AND YOU THOUGHT THE HEART PROBLEM WAS BAD NEWS

The problem with the way the body works and the way medicine is set up is that our bodies do not respect these artificial barriers of specialties.  That means that, when we treat ourselves badly, it is not just one organ (i.e the heart) that is affected.  It is not just diabetes that occurs.  It is not just weak bones that occur.  It is not just cancer.

The sad fact is that the risks for all of these track together.  If you have one, you’ve got them ALL, just not always to the point of getting a named disease or condition.

In this particular study (and it’s not the first one along the exact same lines), researchers looked at patients who were found to have colorectal masses on colonoscopy.  As if this isn’t bad enough news, in those patients who had mass, they had a much higher risk of also having heart blockages.  The reverse was also tru–those having cardiac procedures (in this case angioplasty) had a much, much greater risk of having colorectal masses.

Herein lies the problem with using medications designed to treat a single disease.  They are designed to address only ONE condition (and usually do a pretty poor job of even that).  Lifestyle changes, on the other hand, cut across every disease state we know of.

 

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The Cost of Medical Research; It’s Not What You Think

Kenishirotie/Dollar Photo Club

The drug companies use the cost of drug development as a rationale for charging massive amounts for new drugs when they get brought to market under a patent.

The reality is that many of these drugs are priced far above what it cost to bring it to market and definitely beyond what it costs to produce.  In other words, it has nothing to do with what the drug company’s costs were or are; it instead has to do with how much the market will bear the costs.  This leads to massive profits.

But this is NOT were the true cost of these drugs lie for society.

The true cost lies with the fact that many of these drugs are a complete waste of money.  (This of course does not begin to account for the damage done from drugs that are later taken off the market or given black box warnings for safety reasons discovered after the drug was launched)

Sound a little extremist?

Before you judge me, you need to understand the concept of SURROGATE END MARKERS, which I have discussed many times before.  A surrogate end marker is used in drug research studies to basically save money and time.

The ultimate classic example is cholesterol lowering drugs.  Lipotor was initially approved and based on its ability to lower cholesterol levels.  What I usually point out is that no one really gives a hoot about his or her cholesterol levels, it’s just that no one wants to have a heart attack or stroke.  Using cholesterol as the surrogate end marker for heart attacks, the Pfizer did not need to run years-longer, more expensive studies to see if Lipitor actually lowered rates of heart attacks.

And that’s what happened.  It took YEARS before the studies on statins were done and published to see if cholesterol lowering drugs actually lowered rates of heart attacks.  When the dust finally settled on the topic, the results were less-than-stunning.  About a 1% absolute reduction in the rates of heart attacks.

The amount of money wasted (and continuing to be wasted) on this class of drugs is beyond most of our comprehension.

If this was an isolated example everything would be maybe OK, but it’s not.

Blood pressure medications for stage 1 hypertension (systolic <160 or diastolic <100) do not lower the risk of heart attack, stroke or death.  What the heck are we wasted BILLIONS of dollars on them then???  (I’d love an answer, but I fear the question is largely rhetorical)

Fancy new cancer drugs that improve “disease free survival” do not actually help cancer patients live longer but cost tens of thousands of dollars more per patient.

But we can’t leave diabetes medications out of the mix.  About a decade ago, there began a massive shift in research dollars towards a gut hormone called GLP-1 that happened after researchers found that a compound in Gila monster spit could act the same in our bodies.

Since that time, published research on this hormone and the class of drugs that could slow down our body’s own breakdown of GLP-1 (normally only last about 1-2 minutes in our own body) has dominated the diabetes medical journal landscape.  These two types of drugs (GLP-1 like drugs and drugs that slow down our body’s breakdown of this same hormone) hit the diabetes drug market at a full-on sprint with names like Byetta, Vicotoza, Januvia and Onglyza.

And they weren’t cheap (lots of variables, but on average $300+ / month)

But no one could argue that they did a better job of control blood sugar (if you can ignore those pesky side effects like acute pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer).  But one COULD argue that the lesson from the past about using surrogate end markers almost always ends up to be a bad plan.

You see, most diabetics die of heart-related complications.  This means that any drug used to treat diabetes really has to have an impact on heart disease if it’s going to be worth squat.

I’m betting you can see where I’m going with this….

In this particular study, researchers evaluated any published studies done on the benefit of DPP-4 inhibitors (the drugs that block the enzyme that breaks down GLP-2 so quickly) and major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE).  Here’s what they found when they looked over 69 different trials with almost 68,000 patients:

• Luckily, when compared to another class of diabetes drugs called sulfonylureas, DPP-4 inhibitors were associated with a 42% lower risk of MACE.
• But when the DPP-4 inhibitors were compared to the newest class of drug for diabetes (SGLT2 inhibitors, which allow sugar to be lost through the kidneys) they were linked to a 89% higher risk of MACE.
• When compared to placebo the expensive, heavily used, new class of drugs that mess with the GLP-1 pathway, there was no benefit on major cardiovascular events.

To sum this up, an entire new class of drugs designed to help diabetics manage blood sugar are pretty much worthless at preventing the major complication in diabetics.

With this in mind, it doesn’t matter squat what it cost to develop or what it costs to manufacture because the drug doesn’t really help diabetics in the long run.  This means that cost to society is equal to pretty much every dime spent by the healthcare system on this class of drugs PLUS the medical costs associated with the sometimes dangerous and fatal side effects from the drugs.

Good thing more people have access to drugs through the Affordable Care Act.

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My Biggest Frustration with Migraines

Chronic migraines as a progressive brain disorder

I have dedicated a significant amount of time to migraines.  From treatment in my office to hundreds of review articles of medical studies to publishing a book on Migraines And Epilepsy, I consider myself quite educated on the topic.

While there have been a few exceptions in my office (literally less than a handful over the past 18+ years), if patients are willing to make the changes I recommend, they get better.  My recommendations range from a course of treatment in the office to exercise to managing stress to major lifestyle overhauls.  If patients are willing to make these changes, I can almost guarantee that migraines will be history.

Why?  How can patients get better with my recommendations versus the neurologist that they’ve been seeing for years and practice out of a very well-known hospital system?

Because the “why” is far more important to me than suppressing the symptoms of a migraine.  It is VERY rare that I have a chronic migraine patients come into my office that has been educated on the underlying cause of his or her migraine headaches.

But before I get into the secret of migraine headaches I need to make a very important distinction.

By the time patients make it into my office they have accumulated multiple types of headaches.  The two biggest classifications are structural and migrainous.  And I can say, with a high degree of confidence, that every migraine patient has aspects of both.

