Health Archives

Apr

2013

Caution, Processed Food Ahead

By Ray Schilling | Alzheimer’s disease, Anti-aging medicine, Cancer, Diabetes, Health, Heart Disease, High Blood Pressure, Medical Condition, Nutrition, Obesity, Prevention, Stroke

Introduction

The title of this review is: caution, processed food ahead. During the last month there have been three large studies that drew media attention regarding healthy food intake. The first study dealt with processed meats (sausages, ham, bacon). Over 12.7 years those consuming 160 Gm per day (=5.64 oz.) were 44% more likely to die prematurely than those who ate only 20 Gm (=0.7 oz.) of processed meat per day. The study included 10 European countries including about 500,000 people over almost 13 years; nearly 10,000 people died from cancer and 5,500 from heart problems.

Harvard study

Then there was the Harvard study that analyzed 114 national dietary surveys around the globe and came to the conclusion that every year there are 180,000 obesity related deaths from overuse of sugary drinks. The US stands third highest on the ranking list regarding deaths from drinking sugary soda pops. The deaths are due to heart attacks, strokes and diabetes, which associate with obesity.

15% of all death around the world from salt overuse

As if this was not enough the third bad news story came shortly after story about salt overuse: At a cardiology conference in New Orleans Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, the main author regarding the sugar study mentioned above, revealed a long-term study regarding salt intake between 1990 and 2010 . He determined that 15% of all deaths that occur around the world every year (which translated into 2.3 million people) are the result of salt overuse. The recommended salt limit is 1500 mg per day. But many people in the study consumed 4000 to 6000 mg of salt per day or more. This led to hypertension, heart attacks and strokes with the yearly mortality rates indicated.

Caution, Processed Food Ahead

What do these studies have in common and why is processed food so devastating?

All these studies pointed out that processed foods are dangerous to your health. Sausages, ham and bacon contain a lot of fat and salt; they are full of extra calories and they elevate your fatty substances in your blood (triglycerides, cholesterol). The extra salt raises your blood pressure. Processed meat is also poor in omega-3-fatty acids. No wonder that they can cause heart problems and cancer.

Sugar and processed food

Next, we have the sugary soda drinks, but also the hidden sugar in starchy processed foods like cookies, bagels, bread and cakes. Dough and pasta digests within 30 minutes into sugar, which your gut absorbs and your liver processes as extra calories to be stored as fat. Where? As visceral fat and subcutaneous fat, and the end result is obesity. At the same time the sugar from soft drinks and the sugar from starches stimulate the pancreas to produce extra insulin, which leads to hyperinsulinemia and insulin resistance. This is known as metabolic syndrome and was found to be an independent risk factor for heart attacks apart from high LDL cholesterol and high triglycerides. We know for quite some time that obesity, diabetes, insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome are all associated with a higher rate of deaths from heart attacks and strokes.

Salt overuse

Finally, there is the salt overuse story. In 2009 the same Harvard group that gave us the world data on salt mortality now, stated that 102,000 Americans die every year from salt overconsumption. The same study cited that 82,000 Americans die needlessly every year due to their love affair with deep fried foods (due to high trans fatty acids) , and 84,000 die from a lack of omega-3-fatty acids in their diet, which when present in the diet protects from heart attacks and strokes.

Food processing

What does food processing do? It reduces or eliminates dietary omega-3-fatty acids, adds cheap oils containing omega-6-fatty acids (the fatty acids that lead to inflammation), adds salt, sugar and starch. It is the perfect recipe to die from strokes and heart attacks. The same research group from Harvard University did a study in India, published in 2010, where they established that salt over consumption caused insulin resistance and this was the cause of higher mortality from heart attacks and strokes.

Other studies pointing to the dangers of processed food

Deficits in cognitive function (dementia or Alzheimer’s disease) are associated to dietary habits, particularly sugar and starch overconsumption. Research has established that hyperinsulinemia or insulin resistance is responsible for the degenerative changes in the brain of Alzheimer patients. This study also pointed out that these diets are typically very low or deficient in omega-3-fatty acids, which is necessary for normal nerve cell metabolism in the brain. The lack of it leads to brain cell disease like Alzheimer’s and a lack of omega-3 fatty acids in nerves leads to damaged nerves which in turn cause excruciating pain.This condition is also known as neuropathy.

Gout was around in the Middle Ages

In the Middle Ages it was first observed that overindulging in red meat and sausages caused gout attacks. A nickname for gout was “a disease of the rich”. Higher uric acid levels, which are found in gout have been linked to higher mortality rates from heart attacks and stokes. A low purine diet can lower the risk for gout and also the risk for heart attacks and strokes. It is interesting that this type of a diet is also devoid of processed food at the same time.

What can we do to reduce dangers to our health?

We have identified the suspects; it is sugar, starchy foods, salt and processed meats. Instead of just buying precooked meals, boxed foods and other processed foods from the center of the grocery store or from a fast food place, look for original ingredients more at the periphery of the grocery store. Read food labels and look for sugar, fat and salt content. Start buying organic food and buy the ingredients you need to prepare a meal by yourself. When you start preparing your own meals with organic ingredients, you may as well avoid the toxins that I described in a recent blog.

Buy organic foods

By buying organic foods, you largely avoid these toxins. Don’t exceed your daily limit of 1500 mg of salt, as your kidneys are not able to process this and would cause you to get high blood pressure. Personally, I cut out all sugar and starch from my diet since 2001. This includes potatoes, pasta, bread, bagels, French fries, toast etc. However, you will get enough complex carbohydrates (from vegetables and greens). The body absorbs them much slower and does not cause the insulin surge by the pancreas. In contrast, highly processed carbs lead to an insulin surge.

Omega-3 fatty acids important for health

You want to eat foods rich in omega-3-fatty acids, but seafood (even salmon) has a contamination with mercury. You can circumvent this by taking 3 or 4 capsules of high potency, molecularly distilled omega-3 per day. This is free of toxins and protects your brain and nerves from the dangers mentioned above. Your organic vegetables/greens have enough natural minerals that you will seldomly want to add salt to your food. Do not add extra salt when you cook or when you eat your prepared meals. Use spices instead. Also avoid eating out too often. Restaurants are notorious for overusing salt.

More information

More information on nutrition: http://nethealthbook.com/health-nutrition-and-fitness/nutrition/

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Apr

2013

My Experience With Cancer Research

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, Health, Nutrition, Prevention, Vitamins and supplements

This article is about my experience with cancer research. April is cancer awareness and fundraising month. I thought it would be interesting to analyze what’s going on behind the scenes of cancer research. I was a cancer researcher for over 3 years at the Ontario Cancer Institute (OCI) from 1972 to 1975 and I will share some insider experiences here.

1. Publish or perish

Our supervisors said: “publish or perish”. In other words all the experiments we did needed to fit into the larger picture the group was working on. And the results should be different, interesting and most of all publishable. There had to be significant differences between experimental groups and controls. This was a requirement by publishers of medical journals would accept them for publication. There were often two or three manuscript revisions where the content was “massaged”. I had to pay attention to proper wording and comparing or opposing the results with other publications. This way the publisher deemed the manuscript “publishable”.

2. Fund raising awareness

One of the major fund sources for cancer research in Canada was the MRC (Medical Research Council of Canada), which has been replaced by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) in 2000. Without money there is no cancer research, so everybody was aware of the policies and expectations of the fund source.

3. Mouse model versus human tissue based research

My work was in the immunology section of the biophysics department, where researchers perform basic medical research at the OCI. In this department much research had already been performed separating cell populations in a mouse model to determine what cell types were needed to initiate an immune response. The B cells in mammals are antibody-producing cells of the immune system that protect from viruses. T cells are lymphocytes, which the body processed in the thymus. They turn into killer cells, which can attack parasites and also cancer cells. I was working in this area.

Cell separation experiments and doubts about mouse research

We did cell separation experiments. With this method I was able to separate cells according to cell size and collect them in vials. Subsequently I did remix experiments. The purpose was to find out which cell types were able to mount an immune response. My supervisor suggested the use of a mouse tumor cell line as targets. I started questioning whether a mouse model would be the appropriate model to study human cancer biology. But my superiors were not in agreement. The “holy grail” was that to work in a mouse model (mouse mammalian cells). The assumption that this should also work in the human situation (human mammalian cells).

