps it would be prudent for news media to report that fact for the sake of context when reporting the results of this new meta-study. Why should you have to learn that from a blog? Apparently, since reporters won't do their jobs, bloggers have to.

Obesity linked to leukemia risk

2004-11-11T16:30:00.000-08:00

News flash today: The risk for acute myelogenous leukemia (AML) more than doubles in the obese elderly. The prognosis for this cancer is relatively poor. Another reason to get eating under control and keep it under control.

My best friend and his wife have had excellent weight loss and maintenance results with a low-carb diet, suppressing appetite by taking essential fatty acid capsules before a meal. They also supplement with a muliple vitamin-mineral tablet and take an herbal brew based on the anti-cancer Essiac formula, called Guardian Spirit Tea made by Frontier Herbs.

Circling sharks: the Nexium rip-off, Part I

2004-11-11T04:45:00.000-08:00

Normally I don't expect to find health information in the New Yorker magazine, but in October Malcolm Gladwell wrote about High Prices of medicines in the column 'A Critic at Large'.

Once upon a time, there was heartburn. People tried antacids to neutralize the acid, then drugs to block the production of stomach acid. Finally, in a land named the AstroZenica corporation, they created a molecule they named Prilosec. They made $26 billion from Prilosec in one five-year period. And among the people of Prilosec, there was much rejoicing, that they had been able to extract so much money from so many heartburn-suffering people. But all was not well in AstraZenicaland. The evil patent-expiration monster threatened to take away all their income in 2001, when their exclusive right to profit from the design of this molecule would be null and void.

In 2001, profits from Prilosec would begin to drop off, and the profit chart would look like the trailing edge of a shark fin. So the lawyers, scientists, and marketing men got together to form a strategy to continue making huge profits, called the Shark Fin Project. And how lucky they were. As it turns out, Prilosec is a two-handed molecule. It comes in two forms, each of which is a mirror image of the other. If you take away one of the hands, the new truncated Prilosec becomes elegible for a new patent! And visions of dollar signs danced in their heads.

And so they did. They cut the molecule in half. They applied for a new patent. They gave the drug a new name. They did a study showing that for one particular condition that occurs in people with excess acid, where the stomach juices gurgle up from below and burn the esophagus, the new amputated Prilosec, called Nexium, worked 3% better than Prilosec. That this difference is insignificant in practical terms did not deter the advertising men and the drug promotion arm of AstraZenica. They put $500 million in their pockets and went out to sell this "new" drug, which was the same molecule as the old drug reduced by half, to doctors and patients for $120 per month's supply.

And so AstraZenica lived happily, if not ever after, at least for the mean time.

This little parable encapsulates much that is wrong with the drug industry -- selling the same old thing with a new name and a new patent, a little modification perhaps, touted as better but really not much better if at all. Since it is a new drug, it will have a high price, to pay for "research and development."

But in a rational world, very few people would buy this drug, because very few would find it more effective than the alternative, the good old Prilosec, which can now be purchased without a prescription at a cost of $20 per month. We obviously do not live in a rational world, and the fault lies not in the AstraZenicas, but ourselves. More about that next time...

Everything you know is wrong

2004-11-09T06:12:00.000-08:00

Deception is everywhere in conventional medicine and in alternative medicine. It's a minefield out there.

My focus here will be life extension and treatment of disease in the true Hippocratic mode ("I will apply dietetic measures for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice."). This approach will involve discussion of diet, nutritional supplements, and non-toxic alternative therapies more than it does the use of controlled doses of refined toxins (pharmaceutical drugs). By so doing, I hope to keep us from "harm and injustice". Since physicians have generally failed in this oath, someone has to take up the slack. It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it.

I am more interested in finding techniques that work than I am in understanding how they work. Understanding is a fine thing, but honestly, we don't understand how gravity works, and we may not understand for some time to come. (Warps in space-time? gravitons? I don't know. Neither does anyone, except God.) This lack of knowledge does not hamper the useful application of gravity. (Some scientists have even demonstrated an antigravity effect, with the use of spinning discs of certain materials. No one knows why that works, either.)

I'm looking forward to searching health news to bring readers tips to help them look better, feel better, slow the aging process, suffer fewer illnesses, and cope better with illnesses already extant. Plus, I have a few opinions of my own to throw in from time to time. Only a few. Haha.

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