The structural headaches are related to the soft tissues (ligaments, tendons, muscles and fascia) and joints.  While my opinion is strongly biased, these types of headaches HAVE to be addressed by a chiropractor that understands and treats the soft tissues.  Adjusting alone, exercises alone, Botox alone (and yes-if someone responds to Botox it is because they have been improperly diagnosed with migraines instead of a structural headache) or soft tissue work alone is not going to completely fix the problem.

But, as I mentioned, it’s my bias based on almost 20 years of treatment migraine patients who have not responded elsewhere.

The true migraine headaches, however, do not respond well to good structural care.  This is because the true cause is not one that can be addressed from outside the body.

If you experience chronic migraine headaches and you really, really want to get rid of your headaches, you’re going to have to address the health of your blood vessels.

Period.

Anything less will not guarantee a fix for your headaches.  And medications?  Not a damn one of them will fix your blood vessels.  Some will actually make it worse.  And even if medications control your headaches, they have not fixed the problem.

Poor blood vessel health, endothelial dysfunction, vascular dysfunction.  It goes by different names depending upon who you are speaking to, but they all mean the same thing.

The blood vessels of a true migraine patient have lost the ability to respond appropriate to changes in demand for blood supply.  This system—where the blood vessels open and constrict based on how much oxygen the tissues need—is an incredibly dynamic process, with changes occurring by the second.  If your blood vessel is no longer able to respond to needs of your brain cells your brain cells are not going to be happy with you and can trigger a migraine.

THIS is the key to understanding your migraines.  THIS is the key to lifestyle changes that will help your chronic migraine headaches.

I have certainly spent time on migraine message boards and there are a lot of headache patients who get pissed off at my suggestion that headaches can be fixed.  These patients, however, have not achieved ideal body weight.  They are stressing too much.  They are not eating the right foods (even if he or she thinks his or her diet is ideal).  They are not exercising.  They are smokers.

I would suggest that, as much as it may be offensive to some, patients with true migraine headaches have not made the correct choices for his or her blood vessels and brain.

The details of these changes are beyond the scope of this article, but are outlined very readily in my book Migraines and Epilepsy that can be purchased by clicking here.

While many migraine sufferers care about getting rid of or controlling headaches, there is a bigger problem looming.  Poor blood vessel health has everything to do with risk of heart attack or stroke in the future.  This is absolutely, unquestionable solidly demonstrated in medical research study after research study.

Most of these research studies, however, have focused on migraine with aura.  Most of the studies that have linked future risk of heart disease or stroke have been on migraine with aura.  This particular study is yet another one in the long list of studies linking heart disease risk and migraines, except this one covered ALL migraines, not just those with aura.  Here’s the details on this large study of 17,531 women with migraines who were followed up for 20 years:

• Migraine was associated with a 50% higher risk for major cardiovascular disease.
• They had a 39% higher risk of a heart attack.
• There was a 62% higher risk of having suffered a stroke.’
• Sufferers had a 74% higher risk of having chest pain or having had a coronary angiogram.
• Furthermore, migraines were linked to a 37% higher risk of dying from heart disease.

The relationship is so strong that, in a linked editorial, the suggestion is that migraine should be viewed as a risk factor for heart disease just like high blood pressure and cholesterol.  This is a strong statement and one that is not entertained by the average treating neurologist or primary care doctor.

It also reinforces my concern that the vast majority of true migraine patients are not getting the education needed to understand and improve the condition.  Chronic migraine sufferers HAVE to address the underlying dysfunction of the blood vessels through lifestyle changes geared towards protecting the heart.  This include diet, stress management, exercise and focus on reducing exposure to environmental chemicals that damage the heart and blood vessels.

Anything less is only a band-aid.

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Low T Symptoms and Fertility; Barking up the Wrong Tree?

vladimirfloyd / Adobe Stock

I could not be more against testosterone supplementation. Sure, patients feel better and have more energy, but people on cocaine have more energy, too. Doesn’t mean it’s a good idea.

Several years ago, very aggressive marketing by the manufacturers of testosterone supplementation put “low T” on the map, leading to a huge uptake of lab testing for testosterone levels. And guess what? Just like the vitamin D phenomenon, it seems like everyone (males and females alike) came back low.

And low testosterone became linked to everything from fatigue, low libido, belly fat and erectile dysfunction. And you can’t talk about testosterone without talking about fertility.

This is because male fertility is the ultimate expression of testosterone (it’s not, but that’s how society would have us view it). For this reason, you can bet your right testicle on the fact that any fertility consult with a “fertility specialist” will include a testosterone check.

But there are many other factors that play a role in fertility that are indirectly related to testosterone. Environmental chemical exposure to BPA and phthalates are well known to affect fertility rates in both men and women.

Low testosterone, much like low cholesterol or high blood sugar or high blood pressure, is merely the symptom of a bigger problem. Fixing high cholesterol with statins, lowering blood sugar with insulin or lowering blood pressure with medications does not, in any way, shape or form. None of those medications fix the actual underlying “broken thing” that is causing the cholesterol, blood sugar or blood pressure.

Testosterone replacement therapy is absolutely no different.

So, while you feel better in your own little plastic bubble of T replacement therapy, there is something very wrong with your physiology that is absolutely increasing your risk of all kinds of really nasty things like Alzheimer’s, cancer, heart disease and stroke.

I have certainly written on this topic before, but just in case you think I’m really off base on this one, I’d like to present this particular study.

In it, researchers looked at the levels of pesticide exposure from fruits and vegetables and how this related to sperm quality in a group of 189 men age 18-22. The fruits and veggies were categorized as having high [Pesticide Residue Burden Score (PRBS) ≥4] or low-to-moderate (PRBS <4) pesticide residues on the basis of data from the USDA Pesticide Data Program.

Here’s what they found:

• Higher intakes of fruits and veggies, in general, did not affect sperm quality.
• However, men eating fruits and vegetable intake with the lowest pesticides (≥2.8 servings/d) had a 169% sperm count and a 173% higher sperm concentration.
• The intake of fruit and vegetables, regardless of pesticide-residue status, was not associated with reproductive hormone concentrations.

So what does this mean? It means that, while eating more fruits and veggies is important for your health, but it is really important to pay attention to whether or not you are eating organic foods that are well-known to be higher in pesticide levels.

The Environmental Working Group’s Guide to Pesticide Exposure in Produce is the best guide you can find to get this information.

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Why Blockbuster Drugs are Never a Good Thing

Avandia has been in use for over 15 years.  It was launched around the same time that another drug in the same class (PPAR-agonists…Rezulin) was pulled from the market due to liver failure.