My Experience With Cancer Research

4. Non-medical researchers in cancer research

This is a thorny issue, but a reality. My immediate supervisor in cancer research had a PHD in physics. His physics degree was perfect for sorting out density issues for cell separation experiments. The co-chair of the immunology department had a PHD in biology. His qualification was good for conducting mouse experiments. Both of them felt somewhat insecure when I asked questions. I wanted to know how relevant mouse experiments were for the examination of human cancer conditions. As I needed to publish my experiments, I had to quiet down and concentrate on the mouse model the team was working on. For a while this could even be exciting as we were studying the cell interaction between macrophages and T cells to mount a cell-mediated immune response.

5. Regulation of the cancer research industry

After playing with cell cultures for 2 ½ years it was time for me to reach out to get a job in the cancer research field or else go back to medicine. In1975 there was no equal opportunity legislation in place that would have protected me as a landed immigrant from discrimination. The reality in 1975 was that only Canadian born physicians who attended a Medical School in Canada could become a director of a cancer research facility in Canada. The rules for me (I had left Germany right after my rotating internship) were that I had to go through further medical training and pass the Canadian licensing exam (LMCC), which I did eventually at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario.

Interview with Dr. McCulloch

One final attempt to shed light on my options was an interview with the “big boss” at the Ontario Cancer Institute at the time, a physician cancer researcher, Dr. Ernest A. McCulloch, for whom I had great respect. He was a sharp thinker and had vision, and he was a fellow physician. I asked him what he would do on the long-term, if he was in my place. He said that in the long-term with my medical background it would be a lot more satisfying for me to get back into medicine and practice medicine. However, he wanted me to go on for another 1 or 2 years and publish more papers together with my supervisors.

My decision to leave cancer research

I decided for myself right there that I would leave cancer research and I prepared quietly for my exit. Within a short time I got a position to work as an intern at a hospital at McMaster University and in the spring of 1978 I passed the LMCC (licensing) exam. As a fully licensed physician in Canada, I was no longer interested in “slave work” in cancer research. I also left the cold winters of Ontario behind and went to the west, to British Columbia.

6. Future vision of medical cancer research

Research has come a long way. Recently I came across a new breast cancer protocol, which is non-toxic, without chemotherapy and without radiation. It is so unconventional that the US research team, aware of the politics in the US, decided to do the initial trials in the Caribbean. I wrote a blog about this new breast cancer treatment protocol, which I believe will become the future standard for breast cancer therapy and perhaps even for other cancers.

Alternative breast cancer treatment

In Germany and Switzerland an alternative breast cancer treatment consists of with mistletoe extracts. This is a non-toxic plant chemotherapy, which slows down tumor growth. It has a dual action, namely a chemotherapeutic effect, but at the same time an immune system stimulating effect. Here is a study going back to 2001, which is still relevant. There was a 40% long-term survival benefit in the Iscador group when compared to a control group without treatment. Normally, oncologists jump at such an excellent chemotherapeutic agent as they even consider chemotherapeutic agents that with a 25% beneficial survival effect a good treatment option. However, as the medication is a simple mistletoe extract and cannot be patented, Big Pharma is not interested in marketing this. As a result cancer treatment protocols in Europe are significantly different from those in North America.

The future of cancer treatments

In the future I would expect that non-toxic treatment methods for any type of cancer will be more successful than any chemotherapeutic or radiation treatment approaches as both interfere with the immune function, which is what will kill the patient at the end. Cancer is a disease where the immune system fails. So, cancer patients need teaching how to stimulate their immune system. This is the only thing that controls cancer on the long-term.

You will hear more about epigenetic switches as often a cancer producing substance will turn off a gene (epigenetic switch) and this causes cancer. Remove what throws that switch into the off position or introduce a healing agent that resets the switch and the cancer will get eliminated.

7. Prevention of cancer

Researchers noticed that herbs, spices, vitamins and minerals contain the most powerful cancer preventatives. Did you know that curcumin, derived from the Indian spice turmeric, prevents a number of cancers? Similarly, vitamin D3 at high enough doses (4000 to 5000 IU per day) has been shown to prevent cancers. Linus Pauling showed long time ago that vitamin C at high enough dose would be an antioxidant and would stimulate the immune system and thereby be a cancer preventative. It works together with a detoxifying antioxidant, glutathione in the liver to neutralize any free radicals, which are aggressive chemicals that cause cancer.

Learning from risk factors for cancer

There are many other vitamins and minerals that I have explained elsewhere, which are needed together with organic food to give you the building blocks for a stable cell metabolism. This in turn will strengthen the immune system to defend you from toxins of the environment. A simple step like a daily exercise routine can cut your cancer risk down to 50% compared to those who elect to not exercise. Did I mention the importance of quitting smoking and cutting out alcohol? The “quit smoking” part has been known for some time.

Alcohol is a cell poison and can cause cancer

At the Anti-Aging conference in Las Vegas in December 2011 I learnt about the importance of alcohol exposure that causes cancer. Even smaller doses of alcoholic beverages over a long period of time can cause cancer. First I thought it would be a big deal to quit alcohol entirely. But since I have quit the modest few drinks per month, I actually have not missed them at all! I strongly believe in cancer prevention, so quitting alcohol completely was only one small step in this overall objective. In view of the recent statement by the WHO that 70% of all deaths are caused by smoking and drinking of alcoholic beverages, it behooves us to change our lifestyles, if we are at all interested in a healthy long life.

Conclusion

Nothing has changed in cancer research circles since the time when I was part of it. Basic cancer research involving animal experiments is necessary. But in my opinion cancer research should be more human-centered using human cell lines in culture and using clinical trials. Ultimately cancer research needs to invent and develop new non-toxic cancer therapies to cure cancer patients.

More on cancer in general and on specific cancers: http://nethealthbook.com/cancer-overview/

Last edited Nov. 6, 2014

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Mar

2013

Living In A Toxic World

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, Health, Heart Disease, Hormones, Nutrition, Prevention, Vitamins and supplements

The following article is about living in a toxic world. In the past nobody worried about toxicities except parents when their children were gnawing on lead paint. Paint always contained lead and people thought that it was only children we had to worry about. We thought that adults were “immune” to this. We learnt a lot about lead toxicity from early studies in Germany and it was there that EDTA was developed in 1935 to treat children with lead toxicity. During the Second World War when ships were painted with lead containing paints many soldiers were poisoned with lead. EDTA treatment protocols that had been developed earlier for children were found to be also effective for these soldiers.

Lead poisoning from Chinese made toys and mercury poisoning from the air

Fast forward to 2013. We all have heard of lead poisoning from Chinese made toys, from Chinese fashion jewelry and we have heard of the melamine poisoning of baby food and candies. These are not the only poisonings. Mercury is in the air; it is also present in light bulbs and in cruise ship exhaust fumes from incineration of light bulbs and batteries. We have over 600 chemicals and carcinogens in cigarette smoke, which is perhaps the largest “legal” roulette game involving humans where several poisons are inhaled at once. Our water is chlorinated or fluoridated, which interferes with our thyroid gland function. Vegetables that are supposed to be healthy for us contain residues from insecticides and herbicides that have estrogen-like activities called xenoestrogens.

Xenoestrogens can cause breast cancer

They are known to cause breast cancer in women and prostate cancer in men. Milk in the US often contains antibiotics and genetically modified bovine growth hormone (rBGH), which again can cause various cancers in humans as this link shows. rBGH is banned in Europe and in Canada. The problems do not stop at chemicals in our water, environment, food and air, the newest threat is genetically modified food like wheat, corn and high fructose corn syrup, which is manufactured from GMO corn. Other GMO foods are golden rice, sugar beet, yellow crookneck squash, cotton for cottonseed oil, soybeans, canola, Hawaiian papaya, just to name a few. GM food is illegal in most European countries, but the US is trying very hard to push for “fair trade practices” in order to expand the market for GM foods.