Over time, this rapidly-adopted “blockbuster drug” began to accumulate evidence that Avandia greatly increases the risk of heart disease.  Given that 70% of diabetics already die from heart disease, one would think this would be a concern.

The bottom line is that, while this class of drugs makes your blood sugar numbers look better, it creates many more problems than it solves.

Lifestyle changes remain the only answer that doesn’t kill you first.

 

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Can a Simple Mineral Beat Statins for the Heart?

There are times when it seems like the only answer in medicine is another drug.  For heart stuff this is unquestionably statins.

Have high cholesterol?  Take Lipitor.  Have a family history of heart disease?  Take Crestor.  Your dog’s litter mates’ cousins’ owner had a heart attack?  Take atorvastatin.

You get the idea.

But when it comes to natural approaches which are JUST as powerful without a long list of potentially fatal side effects, it seems like “we just need more research.”

In this particular study, we see a simple approach…those with the highest levels of magnesium in their bloodstream had a 40% reduced risk of suffering sudden cardiac death.

At a cost that is just a fraction of even a generic statin and no side effects when taken orally.

 

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MORE EVIDENCE TO SIMPLY LOWER BREAST CANCER RATES

I just have to ask…if you’re not supplementing with Vitamin D yet, why not?

The research is very strong and the bottom line is that we were designed for heavy amounts of sunlight.  Our paleolithic ancestors didn’t have sunscreen.  Didn’t have the option of staying inside and playing Xbox instead of hunting for food.  Granted, my Irish ancestors weren’t hanging out in the Sahara, but they still were getting lots of sunlight at their latitude.

There is also something in today’s society leading to lowered blood levels of D.  Sunscreen, obesity, spending much time indoors, sunlight coming through glass, showering at night and particulate matter in the atmosphere are all likely playing a role in too low of levels in the blood.  Good thing supplementation is so darn cheap (in our office, $20 for about a YEAR for the highest quality vitamin D).

In this particular study, researchers found that, in those women with the highest vitamin D levels, there was a 27% lower risk of developing breast cancer.  However, for women under 53 years of age, this protection jumped to 40%.

Pretty good numbers for such an inexpensive and safe supplements.

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Fibromyalgia Sufferers: Vibrate Your Way to Better Health

Whole body vibration is a pretty unique experience.  Our office has had this therapy for almost 10 years now and have seem some pretty wonderful results, provided realistic expectations are given.

In general, the less active someone is, the greater the benefits (which raises the question of why gyms have WBV units..?).  In this particular study, patients with fibromyalgia had a very positive response in their balance with the use of WBV for 12 weeks, done 3 times per wk.  Couple this with lifestyle changes and you’re on your way to feeling better.

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Drugs for Ulcers; Extreme Dangers of Long-Term Use

Adobe Stock / freshidea

If you’ve got a bleeding ulcer, drugs that block acid like Nexium, Prilosec and Aciphex can save your life.  Even if that ulcer is caused by your daily anti-inflammatory.

However, for the remaining 99% of the time that acid-blocking drugs are used, they can wreak havoc.

You see, the body digests….and it does everything else.  When it comes to digestion, stomach acid is the lynchpin.  The key.  The big daddy.

Stop the production of stomach acid, and you open up the Mother of all Pandora’s boxes.  Stomach acid does not just participate in digestion, it STARTS it.  Among many other things.  Here is just a small sample of what stomach acid does in the human body:

1. The most obvious function is the digestion of proteins.
2. Most other digestive enzymes are produced in an inactive form (otherwise the enzymes would digest the very glands they are made in). Stomach acid activates these enzymes so they can work.
3. The pH of the stomach has to be low enough to tell the pancreas to release bicarbonate. Stomach acid ensures this happens.  Without it, the pH of the contents released from the stomach (chyme) stay acidic and can damage the entire length of the intestinal tract.
4. Stomach acid turns on certain anti-cancer compounds in foods (like indole-3-carbinol in cruciferous veggies).
5. Stomach acid is needed to absorb certain compounds like iron and B12.

There’s one other little ditty that stomach acid does.  There are very few microorganisms that can survive a pH of 2 or 3.  In other words, stomach acid sterilizes most things that try to make it through the stomach.

That means that if you do not have enough stomach acid because you are, say…taking Nexium…, bacteria will begin to grow in regions of the intestine that are not supposed to have bacteria growing in them.  The technical term for this is small intestine bacterial overgrowth (or SIBO, for short).

And if you want to pick something that can totally screw up your health, SIBO is a good first choice.  Having bacteria growing where it is not supposed to be begins to damage the lining of the small intestine, allowing things to get into your body that are not supposed to.  This can create massive amounts of inflammation everywhere, even in the brain.

Just in case you think I’m making this up, researchers in this particular study looked at the gut flora of the lower intestinal tract (microbiome) of 1827 healthy twins to see if proton pump inhibitor (PPI) use had any negative effects.

Here’s what they found in those PPI users:

• There was a lower number of normal gut bacteria (commensals).
• There was a lower microbial diversity (the “mark of death” when it comes to a healthy gut).
• There were a higher number bacterial from the oral cavity (again indicating that these bacterial are not getting killed off in the stomach), with a special mention of the Streptococcaceae family.

The list I gave earlier is really bad enough when it comes to destroying your health.  But when you add in a disruption to the microbiome, the sky’s the limit to how much damage long-term use is to your health.

And just what is “long-term?”  If you read the safety labels, then anything over 3 months is completely out of context of what these drugs are designed for.  That does not mean that I haven’t seen patients on these for DECADES.  THAT is a disaster waiting to happen.

But what about all those patients out there that make too much stomach acid and need these drugs?

I will go out on a limb and state that almost NO ONE who has reflux or gastritis makes too much stomach acid.  Quite frankly, short of a gastrin-producing tumor, it just doesn’t happen.  As a matter of fact, with stress and with aging, stomach acid production goes down.  It gets to the point where some 40% of women over 50 are not producing any stomach acid AT ALL (achlorhydria).

I’m not saying that stomach acid getting where it’s not supposed to be is a good thing, because it’s not.  What I am saying is that stomach acid is not the problem.  Usually, the problem is just the opposite.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve given digestive support to patients with gastritis or reflux and their symptoms went away.

Kind of ironic that this approach to totally opposed to the mainstream medical approach and yet seems to work very well.

All without destroying your microbiome and your long term health.  What a bargain.