Living In A Toxic World

GMO and endometriosis

How does all of this affect your body? One of the publications from France found that genetically modified food is likely responsible for the increase of endometriosis in women. This link explains that xenobiotics-associated genetically modified foods contain glyphosate (a herbicide) and Cry1Ab protein that affects the women’s hormone metabolism and causes the lining of the uterus to become invasive to cause endometriosis. There have been attempts to study toxicity of GM foods in animal experiments, but the pitfall was a wrong testing time of only 90 days , which was chosen for these experiments, and “no differences” were found between test and control animals (all the official statements about GMO food “safety” in the US are based on these “standard tests”).

The effects of GMO food

However, there are other studies that found significant differences after only 4 weeks of feeding rats and mice 10% GMO food mixed with regular feed as this link shows. The full impact of genetically modified foods is not evident until 3 generations or more in animal experiments, which is the equivalent of 90 years or more in humans. This is 80 years from now because significant amounts of GM food were in the food chain from the food industry for about 10 years. The definition of one human generation generally is 30 years. The animal studies show that with GMO food there is a higher mortality in rats and mice and that infertility is getting worse from generation to generation.

Toxic effects of heavy metals

With respect to chemicals patients detect toxic effects on the body a lot faster than with GMO foods. The toxins such as carcinogens and xenoestrogens are often fat-soluble, which means that obese people have more toxins stored than lean people. Mercury, cadmium and lead were found in a study to have caused specific protein folding problems within the cells. This explains bone marrow toxicity, liver and kidney toxicity and brain and heart toxicity. In other words, these are the organs where cells contain most of the mitochondria in the body and heavy metals are blocking their energy metabolism leading to aberrant body functions. As a result auto-immune diseases have increased dramatically, inflammatory conditions are common, and cancer rates are up.

How do we defend ourselves in a toxic world?

1. Food preparation living in a toxic world

First you need to switch from regular foods to organic foods. Also throw out all the foods in your fridge that are not organic and that contain MSG in it’s many disguises. MSG is an excitotoxin, which kills brain cells. These suggestions are also what Dr. Paula Baillie-Hamilton is recommending. Organic foods do not contain any of the problematic GM foods. They are also free of rBGH, xenoestrogens, residual herbicides or residual insecticides. Switch to either organic milk and milk products or goat milk and goat milk products. As some toxins will be released from the fatty tissue, if you are obese or overweight and you loose weight, it is advisable to use psyllium seed husks as a supplement to bind the toxins in the gut for elimination. Fiber from organic fruit and vegetables or oat bran are also beneficial.

Buy organic, avoid restaurants

On the long term it is less money to buy organic foods and prepare your own meals than going out to restaurants to eat. It is also much healthier and tasty. Avoid fast food chains as their processed foods contain artery clogging trans fats, GM foods and other questionable ingredients like “pink slime”. You do not need a cooking class to prepare a decent dinner. Read cookbooks for inspiration and modify the recipes to suit your own style. Remember to use only organic ingredients. You can’t create a healthy meal with non-organic ingredients mixed in (it’s like you start adding poisons). Break the old habits, do it right! Replace butter with olive oil. Replace sugar with organic stevia (a plant sweetener).

Avoid wheat flour

Avoid flour (especially wheat flour). Replace it, if you must with flour from oats, spelt or farro (at this point none of them have undergone genetic changes). Because wheat has been chemically modified in the 1960’s and 1970’s and gliadin is about 7-fold higher, brain receptors react differently than to the “old” wheat. As a result many individuals find that they want more- bread, pasta, wheat cereal, bagels…you name it! The huge surge in obesity is just the final result. Cutting out wheat and otherwise reducing the intake of grains may be a big step, but is well worth the effort! Another problem with bakery products is that the food industry is using bromine for rising and chlorine for bleaching so this adds to the toxic burden of the thyroid gland. Cut out wheat, pasta and bread and you will gain health.

2. Detoxification living in a toxic world

If you had a lot of exposure to heavy metals in the past, you may want to see a naturopath for intravenous chelation treatments with vitamin C (10 Grams) and glutathione (1250 mg) every two weeks for some time until they are out of your system. If you have a lot of silver/mercury amalgam tooth fillings, let your dentist remove them. Ask your dentist to replace them with non-amalgam ceramic, gold inlets or crowns. Don’t use fluoride toothpaste despite your dentist’s recommendation: it is toxic as it poisons enzyme systems in your body and causes cancer of the intestines over a longer period of time. Use a fluoride-free toothpaste from the health food store. After dental cleanings refuse the fluoride gel for the same reason. Brush your teeth frequently and floss your teeth regularly after meals. Your heart and cardiovascular system will thank you for this.

3. Eliminate other toxins from your personal care products

Check your cosmetics, shampoos, hair conditioners as well as your underarm deodorants, body wash, lip balm and sun tan lotion. Do they have parabens, triclosan (often in deodorants) or phthalates in them? They are weak carcinogens or immune disruptors. If they do, replace them with a healthier product from the health food store that does not contain these harmful ingredients. Use BPA free plastic containers for water during sport activities, they are quite affordable and can be ordered online. BPA free food containers are also available in super markets, department stores and some drug stores.

4. Clean up your home environment

Avoid toxic cleaning agents, solvents, paints, and other chemicals. If you have to deal with chemicals, be sure to ventilate your living spaces. Use latex paint instead of oil-based paint, if possible and air out well until dry. Always use vinyl gloves to protect your skin. The body absorbs thinners or paints through the skin within a few minutes and are toxic to your system. If there is construction in your house or you move into a new home, air out frequently by opening the windows on and off until the “new” chemical odors disappear. New clothes contain chemical agents from the factory; wash them frequently until the chemicals disappear. Avoid fabric softeners as they are chemicals (or use a biological product, if you feel you must use one).

5. Pay attention to your water living in a toxic world

The water utility company treats drinking water with chemicals (fluorine, chlorine or bromine) to make it bacteria free. It is best to drink only reverse osmosis water, bottled water, distilled water or mineral water. Home owners are doing well to remove for the rest of the household fluoride, chlorine or bromine from the tap water. with A good carbon filter can do that for you. Talk to your water treatment company.

6. Hormone balance living in a toxic world

The aging process and the toxins in our environment affect our hormone glands and we produce less hormones as we get older than our ancestors did, but our ancestors overall did not live as long as we are today. A lot of this is due to exposure to immune disruptors like BPA’s from the older water bottles and long-term exposure to xenoestrogens (from residues of artificial fertilizers on non-organic vegetables).

You need balanced hormones

We need balanced hormones; it is important to have them checked by a knowledgeable doctor. Either an A4M anti-aging physician, a naturopath or a functional medicine physician can help you. Replace missing hormones only by bio-identical hormone creams, not by synthetic factory produced pseudo-hormones. Common problems as we age are hypothyroidism, sex hormone deficiencies both in women and men, but also human growth hormone deficiencies in some (measured by IGF-1 blood levels). Without proper hormone balance all the organic food in the world will not be the answer to good health.

7. Vitamin and mineral supplements living in a toxic world

Finally, vitamin and mineral supplements are important to support the mitochondria in your cells. Although no vitamin and mineral list is ever complete, I have summarized what I consider to be essential here. Start simple with only vitamin C, omega-3 fatty acids, vitamin D3 and a multiple vitamin and mineral supplement. You can always add more later.

The only other thought is to take a slow-release capsule of iodine twice per day. This would protect you from radioactive iodine in the environment or food. Compounding pharmacies may be your best source. One capsule generally contains 5 mg of elemental iodine and 7.5 mg of iodide. As time goes on you may want to gradually investigate the other supplements. See whether they would be suitable in your particular case.

How to age gracefully

We all would like to enjoy a long and happy, disease-free life. This goal is no longer achievable by sticking to the old eating habits. Needless to say, that smoking and drinking are out too, because they are toxic to your system. You may as well enjoy organic foods and gradually work yourself through the 7 points I mentioned above. This will ensure that the mitochondria of all your major organ systems will function at their best. As a result, you will feel energized and age gracefully!