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Pneumonia and Antibiotics? Surprisingly Bad Mix

IvicaNS / Adobe Stock

It never ceases to amaze me how much mainstream medicine has moved away from understanding and supporting normal physiology.

There was just a commentary in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) on primary prevention of atherosclerotic coronary heart disease. (in English: the article was about how to prevent a first heart attack)

I went into the article thinking it was going to cover lifestyle and targeted supplementation that has been shown, in medical research over the course of decades, to strongly prevent heart disease. Nope. The ENTIRE commentary was about how to determine when doctors should medicate with statins.

Sad, sad, sad state of affairs.

Vaccination is another aspect of mainstream medicine that has gone way off the deep end.  There are now strong recommendations to vaccinate all young children (girls and boys) with Gardasil for HPV.  This is NOT a cervical cancer vaccine and it has NOT, as of the date of this writing, been shown to lower the rates of cervical cancer.  Yes, this is correct.  It has been shown to lower the rates of higher grade lesions of the cervix, but not actual cervical cancer.  Medicine has taken a big leap here in saying that it protects against cervical cancer–this fallacy of using surrogate endpoints has fallen flat on its face many, many times before.

But wait! It gets worse…

What if one of the most common medical treatments actually derails something that is more effective than vaccination for a common condition. To twist this even further, what if the medical intervention is one that is the go-to treatment for the condition that a particular vaccine is designed for?

Regular readers already have an idea that I’m talking about the use of antibiotics wiping out normal, protective bacterial flora that does amazing things for your health.

Specifically, I’m talking about the use of antibiotics for pneumococcal pneumonia (Streptococcus pneumoniae). The type of pneumonia that medicine pushes the Prevnar vaccine throughout the entire lifespan, from infants to seniors.

This particular study puts all of this into perspective. In it, researchers looked at how the GUT bacteria could protect against LUNG infections. Here’s the specifics:

• It is well accepted that the gut microbiota supports BODYWIDE immune response.
• Researchers wiped out the gut microbiota of mice and then infected them with S. pneumoniae.
• When the gut microbiota was wiped out, there was more bacterial spread into the body, more, organ damage and higher death rates.
• When the bacteria was wiped out, the immune cells in the lung did not respond as strongly to bacterial debris (LPS and lipoteichoic acid) and the white blood cells had less ability to destroy the invading bacteria (phagocytosis).
• When a fecal transplant was done (yeah—sounds like something I’d sign up for…), bacterial counts in the lungs dropped back down to normal.
• After the fecal transplant, the immune system calmed down as well (TNF-α and IL-10).

In summary, the gut bacteria played a very, very strong role in fighting off Streptococcal pneumoniae infections in the lung.

Think about this. Having a healthy microbiome in your gut plays a role in fighting off bacterial infections in the lung. This means that the use of antibiotics for a bacterial pneumonia will PREDISPOSE YOU FOR FUTURE INFECTIONS by decimating your gut microbiome.

Staggering.

The mainstream medical approach to “preventing” pneumonia is to give the Prevnar vaccination (which I’ve written about how the potential pitfalls of this vaccination that can be read by clicking here). With the the same hand, your primary care doctor or pulmonologist will not hesitate to give you antibiotics to combat any number of infections, bacterial, viral or otherwise.

So what does this mean if you’re seemingly getting respiratory infections every time the wind changes direction? I would suggest you bombard your immune system with positive karma the second you’ve got the slightest indication of an infection. Vitamin C (at high doses—not 500 mg), vitamin D, vitamin A, no refined carbs and exercise (yes—exercise—raises your core body temp and helps your immune system fight off the infection better). And NO antibiotics unless you’re on your death bed with a fever of 104.

Over time (years, actually), your gut microbiome will recover to the point where it can help you fight infections in other areas of the body. If not, and you continue to use antibiotics at the drop of a dime, your immune system will NEVER stand on its own.

Never.

 

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Artificial Sweeteners and Bad Decisions-Surprising Links

Timothy Masters / Dollar Photo Club

Despite the mounting evidence on just how bad they are for us, artificial sweeteners remain on the market in just about everything we consume.

Think that just because you avoid diet sodas you’re safe?  Bought any chewing gum lately?  Use any protein workout drinks?  Did your doctor recommend Medifast shakes?  How about pretty much anything advertised as “no sugar added?”  You get the idea.  Unless you go out of your way to avoid them, you are probably taking in artificial sweeteners in a variety of products on pretty much a daily basis.

I do honestly believe that society is finally starting to understand that these compounds are not all they are cracked up to be.  The heavy hitters involved are aspartame (Nutrisweet), sucralose (Splenda) and acesulfame postassium (acesulfame K).  There are other natural sweeteners that are better alternatives, although I still recommend working towards using any type of added sweetener as little as possible.  These natural sweeteners include stevia, monk fruit and the sugar alcohols (xylitol, erythritol, sorbitol).

Artificial sweeteners first came on the market in an attempt to help reduce overall caloric consumption and stem off the tide of obesity and diabetes.  It all sounded like a good idea–how could it not work??

Well, it didn’t (and hasn’t).  Every current study looking at the effects of artificial sweeteners finds that they contribute to diabetes and obesity.  Quite the opposite of the intention.

So how did this happen when it seems to make sense on the front end?

Here are some clues:

• Artificial sweeteners alter the gut bacteria (microbiome) in mice.  Given the strong links between the microbiome and obesity, any uncontrolled alterations in the balance could spell disaster.
• Artificial sweeteners alter our perception of taste, especially in children, leading us to look for more and more “sweet” in our dietary choices.
• Sucralose has been shown to lower levels of brown fat, the wondrous type of fat that acts as a calorie-burner in our bodies.

With just this alone, it should be enough for you to swear off artificial sweeteners permanently.  But, just in case it isn’t, there’s one very interesting finding that you really need to know.  And it deals heavily with the choices that we make when it comes to our health and life.

Anytime we have to make a “deeper” decision on something, there is a reserve that we tap into.  This is opposed to run-of-the-mill quick decisions such as deciding whether or not to stay in the middle lane of traffic or the center lane.

This reserve in our brain requires energy, most typically in the form of sugar.  As we make decisions throughout the day, that energy gets depleted.  This is exactly why you should focus your attentions on things that are more important immediately after breakfast, lunch or dinner.

In this particular study, researchers used two types of lemonade to see if participants could avoid the depletion of decision making (referred to as “ego” in the context of the study).  One had sugar, the other the all-evil Splenda.

The exact test used was the Stroop test, which involves a deeper level of thinking to make sure you get the answers correct.

As time went on in the normal lemonade group, there was no breakdown of ego as the participants performed the Stroop test.  These findings suggest that glucose is an important factor in making sure we retain the ability to make good decisions, even after our brains have been given the run-around.

But what about the Splenda lemonade group?  There was no protection from the artificial crap.

What does this mean?  It potentially means that the use of artificial sweeteners in our daily lives are depriving our brains of what we need to make good decisions throughout the day.  These decisions could make for poor choices, like whether or not to drive home or go straight to the gym.  Or whether or not to make a healthy dinner or stop for fast food on the way home instead (AND skip the gym…).

You get the point.

 

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Knee Surgery for Torn Meniscus – Best to Leave it Alone?

Natural Treatments for arthritis

There are a few things that have managed to make it into “everyday thinking” despite the fact that it is more dogma than reality. Knee injuries are one of these things.

If you injure your knee and tear something, whether one of the supporting ligaments or one of the two meniscus (or is it menisci??), you’re going to have to have surgery.

I was personally one of these back in 1987 when I tore the medial meniscus of my right knee and had a portion of it removed surgically. If only I had known then what I know now…

The problem with evaluating whether or not surgery for a particular condition works is that we just don’t do placebo surgeries—it’s an ethical problem. Kind of like a placebo-controlled trial on whether parachutes are safer while skydiving. We just don’t do placebo surgeries.  Or at least we didn’t until 2002 when the Houston VA medical center decided to do a placebo-controlled surgical trial of patients with knee pain who went under the knife for “debridement,” or a clean-out to get rid of damaged tissue hanging around in the knee joint.

Turns out there was no difference between those who had the full surgery and those who had the placebo surgery.  Truly ground shaking outcomes considering that this type of procedure is done some 800,000 times per year in the US alone.

But I really don’t think that many surgeons truly changed based on the evidence of this study over a decade ago. From an insurance standpoint, it was pretty easy for the surgeon to just say he was going in to fix a meniscal tear.  And this sounded like a good idea because the back part of the medial meniscus (posterior horn) is commonly torn and it does not have a very good blood supply so healing just isn’t going to happen without surgical intervention to go in and remove the torn meniscus.

There are a couple of problems with this thinking.

The first problem is a biggie and has to do with how we determine whether or not there is any damage to the knee using MRI. Many people mistakenly believe that MRI is an exact science and that, if something is “found” on MRI, it’s the thing that is causing the problem.

Study and after has concluded that there is very little correlation to what is found on MRI and a patient’s symptoms. That’s not to say that that torn medial meniscus on your MRI is not causing you pain, it’s just that we can’t know for sure. And I can tell you, from treating hundreds of knees over the years, that a huge chunk of knee pain comes from the soft tissues surrounding the knees (muscles, ligaments, fascia) and not from what is going on inside the knee.

Fix these tissues and the knee pain goes away, regardless of whether or not the meniscus is affected by the treatment. But very few knee pain patients manage to find their way into physician’s offices that are truly competent with addressing these tissues. Part of this may be because they aren’t aware that these types of treatments even exist—It’s the surgeon’s office to MRI to physical therapy and back to the surgeon to schedule the procedure. Kind of circular.

The second problem has to do with this particular study. In it, researchers looked to answer the question about whether surgery to repair a degenerative meniscus tear (as opposed to one that happens from trauma) actually does squat. Specifically, they were interested in whether self-reported locking or catching would be improved by partial meniscectomy (since it is increasingly well-established that doing the surgery for pain alone is not beneficial).

Seventy patients underwent the real surgery to remove a portion of the medial meniscus and 76 had a sham surgery done. Here’s what they found:

• Thirty-two patients (46%) in the true surgery group reported catching or locking before surgery; after surgery that number was 49%.
• Of the fake surgery group, 37 (49%) reported catching or locking before surgery; after “surgery” the number was 43%.

In other words, some $50,000 later, risk of injection and time off and pain for rehab, there was pretty much no difference between the groups.

Studies like these and the other ones mentioned in this article are blowing open the doors of the dogma that surrounds knees injuries, findings on MRI and the value of arthroscopic surgery.  This is not to say that there is not value to the surgical options, but you better damn well be sure you see someone who truly understands how to asses and treat the soft tissues surrounding the knee before you go under the knife.

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Dairy and Your Brain; Quit it Before You Lose It

oraziopuccio / Dollar Photo Club

There are times that I think that maybe I’m off base when it comes to my dislike for dairy products and my recommendation to avoid it.

After all, the recommendation to have at least 3 servings of dairy daily is firmly entrenched in just about every public health recommendation since, well like…forever.  And the commercials that you hear just about every day make it sound like milk, cheese and yogurt will make you grow tall and strong and lift small SUVs without breaking a sweat or pulling a hamstring.

(Not quite sure where the “strong teeth and muscles” comes from—don’t think I have ever come across any study ever that evaluates this relationship—I’m pretty sure it’s purely a marketing ploy)

The belief that dairy is so an essential component of good health is so strong that many patients feel embarrassed or ashamed that they don’t take in the necessary servings, all the time confident that their bones are pretty much melting into sludge.

But where did all this come from??  Who’s the first one to look at a cow’s udder dangling there and think…”Hey!!  I’ve gotta get me some of THAT!!?

I know I’ve asked this hypothetical question before, but how would you react if you saw a teenager walk up to mom and start nursing?  I’m guessing you’d be appalled and disgusted, but this action is actually be somewhat more acceptable because at least mom would be the same species.  Try to name another mammal that continues to drink mom’s milk after it’s weaned.  You can’t because there isn’t one.

There’s only one real answer as to why we continue to believe that dairy is a health food.  Marketing.  REALLY, REALLY good marketing.

That the only logical answer because it sure as heck ain’t coming from solid research.  (Just in case you think that I’m making this up, feel free to browse through my well-referenced eBook on the evils of dairy by clicking here)

And while dairy has been linked to obesity, diabetes, poor bone health as well as prostate and ovarian cancer, I don’t know that I’ve come across any studies linking dairy consumption and brain damage.

At least, not until now.

But before that, a brief primer on Parkinson’s disease…

Parkinson’s disease is a condition where the brain cells in a certain area of the brain have died off to the point where they can no longer do their job.  Specifically, the dopamine-producing cells in a region of the brain called the substantia nigra die off over time until they can no longer produce enough dopamine to suppress muscle movement.  That’s where the resting tremor comes from—the substantia nigra is not producing enough dopamine to apply the brakes on the muscular system with it’s at rest.