More information on vitamins, minerals, supplements and detoxification:

http://nethealthbook.com/health-nutrition-and-fitness/nutrition/vitamins-minerals-supplements/

Mar

2013

March Is Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month, So Let’s Discuss Prevention

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, Gastrointestinal Disease, Health, Men's Health, Prevention, Women’s Diseases

Introduction

March is colorectal cancer awareness month, so let’s discuss prevention. Only 40 years ago cancer of the cervix was one of the major killers for women, but with the introduction of the Pap test this has all changed. For those women who get that screening done, there is no need for fear. The mortality rate from cervical cancer since the 1970’s has steadily decreased as shown in this link.

As far as cancer of the prostate is concerned, a lot of progress with regard to early detection has been made due to the introduction of the PSA blood test, which is used as a method of screening. As a result men are diagnosed earlier with prostate cancer resulting in more cures as the cancer found is at an earlier stage. Here is a link depicting the effect of the PSA test on mortality rates from prostate cancer in time.

March is colorectal cancer awareness month, so let’s discuss prevention

March is colorectal cancer awareness month as this article explains. The key is early detection and treatment as with any type of cancer. Specifically, with rectal and colon cancer there are mostly no symptoms, as blood in stool or any other symptoms occur only late into the disease. What we do know, however, is that there is a long latent phase where precancerous mucous membrane changes lead to polyps and these will degenerate in time into cancer of the colon or rectum.

Not everyone has the same risk of developing colon cancer or rectal cancer. There are people with a higher rate of colorectal cancer, as they carry a susceptibility gene in their families. A healthy lifestyle can also reduce the risk of colorectal cancer.

March Is Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month, So Let’s Discuss Prevention

Polyps are the precancerous precursors for colorectal cancer

It is now widely accepted that polyps are the precancerous precursors for colorectal cancer and colonoscopies done on everybody starting at age 50 (those with family risk factors much earlier) have already been shown to have decreased the frequency of the disease as the data from the CDC show. The problem is that the survival curves for colorectal cancer have only a swallow incline. A steeper decline would mean better survival of colorectal cancer patients. In the case of the mortality rates of cervical cancer and prostate cancer the slope showed a more rapid decline translating int much better survival rates.

Not enough colonoscopies are done

The incidence of colon cancer should have gone down to almost the zero point. All that has been achieved so far is a reduction of a portion of cases (those who went for colonoscopies early enough before it turned into colon cancer); this is by far not an elimination of colorectal cancer. The reason for this is the fact that in many cases people have colonoscopies too late when the polyp has already turned cancerous, or invasive colon or rectal cancer is already present at the time of the first colonoscopy.

Designating March as colorectal awareness month makes a lot of sense to me

I happen to come from a family where my mother died in 1980 from colon cancer at the age of 59. Because of this my doctor told me that I have a risk of about 3-fold higher than the population at large to also develop colon cancer. I have had colonoscopies since the age of 40 every 3 years. Ironically a few days ago right during the colorectal awareness month, I was getting my 9^th colonoscopy. On three occasions polyps were removed, which tells me that the cancer-screening program works!

Why screen for colon cancer in regular intervals?

So why is it important to screen in regular intervals? One reason is that we are now exposed to more toxic chemicals in our environment and food than 100 years ago. So all cancers, but especially colorectal cancer rates have increased. We know the pathophysiology, which is the science that studies how an illness develops. We know that it takes several years between the occurrence of the first precancerous cells that form in the lining of the gut (called “mucosa”) and the formation of polyps. It takes another few years before polyps turn cancerous. This means that there is enough of a time interval to do screening. If we are not aware of this and ignore it (as unfortunately many people do), the process will run down the conveyor belt on an automatic program, which ends up in end stage colorectal cancer. The stages of colon cancer are depicted in this link.

Invasive colon cancer is deadly

As the table of my chapter on colon cancer staging shows, the invasive end stage colon cancer (stage IV or Duke D) has a 5-year survival rate of only 6%. Even when the cancer is limited to stage II (also called Duke stage B) there would be a 5-year survival of only 80% (see table in link).

What does screening really achieve? On an individual basis the gastroenterologist who does the colonoscopy can screen the whole colon for premalignant polyps and remove them during the procedure. This moves the potential cancer staging backwards to beyond any detectable cancer, as all of the potential early cancer cells would have been inside the polyp (called local “in situ” disease) and were removed by cauterizing the stalk (see above link). There is another potential factor that can help to reduce colorectal cancer incidence: Recently a connection was made between

Helicobacter pylori as a risk factor for colorectal cancer

Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection of the stomach and polyps in the colon as well as colon cancer. In the past several smaller studies failed to show this correlation. It took 156,269 patients in this study to show that there was a correlation. As H. pylori is being tested for and treated more and more, this will also have a positive effect on lowering the frequency of colorectal cancer.

Mass colonoscopy screening

On a population basis with mass colonoscopy screening the incidence of colorectal cancer is reduced. The reduction of colon cancer would be much faster. Eventually it would turn into a disease similar to cancer of the cervix. Here it still matters whether you screen or not, but very few people have to suffer from it. Here is an image from a paper (look for Fig. 2, halfway down the page). It shows that survival benefits (longer lives) are registered only after 10 years or more following colonoscopy.

Colorectal cancer statistics

Every polyp that is removed will add up to the colon and rectum health of the nation at large. This shows statistically, when you sum up all of the colonoscopies done around the country year after year. We need a nationwide and worldwide awareness that colorectal cancer screening is something worthwhile doing. This cancer is the third most frequent cancer in many parts of the world.

I am grateful that colonoscopy screening works, as I had polyps removed three times over a 29 year span and I did not have to go through all the surgical procedures that my mother had to endure. Had I lived 50 years earlier I may not have lived long enough to tell you how important colonoscopy screening is.

Here are the recommendations

1. 1. Let us assume there is no risk of colorectal cancer in your family. In this case screen once at the age of 50. This makes sure you are not one of the spontaneous colorectal polyp producers. If OK, screen every 10 years provided the colonoscopy is always negative.
  2. A family history of direct bloodline relative increases the risk for colorectal cancer. Direct bloodline relatives are: mother, father, brother or sister. If one of them had cancer of the colon or rectum, you have a higher cancer risk. In these individuals a gastroenterologist must do colonoscopies every 3 years.

Missed polyps during a colonoscopy

1. 1. There may be up to 15% of missed polyps during a colonoscopy. But with the next colonoscopy there is a high likelihood that the physician catches the abnormal polyp in time. The pathologist confirms that the subsequent screening caught them before they turn cancerous.
  2. There are special cases, families with genetic syndromes like the familial polyposis of the colon. In these families a gastroenterologist needs to screen children/young adults for polyps when they are still young. This is from the age of 20 to 25 years onwards.

Don’t complain, if you belong to category 1 or 2 as it could be much worse (category 3). Cancer is serious business. Remember, March is colorectal cancer awareness month.

More information about colon cancer.

Mar

2013

Coffee, Tea, Vitamin C And E Prevent Stroke And Dementia

By Ray Schilling | Health, Prevention, Stroke, Vitamins and supplements

Introduction

It is important to realize that several studies showed that coffee, tea, vitamin C and E prevent stroke and dementia. Elizabeth E. Devore, ScD, now with Brigham and Women’s and Harvard Medical School, did a long-term study involving 5,395 people aged 55 and older who were part of the long-term Rotterdam Study of medical conditions and other factors in older adults. Notably, over the 14-year observation period 601 patients developed strokes and 599 patients developed dementia. Surely, detailed dietary questionnaires were available from the study that helped the author to detect what the protective factors were in those who did not develop strokes or dementia. Researchers excluded other factors (including tea and coffee consumption) and they studied only antioxidant factors. They noticed that there were no differences in terms of stroke or dementia rates when they compared the lowest and highest percentiles of antioxidant groups.

Tea and coffee consumption protective of strokes and dementia

But when the lowest and highest percentiles of tea and coffee consumers were analyzed and compared, about 90% of strokes and of dementia disappeared meaning that tea and coffee consumption is protective for both. Dr. Devore explained that other studies have shown that vitamin C helps prevent strokes and vitamin E helps to prevent dementia and that both vegetables and fruit as well as tea and coffee have been shown in other studies to help reduce both.