It is estimated that, at the time of diagnosis, those with Parkinson’s have lost 70% of these brain cells.  Don’t know about you, but that sounds like a LOT of brain cells to lose in any one region.

With this in mind, let’s go back to this particular study.  In it, researchers looked at the brains of a group of 449 men (aged 45-68) who had been living in Hawaii to determine how well new nerve cells were being produced in the substantia nigra and how this related to overall dairy intake.  In addition, the researchers looked at the levels of the organochlorine pesticide hepatachlor epoxide residues present in these brains (this pesticide was heavily used in the 1980’s in Hawaii and ended up in the milk).

Here’s what they found:

• Those who consumed the highest levels of milk (>16 oz/day, or 2 glasses) had 41.5% lower brain cell density.
• In this highest group of milk consumers, 90% of them had pesticide residues when compared to those who drank no milk (63.4%).
• For smokers, this relationship between milk intake and brain cells was not present.

So what’s the take-home message here?

First of all, commercially grown dairy cows are notoriously high in pesticide residues even if they weren’t raised in Hawaii in the 80’s.  If you are still compelled, for some strange reason, to take in dairy products, stick with organic when possible.

Second, if you’re a smoker, you don’t have to worry about dairy intake—you’re already damaging your brain as much as you possibly can be.

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Whooping Cough — Is there REALLY an Epidemic?

Richard Villalon / Dollar Photo Club

Vaccine preventable diseases are all over social media and the news.  Measles, the Flu, whooping cough. And you can’t discuss these without polarizing the vaccination crowds.

Both sides.

For me, the discussion is never balanced with the facts.  Both sides rely more on emotions than facts when the answer usually lies somewhere in between.  But when it comes to whooping cough, I think the entire medical community is missing the story.  But, before we go into what the story really is, there are a few “housekeeping” things we need to get out of the way as it relates to Bordetella pertussis:

• Pertussis can be diagnosed by the presence of a cough (without any other known cause) of at least 2 weeks along with paroxysms of coughing, inspiratory “whoop,” posttussive vomiting, apnea (with or without cyanosis) in infants under one year of age, or a lab confirmation of Bordetella presence.
• While antibiotics are ALWAYS given, they actually don’t alter the course of the disease, but of course go a long way towards wiping out the microbiome.
• Beginning in 1991, the acellular version of the vaccine was used because the side effects of the prior vaccination were too great.  This vaccine, however, does not reduce the spread of the disease and may actually INCREASE the likelihood of spreading the disease.
• Whooping cough vaccine MASSIVELY increases the risk of pertussis being caused by a cousin in the same family, B. parapertussis.
• It has become increasingly clear that the vaccine, in general, pretty much sucks at preventing whooping cough.
• And, if it is effective, the protection is far, far shorter than we ever envisioned

All in all, the news is not exactly sparkling when it comes to the prevention of whooping cough through vaccination.  And, more importantly, these findings noted above are not any different today then they were when the acellular version was introduced 25 years ago.

This means that, for the entire 2 1/2 decades that this vaccination has been in use, society has not been nearly as protected as medicine thought it was.  And this means that whooping cough has been present among us for this entire time.  There is no reason to think that, all of a sudden, for no particular reason, the vaccination has lost efficacy in the past few years, leading to an epidemic of pertussis–this thought process just doesn’t make sense.

And yet we still consider identified groups of pertussis infections as “outbreaks.”  In a recent research study on the effectiveness of pertussis vaccination, researchers concluded that, since the vaccine performed so poorly, “…the data clearly indicates that the acellular vaccines (both DTaP and Tdap) are not working for as long as previously hoped, and that new vaccines may be necessary.”

Yes.  That’s going to be the answer.  More vaccinations to pile on top of the already-ineffective vaccine.  Someone’s going to make a LOT more money off of these findings.

Rather then throw more vaccinations at the problem, maybe we should spend more time on how to boost the immune system to combat whooping cough more effectively with things like vitamins D, C and A as well as locally grown honey in hot tea to help combat the cough (although, once it kicks off, not much is going to help control the cough, natural or otherwise).

After all, we’ve been fighting it off for 25 years without any help and doing pretty well-imagine how much better things could be with some nutritional support.

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Want to Lose Weight?? Enlist the Help of a Friend

vlorzor / Dollar Photo Club

What if I told you that you could lose weight without doing a darn thing, so long as you had some help from a friend?

Sounds like an ad for the newest wonder supplement for weight loss.  Get this great new weight loss product for $3 (just pay $59.95 for shipping and handling) with a money back guarantee (not including the S & H).

But no.  This is something far more legit (and free, by the way…).

But first, we need to review the different types of body fat.  And not just the unwanted fat that hangs around your middle and organs and increases your risk of all those nasty chronic diseases.  There are three types of body fat:

1. White fat–the bad stuff that does nothing but sit there and cause problems
2. Brown fat–fat that burns calories like crazy to produce heat; as close to the answer for weight gain that the human body has
3. Beige fat–an in-between state of fat as it transitions from useless white fat to the desirable brown fat

Until recently, scientists thought the brown fat was only present in babies and bats.  As humans age, they lose brown fat, never to get back those heat-generating, calorie-burning fat cells.

Or, at least that’s what we thought.  Turns out that we can actually “brown” our white fat cells, changing the makeup of the fat cell so that it begins to burn calories to generate heat.  On the flip side, certain lifestyle choices have been shown to lower the amount of brown fat.  Some of these are very simple to implement.  Most notable of these is the use of artificial sweeteners (just in case you’re STILL using them to lose weight, this little factoid should wake you up).  I’ve covered many of these factors in a previous article that can be read by clicking here.

The one factor that I need to review in the context of this blog article has to do with exposure to cooler temps.  In a small study, volunteers who were exposed to cooler temps (60 degrees F) for 6 hours per day increased his or her brown fat by a respectable 37% in 10 short days.

Pretty cool.  It certainly makes sense for our bodies to raise the internal thermostat (so to speak) when exposed to short term cold.  It’s about adaptation.  But how exactly does this happen?  This group of researchers turned to mice to get a better grip on how this happens.

And the results are pretty surprising.

In this particular study, researchers exposed mice to slowly colder temps over the course of a month and watched how the mice’s bodies responded.  But they ALSO kept an eye on the bacteria in the gut.  Here’s what they found:

• The cold exposure led to a dramatic shift of the bacteria in the gut (microbiome).
• The cold mice developed more brown and beige fat, lost weight and had lower diabetes markers.
• Here’s the shocking part–transplantation of the cold mice microbiome into germ-free mice LED TO THESE SAME POSITIVE CHANGES.
• But before all of you living in the frigid tundra of Minnesota, prolonged cold led to adaptive changes–the gut actually enlarged to make sure it could grab even more calories to support the brown fat burning calories (increasing intestinal, villi, and microvilli lengths).

To make this even more interesting, the researchers were able to pinpoint a particular bacteria, Akkermansia muciniphila, as having the most potent effect.  Which may not be surprising–I have covered this bacteria before in its ability to fight off diabetes and its relationship with well-trained athletes.

Back to my opening statement.  Yes, you can lose weight during next to nothing.  All you have to do is find a friend to freeze his or her butt off for 10 days and then do a fecal transplant from your cold-adapted friend.

Better be a pretty good friend….

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Drug Treatment for Depression “Bad to the Bone?”

The understanding of the relationship between bone, the gut and diabetes has had exponential gains in the past few years.

Heck–just the fact that there IS a relationship is new news.  For pretty much forever, we have viewed bone as a static tissue that holds stuff up and a place to attach muscles to.  But every system in our body connects and has an impact on every other system; bone is no exception.

We cannot treat “systems” in a bubble and not expect to have an impact on other systems.  In this particular review, authors look at the relationship between serotonin and bone health.

Two-thirds of the body’s serotonin is produced not in the brain, but in the gut.   Higher stress (poor digestion, drugs that increase serotonin levels like the SSRIs, etc…) will actually damage bone growth.  Stress out the gut, produce more serotonin, and you’ll have less bone.

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Common Heart Treatments Increase Heart Disease??

You follow your cardiologist’s advice, thinking it will protect you in the long run.  But what if this is not the case?

It will come to no surprise for regular readers of my blog that I think that lifestyle changes are the ONLY answer for heart disease.  Unfortunately, many patients opt not to make the right changes, or worse–these changes are not even discussed with patients because of a lack of knowledge on the part of the provider.

This particular study looks at outcomes of medical treatment (i.e. drugs), coronary angioplasty (PCI) or open heart surgery (CABG) ten years later.  Here’s the disturbing findings after following 611 patients who had CABG, PCI or standard medical therapy (MT=drugs):

• 10-year rates of needing additional invasive procedures (revascularizations) were 7.4% with CABG, 41.9% with PCI, and 39.4% with MT.
• Those in the drug only group had a 235% higher risk of future cardiac events (including deaths) than in the CABG group.
• Those in the PCI group had a 185% higher risk of future cardiac events than in the CABG group.
• 10-year rates of freedom from angina were 64% with CABG, 59% with PCI, and 43% with MT (P<0.001).

The bottom line?  Medical treatment or PCI actually INCREASED the risk of the need for more stents, heart attacks and / or cardiac death.

Wow.  I know that it SOUNDS like doing procedures is a good thing and it all seems well and dandy on paper, but when translated to the patient the outcomes just don’t work out.  So it boils down to having your sternum cracked open and some blood vessels taken from another area of your body to replace the disease ones that are needed to get nutrients and oxygen to your heart.

Or…

Eat better / stress less / exercise.  Hmmm…tough decision…

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When it Comes to Vaccination, Mother Nature Always Wins

In some cases, the vaccination game is like a giant “wac-a-mole” game.  You smash down one infectious disease only to have another, more powerful bug rise up in it’s place.

The Prevnar vaccination against the Streptococcus pneumoniae bacteria was originally designed against just 6 of the types of this bacteria that can cause ear infections, pneumonia and meningitis.

Sounds great, right?

But, as I mentioned in the title, Mother Nature doesn’t appreciate us trying to best her.

In this particular article, research looked at what happened to the type 19A, a type of this bacteria that is harder to kill with antibiotics, when the Prevnar 7 vaccine was introduced.  Here’s what they found when they looked at the bacteria hiding in 948 infants given different Prevnar vaccinatin schedules (2 doses of Prevnar-7 at age 2 and and again at 4 months; 3 doses at 2, 4, and 11 months; or no vaccinating as the control group) :

• In those who received the 3-dose vaccination schedule, there was a 75% higher risk of having the more dangerous 19A present (16.2% vs 9.2% in the unvaccinated).
• In the 2-dose schedule, these infants were 43% more likely to harbor 19A (13.2% vs 9.2%).

Luckily, after this was realized, on a white horse rode Prevnar 13, which now included the 19A.  But then everyone who had been vaccinated to get vaccinated again.

Wow.  I really wish I had a financial machine like this.  Make billions on the first product that creates a bigger problem, than make MORE money fixing the problem they solved!  And everyone thinks BP Petrolum is the evil corporate giant…

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Info on Heart Failure Your Cardiologist Probably Doesn’t Know

McCarony/Dollar Photo Club

Heart disease remains the biggest killer in the Western world. This is despite billions of dollars pumped into this condition.

Billions of dollars into research, drug development, drug use and cardiology procedures. And yet, all we have to show for it is a slight reduction in deaths from heart disease, but an increasing number of people living with heart disease.

What this tells me is that we are getting better at keeping people alive who have had a heart attack, but we still suck at doing anything to keep people from getting there in the first place.  Most cardiologists and primary care doctors would point to the statin class of drugs as the singlemost important discovery in cardiologist ever.

Which pretty much explains why we’re in the mess we’re in because statins pretty much suck at preventing heart disease. Period. (in case you think this isn’t true, I’d invite you to read through my 100+ page eBook on cholesterol and we can talk after that…)

One thing we HAVE discovered from all the billions of dollars that have gone into cardiovascular research is that heart disease is almost 100% preventable.

Yup.

Seems hard to reconcile that the #1 killer in the Western world is almost entirely preventable. All we need to do is exercise more and eat better.

Except that it’s not quite that simple.

At the surface, yes, healthy dietary choices, not smoking and exercising regularly will eliminate a huge chunk of heart disease in this country. Then there’s the specifics, things like:

1. Short burst aerobic exercise instead of merely walking 30 minutes a day
2. More healthy fats (monounsaturated, omega-3) instead of trans and omega-6 fats
3. Managing stress
4. Avoiding refined carbohydrates and eat more whole grains
5. Avoiding toxic environmental chemical exposure like BPA

But sometimes the answers are far more complex. And way beyond the realm of the average cardiologist.

You see, the human body has never respected the artificial boundaries of medical specialties that we have created. The examples of neurology crossing into gastroenterology, endocrinology crossing into cardiology and obstetrics crossing into psychology are all over the place.