Here is another article that investigated the role that vitamin E plays in reducing brain aging and preventing dementia and Alzheimer’s.

In a meta analysis vitamin C was shown to help prevent hemorrhagic and embolic strokes.

Coffee, Tea, Vitamin C And E Prevent Stroke And Dementia

More studies show health benefits of vitamin C, E, vitamin D3, coffee and tea

Vitamin C and E are not the only beneficial vitamins for the brain. Vitamin D3 can help prevent thromboembolic strokes as the Honolulu study going on for 34 years showed.

What about coffee and tea? There is a 10-year study involving 32,600 women where 1 or two cups of coffee per day led to a 25-32% reduction of strokes compared to non-coffee or tea consuming controls.

Black tea and coffee reduced stroke risk

Males also experience a reduction of thromboembolic strokes with tea or coffee consumption. There has been a Finnish study that consisted of 29,133 smokers (smoking 5 cigarettes a day) aged 50 to 69 who were stroke free when entering the study. It ended in 1993 and had lasted for at least 5 years. Drinking two cups of black tea or 8 cups of coffee reduced the stroke risk by 21 to 23%.

Fruit and vegetables contain a lot of vitamin B complex. As this link shows vitamin B can lower cysteine, a blood component that contributes to heart attacks and strokes.

So, what should you do to prevent strokes and dementia?

Stop smoking, if you do. Avoid alcohol and drugs as much as you can. Your brain cells have very sensitive mitochondria that give you energy, but they are very sensitive to toxins. Avoid brain injuries like concussions as they can accumulate and lead to dementia. Whatever you can do for your heart is good for stroke prevention. This includes weight loss (down to a body mass index of 22.0), exercise, and sensible food intake. Sensible food intake includes complex carbs, cut out sugar, have lean meat, more chicken, turkey, lean pork and only occasional beef. Take multiple vitamins including B, C, D3, E and drink tea or coffee. Some health-oriented people may not want to hear this latter point (tea, coffee), but the studies show it is brain and heart protective.

Further information

More information on dementia: http://nethealthbook.com/neurology-neurological-disease/alzheimers-dementia-and-delirium/dementia/

Links regarding the Elizabeth E. Devore, ScD study:

1) http://www.everydayhealth.com/stroke/how-antioxidants-really-protect-against-stroke-and-dementia-3194.aspx

2) http://www.webmd.com/healthy-aging/news/20130220/high-antioxidant-diet-may-not-prevent-stroke-dementia-study-finds

Here is a link to the National Stroke Association about stroke prevention: http://www.stroke.org/site/PageServer?pagename=prevent

Feb

2013

Forget The Glass Of Red Wine For Good Health

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, Health, Heart Disease, Medical Condition, Nutrition, Obesity, Prevention, Stroke, Substance abuse, Vitamins and supplements

This article is about the statement “forget the glass of red wine for good health”. For over 10 years there was the rule to limit alcohol intake. It said “1 glass of red wine for women and 2 glasses of red wine for men” daily. This was the recommendation in order to prevent a heart attack or a stroke. Now we are confronted with new research from Boston showing that even small amounts of alcohol are bad for you as alcohol is a carcinogen (=cancer producing substance). Misinformation like this occurs when science concentrates only on one angle of health. Researchers focussed on cardiovascular disease prevention. The other part of the equation, the carcinogenic effect of alcohol, was disregarded.

Australian study about the risk of cancer from alcohol consumption

In 1996 this Australian study followed 1236 men and 1569 women 60 years and over for more than 5 years and studied their mortality rates as a function of alcoholic drink intake. The authors found that there was a short-term protective effect with regard to cardiovascular/stroke mortality. Mortality was the end point for both cardiovascular disease and for cancer. Researchers took the study as evidence that alcoholic beverages protect to a certain degree from strokes and heart attacks. The authors were aware that alcohol was cancer causing as they stated, “Those taking any alcohol exhibited an increased proportion of deaths due to cancer at the expense of a reduced proportion of CHD and stroke deaths”.

Popular press is often misleading

But the popular press never mentioned this part in popular articles. Also, alcohol/cardio-protective recommendations did not mention the cancer danger. The authors also were aware that the observation time of 5 years was on the short side. We know from other studies that alcohol toxicity requires a longer observation time such as 15 to 20 years or longer to show significance in a multitude of cancers.

Alcohol consumption linked to cancer risk

As already mentioned above, the new survey of alcohol-caused cancer went through the popular press. Dr. Timothy S. Naimi from Boston University Medical Center was the main investigator of an international team of scientists. The study found that alcohol consumption is responsible every year for 18,200 to 21,300 cancer deaths in the US (that is 3.2% to 3.7% of all US cancer deaths). The authors of the study determined that every person who dies from alcohol related causes lost on average approximately 18 years of his/her life (scientists call this “years of potential life lost”). 51% of women developed breast cancer from alcohol exposure, 62% of men came down with upper airway and esophageal cancers. Less than 1.5 drinks per day caused between 26% and 35% of alcohol-related cancer deaths. No safe lower margin existed. The authors concluded, “Reducing alcohol consumption is an important and underemphasized cancer prevention strategy”.

Other research supporting the statement: “forget the glass of red wine for good health”

Interestingly, in 2006 other research looked at alcohol caused cancer cases in the world based on WHO data and concluded that with the increased worldwide consumption of alcohol, particularly in East Asia, preventative steps regulating consumption of alcoholic drinks would be wise.

A recent study in 2012 where cancer rates in the US were compared between Hispanics and Caucasians showed that Hispanics had higher rates of stomach cancer, liver cancer, uterine/cervix cancer and gallbladder cancer. The authors concluded that more screening is necessary in Hispanics such as Pap tests. Also this ethnic group requires effective vaccines (like Gardasil) against the human papilloma virus. In addition, patients need to reduce obesity, curtail alcohol consumption and reduce tobacco use.

There is no safe level of alcohol consumption, not even the “1 drink for women and 2 drinks for men” (heart attack prevention), because cancer incidence increases with increasing alcohol consumption in a linear relationship.

Effect of alcohol on the body

What does alcohol do in the body that it is so dangerous to your cells? Many cancer researchers have researched this question in detail. Essentially, alcohol is by itself a toxin for your cells (the targets being sub particles in your cells called microsomes and mitochondria). Your liver metabolizes alcohol into acetaldehyde, your kidneys excrete it and your lungs exhale it (this is how a breathalyzer can detect how much you have been drinking). All of these chemical changes in your cells release free radicals, which in turn attack other cells. This sets up a chronic inflammatory process, which breaks down your immune system, leads to cell mutations and finally to cancer.

Forget The Glass Of Red Wine For Good Health

Protection from cancer and cancer prevention

What protects you from cancer? It is the antioxidants that stabilize the above-mentioned processes: vitamin C, glutathione, vitamin D 3, curcumin, multiple vitamins, magnesium, flavonoid foods, cruciferous foods (like broccoli), exercise and soluble fiber.

So, if you were serious about cancer prevention, you may want to stop any alcohol intake. Instead take the above mentioned supplements. The heart attack and stroke protection will be achieved by flavonoid foods (perhaps specifically adding resveratrol 250 mg per day as well) and exercise.

If you were less conscientious about cancer prevention, at least reduce your alcohol consumption. Perhaps you want to drink the occasional glass of wine or beer. But avoid high percentage spirits and remember, the less the better! You may be toasting to ill health with that glass of wine. Say no to false advertising of the wine industry! Your body will thank you for it.

More information on alcoholism: http://nethealthbook.com/drug-addiction/alcoholism/

Incoming search terms:

is one glass of red wine a night bad for you

Feb

2013

News About Your Heart Health

By Ray Schilling | Alzheimer’s disease, Arthritis, Cancer, Diabetes, Fitness, Health, Heart Disease, High Blood Pressure, Hormones, Nutrition, Obesity, Prevention, Stroke, Vitamins and supplements, Weight loss

Introduction

Notably, this article is regarding news about your heart health. Specifically, February is heart month every year. So I thought why not review what is new regarding heart health in the last 15 years. In addition, this review also puts all the facts into perspective. I will start with a review of the older teaching about heart disease. First thing to remember, there was a paradigm shift in medical thinking. I will explain how this has changed the approach to heart disease prevention. The anatomy of the heart including coronary arteries and the heart valves has not changed over the years. The heart has always been at the center of life and will remain there.

A heart attack can develop from closing of one of the coronary arteries

It used to be thought that when a person ages one should expect to get problems with high cholesterol, which would be the cause of hardening of coronary arteries of the heart until one day the person would experience a heart attack from the closing of one or more of the three coronary arteries. Certainly, cardiologists can then offer an arteriogram, place a stent to reopen any blocked coronary artery and the patient would be OK for another 5 to 10 years. Alternatively, coronary bypass surgery can be offered by a cardiovascular surgeon to revascularize the coronary arteries.

Apart from cholesterol patients can get heart attacks from chronic inflammation

In contrast, in the mid 1990’s all this changed with the realization that 50% of heart attacks happened in patients who had normal cholesterol levels. In fact, research showed that inflammation of the heart vessels starts the process of subsequent blockage that causes heart attacks. A great deal of research in animal models and with humans took place. Indeed, this showed that a lot can be done in the area of prevention of heart attacks. Cure rates can only change very little when damage to the heart muscle has already occurred. The paradigm shift is in the understanding of what leads to a heart attack.

Too much sugar, starchy food and fat cause inflammation of the coronary arteries

We now know that too much sugar, too many starchy foods and too much animal fat will lead to inflammation of the arteries including the coronary arteries. The reason is that faulty nutrition leads to a lack of omega-3 fatty acids and a surplus of omega-6 fatty acids. This starts the inflammatory cycle, which causes inflammation in the arterial walls. Rising LDL cholesterol levels (that’s the bad cholesterol) follow and HDL cholesterol levels (that’s the good cholesterol) fall.

Nitric oxide production necessary to keep coronary arteries open

Associated with this is a lowering of nitric oxide production in the lining of the arterial walls, which leads to a narrowing of the arterial opening and simultaneous development of high blood pressure. Research of the metabolism of cells, particularly the subunits of cells called mitochondria, shed a new light on the heart as well. Mitochondria are the energy producing subunits of the cells. They are abundantly present in those organs that have a high metabolism. These organs are the heart, brain, liver and kidneys.

News About Your Heart Health

Life prolonging steps to prevent heart attacks

This newer knowledge allows the prevention-oriented physician to help patients not to get heart disease on the first place. The key is to prevent inflammation of the arteries and to add nitric oxide as a supplement. Also, the physician wants to change the food composition that the patient consumes. In addition, the physician wants to intervene at the mitochondrial level. The patient achieves this with the help of supplements and by a regular exercise program. Over the years there have been impressive clinical trials that show that these preventative means when taken together can add 10 to 20 years of productive life without any disability. In the following I am going to describe the rationale for each of these life-prolonging steps:

Preventing inflammation of the arteries

Preventing inflammation of the arteries: at the moment many people eat the standard North American diet consisting of foods with too much sugar, processed foods with animal fat and lots of pasta. People need to eat a lot of leafy-green vegetables (kale, spinach, Swiss chard) and lean pork, turkey and chicken. this will change the omega-3 to omega-6 ratio in favor of omega-3 fatty acids. This has a powerful effect on your body, as the surplus omega-3 fatty acids will suppress any inflammation in your blood vessels, which prevents heart attacks.

Eat organic foods

If you also eat as much organic food as possible, you will in addition reduce the toxic load in your body from heavy metals like lead and mercury and chemicals like herbicides and insecticides that often are contained in regular non-organic foods. By cutting out sugar and refined carbohydrates fasting insulin levels and triglyceride levels fall. This prevents diabetes and keeps your arteries open longer.

Adding nitric oxide and doing intermittent chelation therapy

By adding nitric oxide as a supplement such as “Neo40” (this supplement has hawthorn and red beet extract in it) the lining of the arteries gets a boost of nitric oxide production. This lowers your blood pressure and widens the arteries in your body including the coronary arteries. The result is more oxygen and nutrients for your heart cells. By intervening at the mitochondrial level with the help of supplements and by doing occasional intravenous chelation therapyto remove heavy metals you can revive the sluggish metabolism of the mitochondria of your major organs. It’s like you are recharging the battery of your car, just here we are dealing with the microscopic energy packages, the mitochondria, in the cells of your vital organs including your heart.

Life prolonging supplements

Certain vitamins and supplements help in this process as follows: D-ribose, alpha-lipoic acid and CoQ10 support mitochondria; niacin lowers triglycerides and LDL cholesterol and elevates HDL-cholesterol (the good cholesterol); magnesium is an important cofactor of many enzymatic reactions in your cells and it also lowers blood pressure by widening the arteries making it easier for your heart to pump blood through them. Omega-3 and vitamin D3 both are anti-inflammatories, which makes these two important supplements for heart attack prevention. Vitamin D3 is also important for your immune system and helps to absorb calcium from the gut. Vitamin K2 has been found to be important to help transport the calcium into your bones preventing osteoporosis, so that it does not stay in your vascular system and cause hardening of your arteries by getting into your arterial walls.

Bioidentical hormone replacement

Bio-identical hormone replacement therapy is a powerful stimulus for the metabolism of your whole body, but particularly your heart. The heart needs adequate amounts of thyroid hormones and sex hormones (testosterone in males, balanced estrogen and progesterone in females). DHEA is a precursor hormone from your adrenal glands that your hormone balance requires for support of your heart muscle. The physician can order hormone tests and replace what is missing with bio-identical hormones.

Regular exercise program

A regular exercise program rounds up your heart support program. A regular exercise program by itself has been shown to be powerful heart attack prevention by cutting heart attack rates into half when compared to a non-exercise control group. Exercise builds up your heart muscle reserves and prevents clogging up of coronary arteries.

Lifestyle changes

Lifestyle changes can have a powerful effect in terms of preventing heart attacks. Everybody knows that those who smoke will not live as long as those who don’t. Smoking accelerates hardening of the arteries and causes not only heart attacks, but also cancer. Perhaps less known is the fact that alcohol can poison mitochondria. The fact that wine contains bioflavonoids is what prevents heart attacks. Statistics show that 1 glass of wine for women and two glasses of wine for men prolong life. The wine industry was quick to exploit these statistics for the benefit of their sales. Fact is that even small doses of alcohol are a cell poison. Bioflavonoids are much more effective when taken as part of your daily supplements (resveratrol capsules) and it is much healthier for your heart and other body parts, if you do not consume any alcohol at all.

Apart from the Framingham Heart Study what we know

Originally the Framingham study showed that high LDL cholesterol was associated with heart attacks. But now we know that it is the overconsumption of sugar, high fructose corn syrup and refined carbohydrates in processed foods as well as animal fat overconsumption (mostly omega-6 fatty acids) that lead to inflammation of the lining of the arteries including LDL cholesterol overproduction from the liver. The focus has switched from lowering cholesterol and triglycerides to reducing and preventing inflammation and to supporting the mitochondria of the heart muscle cells.

Preventing 85% of heart attacks

Simple steps as outlined above have the power to prevent about 85% or more of heart attacks. They work by treating insulin resistance through the diet changes, which in turn lowers fasting insulin levels, blood sugars and triglycerides as well as cholesterol. Inflammation is kept at bay. You prevent heart disease and in addition also arthritis, high blood pressure, strokes and Alzheimer’s disease. One of the side effects is weight loss, extra energy and a sense of wellbeing.