This particular article is no different. In it, researchers looked at 60 stable patients with mild CHF (half with NYHA functional class I to II) and moderate to severe CHF (half with NYHA functional class III to IV) and evaluated the composition of the inhabitants of the gut. Here’s what they found when these heart failure patients were compared to normal patients:

• The entire heart failure population had massive quantities of pathogenic bacteria and Candida.

You can bet these findings will be the key topic of discussion at the next joint Cardiovascular / Gastroenterology convention.

(Yeah, don’t hold your breath waiting for the invite to this event…)

But seriously, these are some VERY striking differences between the heart failure patients and the normal participants. The question is whether the changes in the gut were the cause or the result of the chronic heart failure.

As with everything, the answer likely lies somewhere in between. We already have strong evidence that the bacteria in the gut contribute to obesity and diabetes. It would not be a big stretch to link bad bacteria balance in the gut with the later development of heart disease.

Personally, I’ll keep an eye on the research as it comes out over the next few years linking the gut bacteria and heart disease. In the meantime, I would do everything possible to make sure I’m living a lifestyle that is consistent with a healthy bacterial flora in the gut as well as avoiding antibiotics in all but the most life-threatening situations.

Your heart will must likely thank you for it.

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Should All Patients with a Migraine See a Chiropractor?

Ok..given my bias everyone probably knows my answer here.

It never ceases to amaze me when a patient has had headaches for years or even decades that have never been to a chiropractor.  Given the evidence, it really should be considered malpractice (lack of informed consent) for a neurologist to NOT refer to a doctor of chiropractic for an evaluation of any headache patient.

And yet the referral to a chiropractor who specializes in soft tissue treatment of the neck almost never happens.  It is the migraine sufferer that loses out.

Just how common is neck pain in migraine headache sufferers?  This particular article looks at this question in 113 migraineurs, who had headache frequencies ranging from episodic to chronic migraine.  These headaches sufferers were examined by headache medicine specialists to confirm the diagnosis of migraine and rule out both cervicogenic headache and fibromyalgia.

For each attack over the next few months, sufferers recorded the whether nausea was present as well as the intensity of headache and neck pain (graded as none, mild, moderate, or severe).  Here’s what they found:

• There were 2411 headache days, 786 of which were migraines.
• The majority of migraines were in the moderate pain stage.
• Regardless of the intensity of headache pain, neck pain was a more frequently present than was nausea.
• Those diagnosed with chronic daily headache were more likely to have neck pain.

So what does this mean?  From a standard migraine approach, this means that, although the presence of nausea is a characteristic of a migraine headache, neck pain (which is not a characteristic) is actually more common.

From my standpoint of almost 20 years of treating migraine patients, we have totally, absolutely missed the ball.  Since most headache specialist do not touch the patient and wouldn’t even know how to treat problems in the neck is he or she found them, these patients are mis-diagnosed.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had patients come in with a diagnosis of “migraine” only to have the headaches go away with soft tissue treatment of the neck structures combined with manipulation.  These were NOT migraines.  Migraines generally do not respond as well to manual therapies, but most often need a lifestyle overhaul to manage the headaches.

The bottom line?  Neck pain is strongly associated with headaches.  If you have headaches, it is absolutely essential for you to find a chiropractor competent in soft tissue treatment to see if this will help.

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Does Your Cardiologist Perform this Invasive Procedure?

If you have any interactions with a cardiologist, this is a must read.  And read VERY carefully.

Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is the procedure where a stent is (almost always) placed into a coronary artery.  Most know this as coronary angioplasty.  This procedure largely did not even exist a decade ago (it began to blossom in the late 80’s, but it seems to me like the past decade has seen major increases).   It has created an entire field within cardiology called interventional cardiology.

It has been established that coronary angioplasty for non-emergency chest pain really does nothing but makes the patient feel better temporarily, until they actually have a heart attack sometime in the near future.  To make this a little more problematic, this is NOT a cheap procedure (runs around $35K) and has its list of side effects, including death.

But does your cardiologist know this?  In this particular study, researchers asked this very same question of a group of 27 cardiologists (10 interventional and 17 referring).  Here’s what they found:

• 63% of cardiologists surveyed agreed that PCI is ONLY good for symptom relief.  Symptom relief only.
• Almost 3/4 of patients felt that, without the PCI, they would definitely suffer a heart attack in the next 5 years
• 88% of patients, however, mistakenly believed this procedure would prevent a future heart .  Talk about a disconnect!
• The real deeper problem here, however, is that, despite the fact that this procedure would only manage symptoms and not really fix anything, 43% of cardiologists would STILL PERFORM THE PROCEDURE!!

Yes–almost half of the cardiologist would still perform a $35,000 procdure with death as a potential side effect that does little other than help with chest pain.

And your insurance will gladly pay for it.  No wonder our system is so screwed up!

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Are Your Cooking Pans Damaging Your Child’s Health?

You know those wonderful, non-stick pans that you love so well?  I hope you realize that many of today’s “conveniences” like non-stick cookware come with a price beyond the initial purchase.

The wonderful Teflon that keeps all your foods from sticking to the pan is no exception.  The chemical compounds typically found in non-stick cookware include 25 cent words like perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) and perfluorooctanesulfonate (PFOS).  Toxic compounds like these have been found to affect thyroid function, cancer risk and heart disease.

In this particular study, researchers looked at the relationship between PFOA and PFOS levels and cholesterol levels in 12,476 children.  Here’s what they found:

• PFOA was linked to higher total cholesterol and LDL-C
• PFOS was linked to higher total cholesterol, HDL-C, and LDL-C

Even if these compounds were not linked to heart-disease-friendly changes in blood lipids, do we really want something called “perfluorooctanoic acid” in our children’s blood anyway when the word is too long to even fit on a Scrabble board??

Toss your non-stick cookware and buy stainless steel.

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Have I Mentioned that Prediabetes is Bad for the Heart?

I have said before that, from my standpoint, diabetes and heart disease are the same thing.

Seventy percent of diabetics die of cardiovascular causes.   Almost all heart disease sufferers have some trace of diabetes or prediabetes.  The lifestyle changes that impact one impact the other, both negative and protective.

In the medical research over the past few years, there has been a very strong push towards using a compound called brain natriuretic peptide (BNP) to estimate risk for heart attacks and strokes.

In this particular study, research found that the more prediabetic factors someone had, the higher his or her levels of BNP.

You can rest assured that this is because a drug to control BNP levels would then be a brand new blockbuster drug worth untold billions of dollars.  In the end, this would really just create another drug to dance around the problem of insulin and the cell not playing well together and not actually fix anything but a number found on bloodwork.

Just like blood pressure meds, diabetic drugs and statins for cholesterol.

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