More information on heart disease: http://nethealthbook.com/cardiovascular-disease/heart-disease/

Jan

2013

Staying Healthy During Exotic Travel

By Ray Schilling | Health, Infectious Disease, Prevention, vaccinations

A study of 82,825 ill travelers from Europe, North America, Israel, Japan, Australia and New Zealand was published who were interested in staying healthy during exotic travel. They had traveled the world between June 1996 and August 2011. The data was based on the GeoSentinel surveillance network database. There were 3,655 patients (4.4%) who were seriously sick with one of 13 tropical diseases. There were 13 deaths (=0.4%), 10 of which were from malaria. Two died from melioidosis. This is an infectious disease caused by a bacterium found in soil in Southeast Asia (including Thailand, Laos, southern China, Singapore, Malaysia, Burma and Vietnam), Taiwan and northern Australia. One person died from severe dengue. The interesting fact is that there was not a single case of Ebola virus, although this is a highly publicized and lethal illness in Africa. The majority of travelers sustained malaria and typhoid.

The tropical diseases were either due to viral illnesses, bacterial infections or protozoan infections.

Frequent viral illnesses encountered by visitors to Asia were dengue hemorrhagic fever (DHF) or dengue shock syndrome (DSS); avian influenza, Lassa fever as well as other tropical hemorrhagic fevers, Japanese encephalitis including other tropical encephalitis cases, Rift Valley fever and yellow fever.

This is a list of the bacterial infections that were reported: Anthrax, Carrion’s disease (=Bartonella bacilliformis), epidemic typhus, leptospirosis, melioidosis, murine typhus, paratyphoid fever, plague, relapsing fever, scrub typhus, spotted fever group rickettsioses and typhoid fever.

An interesting side-note is that even in familiar places like Hawaii leptospirosis is re-emerging as this link shows. So, it is important for visitors to Kauai and the Big Island of Hawaii (Waipio valley) to refrain from swimming in streams or natural ponds and to not expose your face to cascading waterfalls as leptospirosis can enter through the eyes, the nose, the mouth and scratches on the skin.

Finally, the following protozoan infections were found frequently: East African sleeping sickness, falciparum malaria and Plasmodium knowlesi malaria.

Staying Healthy During Exotic Travel

Each travel region has its special infection characteristics. With travel to Central America infectious diseases ranked in decreasing frequency like this: typhoid fever, leptospirosis, falciparum malaria and paratyphoid fever. In the Caribbean falciparum malaria was followed by typhoid fever, leptospirosis and paratyphoid fever. In South America the highest on the list was again falciparum malaria, followed by typhoid fever, paratyphoid fever and leptospirosis. In Sub Saharan Africa the highest number of falciparum malaria cases were registered (2633 of them), followed by 42 cases of typhoid fever, paratyphoid fever and leptospirosis. In the Middle East only one case of falciparum malaria, one case of typhoid fever and 2 cases of paratyphoid fever were reported. In contrast there were many more infections reported in South Central Asia (India): 286 cases of typhoid fever, followed by parathyroid fever, falciparum malaria and leptospirosis. All of the cases of typhoid fever and parathyroid fever in India were adequately treated with antibiotics and no deaths resulted from that. This is an example where no vaccine is available for prevention, but swift medical treatment could help immediately when an infection had occurred.

In South East Asia (Malaysia, Philippines, Indonesia) leptospirosis was on top, followed by typhoid fever, falciparum malaria and parathyroid fever. North East Asia (Korea, Mongolia), had only 3 cases of typhoid fever and 1 case of paratyphoid fever. Oceania (Polynesia) reported 26 cases of falciparum malaria, followed by paratyphoid fever and typhoid fever.

Several interesting observations were made with regard to this study.

Most patients with travel acquired tropical illnesses presented within less than 17 days at the doctor’s office at home and 91% of them had developed a fever.
The spectrum of the tropical disease that was diagnosed and treated varied according to the geographic destination where the traveler had been, which is consistent with the observations mentioned above (different distribution of tropical diseases depending on which area was traveled). Visitors to West Africa had a high rate of falciparum malaria, visitors to India sustained largely enteric fevers; and leptospirosis, scrub typhus and murine typhus were the dominant tropical diseases for visitors to South East Asia.
Males were found to be less diligent in using chemoprophylaxis for malaria prior to their travel than females. Overall only a minority had attended a travel clinic prior to their travel for immunizations and chemoprophylaxis for preventable tropical disease such as malaria.
Other global life-threatening diseases like meningitis, other forms of septicemia, severe bacterial pneumonia and legionnaires also have to be considered as they occurred in roughly 30% of returning travelers.
Malaria was the largest percentage of the tropical diseases that travelers brought home and 67% of all cases were male patients. They were mostly visiting West Africa where they acquired malaria (typically from Nigeria, Ghana and the Ivory Coast). As mentioned they accounted for 10 of the 13 deaths.

The authors recommend that travelers should prepare themselves for trips to the tropics and subtropics, preferable visiting one of the travelers’ clinics. The recommended procedures should be followed meticulously. Not all of the diseases can be prevented, but if the traveler turns sick, they should seek medical advice as soon as possible in the country where they travel as these physicians often have special expertise in these tropical diseases.

One of the comments of the study was that often people visit relatives and friends in an area where tropical disease exists without any chemoprophylaxis or vaccinations beforehand. The visitors were under the impression that prior living in the area as a child would still protect them now during the travel as an adult, which is not the case. This can be prevented by visiting a travel clinic well before the planned trip, so there is enough time for vaccinations and possible blood tests.

More information on:

1. Traveler’s diarrhea: http://nethealthbook.com/infectious-disease/parasites/travelers-diarrhea/

2. Parasites: http://nethealthbook.com/infectious-disease/parasites/

Jan

2013

Long-Term Multistep Weight Management

By Ray Schilling | Cancer, Diabetes, Fitness, Health, Heart Disease, Hormones, Nutrition, Obesity, Prevention, Stroke, Vitamins and supplements, Weight loss

In February of 2001 my wife and I attended an anti-aging conference in San Diego. The keynote speaker was Dr. Barry Sears who is the inventor of the zone diet. We had read a book from him before the conference and were excited to hear him speak in person. We liked the book; we liked the talk, so we cut out sugar, starchy foods and stuck to a diet where the calories derived 50% from low-glycemic, complex carbohydrates, 25-30% from lean meat, poultry and fish. Calories derived from fat were reduced to about 15-20% (there is hidden fat even in lean meat). No butter, but instead some lean cheeses and olive oil for cooking and in salad dressings. We shed both 50 pounds within 3 months without any hunger pangs. Our energy increased and this has stayed this way ever since. There was no problem getting down with our BMI’s (body mass index) to 23.5 or 24.0, which is usually viewed as normal by the medical profession. We noticed, however, that when we did not exercise, there was a problem maintaining our normal weight. We are under the care of an anti-aging physician who did special tests like fasting insulin, C- reactive protein, and hormone tests. They were all normal. We took up ballroom dancing really seriously having been inspired by “Dancing With the Stars”. This was 6 years ago. What started innocently with only a few basic ballroom lessons three times per week has now blossomed into dancing more than 10 different dance styles 5 times per week.

Long-term Multistep Weight Management

3 ½ years ago both of our energy levels were slowly going down, particularly after a long night of dancing. Hormone tests revealed the initial stages of age-related hormone deficiencies which did not come as a surprise , as decreasing hormone levels was a topic discussed in detail at the conference in San Diego in 2001 (we also attended several other anti-aging conferences on a yearly basis from 2009 onwards). With bioidentical hormone replacements these levels normalized within one year, our energy was back and our weight stayed normal. We enjoy travelling, but there can be problems with our multistep weight management program. We need to watch our diet (no toxins, preferably only organic food), and physical exercise may be less regimented. In 2008 we read Suzanne Somers’ book “Breakthrough”. We ordered urine tests for toxic metals and we were shocked that we had noticeable levels of mercury and lead. Since then we started to cut our salmon consumption from 3 to 4 times per week down to once or twice per week. To get rid of the heavy metals we started intravenous chelation treatments with vitamin C (10 Gm) and Glutathione (1250 mg) every two weeks. In July 2012 there were reports of radioactive salmon from the Japan nuclear disaster earlier that year in the Canadian media. After this news we stopped eating all fish and other seafood, not only because of radioactivity, but also because of other toxins like mercury, cadmium, PBC’s etc. We do take high doses of molecularly distilled omega-3 fatty acids along with our other supplements. We also started eating mostly organic foods as we do not want to ingest insecticides, herbicides and other toxins.

We acquired body composition scales, which give information about fat percentage including visceral fat percentage, muscle mass percentage, BMI, weight and the basic metabolic rate. We wanted to define the end point of what our ideal body weight would be. We noticed that our dance program was not good enough to lower the BMI below about 23.5; using the body composition scales we noted that our body fat content was still too high and the visceral fat percentage was still in the 6% range. It took a prolonged trip to the US where we could not find enough dance events to decide that we would introduce a one hour gym program consisting of 30 minutes of treadmill, 15 minutes of upper body circuits, and 15 minutes of lower body circuits every day as a basis to our exercise program. Any dance activity would be just an additional exercise on top of the base exercise from the gym. It took only about 2 months before our fat composition decreased, our muscle mass increased, the visceral fat went to a normal at 5% and the BMI was now stabilized at the 21.5 to 22.0 range. We feel a lot more confident in managing our weight long-term without really thinking much about the weight. It is now a routine we follow, like an athlete would do to stay in shape. While nobody has a permanent guarantee to everlasting health, we do it to prevent the diseases we do not need in our retirement like diabetes, arthritis, heart attacks, strokes, cancer or Alzheimer’s.

What we did not know until after the 20^th A4M Anti-Aging Conference in Las Vegas (mid December 2012) was that inadvertently we were protected from exposure to chemically modified wheat from 2001 onwards as we had cut out all refined carbohydrates and starchy foods (including wheat) since then. Unfortunately many Americans still expose themselves unknowingly to larger or smaller quantities of wheat, suffer from leaky gut syndrome with the associated changes in the immune system and the development of autoimmune diseases.

Personally, I believe that long term weight management is possible: you can turn older and hopefully wiser…not wider. The good news: it can be done. The bad news: this is not an instant fix, but a program that needs to be part of your lifestyle package.

More information on weight loss: http://nethealthbook.com/health-nutrition-and-fitness/weight-loss-and-diet/

Last updated Nov. 6, 2014

Jan

2013

Thinking Of Health In The New Year

By Ray Schilling | Anti-aging medicine, Fitness, Health, Heart Disease, High Blood Pressure, Hormones, Nutrition, Obesity, Prevention

The following article is about thinking of health in the New Year. As we start a New Year (2013) it is a good time to reflect on our health, what makes us healthy, what keeps us healthy and what makes us age less quickly.
Here are a few thoughts, partially my own, partially influenced by the 20th Anti-aging conference in Las Vegas in December of 2012.

Stay away from cigarettes

1. In particular, we know that cigarettes are no longer in. But in the casinos of Las Vegas and outside of restaurants a lot of people are still smoking! Here is a website that tells you why you should quit. Notably, cigarettes cause lung cancer, hardening of the arteries, strokes, and often reduce life expectancy by 10 to 15 years. To emphasize, if you are smoking do anything to quit this habit! Acupuncture helps, Nicorette assists you in overcoming the addiction part of smoking. In addition, self hypnosis discs are also helpful.

Reducing toxins

2. Reduce toxins in your life: you may think that toxins consist of lead, mercury and other heavy metals and that only people in certain industries would be exposed to those. Not so. It is in the air we breathe. Your tooth fillings (silver amalgam fillings) may leech out mercury, old paints at home could still expose you to lead, as would fashion jewelry made in China. Various foods contain toxins in them in form of residues from herbicides and insecticides. How do we detoxify? Vitamin C is a good start. It can be taken as a daily vitamin supplement (see below).

Intravenous chelation therapy

Detoxification can be done intravenously, if urine and blood tests show high levels of toxins.

This is something an anti-aging doctor or a naturopathic doctor can help you with. Glutathione and vitamin C can be given intravenously for chelation treatment with the least side-effects. Here is a link that tells you more about chelation in general.

Staying away from modern wheat and genetically modified foods

3. Cut out wheat and other genetically modified foods: What’s the thing about wheat? Read my blog about this.
All of the wheat we get today in bread, cereals, pasta, pizzas etc. has been genetically modified and has about 7 times the gliadin concentration that the original wheat species had before BASF did the chemical modification of wheat in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Today practically all of the commercial wheat is this type.
As a result I have avoided wheat in my food intake since 2001. When you avoid wheat and sugar, which is another culprit (sugar is simply too strong for your body to handle and leads to hyperinsulinism and diabetes) you will likely loose whatever weight is too much for you without any effort.

Thinking Of Health In The New Year

Eat mostly organic food

4. Eat only organic food , if you can afford it. Or grow your own vegetables and lettuce in your vegetable garden, if you can. Because of what I said under point 2 above, I stay away from regular vegetables and lettuce that are sold in super markets as they contain residues of round-up (herbicides) and insecticides on them. Organic food nowadays is affordable as enough of us demand it. Even Wal-Mart has some organic foods! Keep an eye on your body weight and aim for a body mass index between 21.5 and 23.0. Several long-term studies have shown that the BMI is worth observing in order to reduce mortality.

The Singapore Chinese Health Study: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0014000

The Buffalo Health Study: http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/146/11/919.full.pdf+html

Regular exercise

5. Exercise regularly 5 to 7 times per week. Perhaps one of the most important points is regular exercise. Engaging in ½ hour of vigorous exercise three times per week reduces your probability of coming down with a serious illness that could kill you by 15%. If you exercise 5 to 7 days per week for 30 minutes or more this percentage goes up to about 40%. If you exercise 60 minutes 6 to 7 times per week in a gym, you reduce mortality by about 50 to 60%. Here is an interesting graph that shows that older adults benefit more from exercise than younger adults do.

Have your hormone status checked yearly

6. Have a yearly check-up including a check-up of your hormone status: As we age, our hormones reduce in a characteristic patterns with melatonin and growth hormone production going on a downhill slope after the age of 30, followed soon by DHEA and cortisol. Often by the time a woman reaches menopause at the age of 35 to 50, there is a lack of estrogens, progesterone, and often also of thyroid hormones. In a man this decline (andropause) may take longer until the age of 55 to 65 before he experiences a lack of energy, erectile dysfunction and muscle weakness from testosterone deficiency. Sex hormones are best measured in saliva samples, the remaining hormones in blood samples. Here is a website that describes the various hormones that often need replacement (note that I am not endorsing this website, just citing it as an example of what to look out for).

Bioidentical hormone replacement

Replace hormones only with bioidentical hormones: When there is a hormone deficiency, a doctor would usually replace the deficiency with synthetic hormones from Big Pharma. This was good for the profits of the companies, but bad for people as the Women’s Health Initiative has shown.
As a result of this study (showing heart attacks, strokes, breast cancer) a lot of American women and women around the world were unjustly horrified of hormone replacement.

Bioidentical hormone replacement safe

However, many trials with bioidentical hormones around the world have proven that bioidentical hormone replacement with hormone creams from compounding pharmacies add years of life expectancy as these hormones restore all body functions back to normal. No breast cancer, no heart attacks and no strokes were noted on these natural hormones. The key is to replace with low doses and slowly under the supervision of a naturopathic physician or anti-aging physician.
Here is a site that explains bioidentical hormone replacement (note that I am not endorsing this center, just citing it as an example of what to look out for).

Friendships and hobbies

8. Have hobbies, cherish friendships. Social networking is good for your emotional health. It reduces stress, re-balances your hormones, reduces your risk of heart attacks and strokes.

Cherish your spiritual life

9. Don‘t neglect your spirituality. Be part of a church community that builds you up, if you are religious. For those who no longer belong to a church group, meditate instead, use yoga, do self hypnosis or read an inspiring book. Music can energize you or contribute to relaxation.

Vitamin and mineral supplementation

10. Use vitamin and mineral supplements. There are a number of vitamins and minerals that have anti-oxidative effects. They help to detoxify your body and protect you from some of the environmental challenges. I have discussed them elsewhere in more detail under this link.

So, here they are, the 10 steps to a healthier 2013. Review what you are doing in your life . You may need to only modify the one or the other point. Otherwise, if you have identified several points you want to change, just start with the ones you feel can be achieved the easiest first and then gradually tackle the rest. Your reward is more energy and you will probably find it difficult to hide your successes from your friends.