Dr. Soram's Integrative Medicine
Practical Complementary and Alternative Medicine
It’s no stretch, then, to think that food can also influence our behaviors — and it does. According to cutting-edge research, eating a healthy diet affects much more than your weight and health. It’s been linked to decreases in violence, rudeness and antisocial behavior and increases in IQs, test scores and grades among students.
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Cholesterol, of course, is composed of two types: the good “HDL” (high-density lipoprotein) cholesterol and the bad “LDL” (low-density lipoprotein) variety.
Most Americans focus on reducing LDL cholesterol as a key part of their treatment regimen. However, a new study found that having too little good cholesterol is at least as damaging when it comes to heart disease as having too much of the bad kind, and it may even be more damaging.
This American tradition has much older roots than most people know, and actually didn’t originate in America at all. In fact, it’s said that the first fireworks came from China in the 800s, when bamboo shoots were filled with gunpowder and set off at the New Year to ward off evil spirits.
What else do you not know, but secretly want to, about fireworks?
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Look 10 Pounds Lighter AND More Confident
Many posture enthusiasts claim that the correct posture can instantly make you look 10 pounds lighter. Meanwhile, sitting or standing upright is key to looking confident and displaying that confidence to others.
With the correct posture you can look taller, slimmer and at ease with who you are. Compare that to someone who is slumped over in their work chair, slouching while they walk or hunched up in general, and the difference is obvious, at least from the outside.
In fact, common objects people deal with day-in and day-out can be extremely dangerous to the eyes. According to the U.S. Eye Injury Registry, 90 percent of eye injuries in the home could be prevented if precautions were taken. Here we’ve compiled some of the leading causes of eye injuries and urge you to play it safe when it comes to your eyes.
1. Household Chemicals
Chemicals like bleach, ammonia, cleaning agents, pesticides and others can burn your eyes’ delicate tissues. When using any chemicals in your home, wear goggles, make sure the area is well-ventilated and be sure the nozzle is pointed away from your face before you spray.
Although most cancer deaths are caused by melanoma–about 7,800 of the total 10,600 skin cancer deaths each year–non-melanoma skin cancers are a serious concern.
And, they’ve been increasing among young adults for the last 30 years, according to a new study published in the August 10 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). Said Leslie Christenson, M.D., Mayo Clinic dermatologist and lead investigator of the study:
“Because non-melanoma skin cancers generally occur in persons after 50, very little attention has been paid to their incidence in younger adults and children. We have discovered that these cancers are becoming increasingly prevalent in younger people, and if steps are not taken at a young age to prevent these cancers, we may see an exponential increase in the overall occurrence of non-melanoma skin cancers.”
Needless to say, a staggering number of people are being affected by this disease, to the tune of over $316 billion in costs for health care services, medications and lost productivity. Of course, if you suffer from heart disease or a heart attack, the impact on your life can take a toll that’s much greater than that, in the form of serious disability or even death.
Knowing the warning signs for heart disease is essential for all Americans, as the sooner you notice there may be a problem, the sooner you can take steps to fix it.
A new study done at the University of Basil Switzerland, and led by Stefan Borgwardt, MD, PhD, has now shown that drinking a green tea extract can enhance memory performance. This may have important practical applications for the treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders such as cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s disease.
Green tea has been discussed for a long time as a tool to use to improve memory. Studies have shown that it does improve cognitive functioning in mice. Several preliminary studies have been done in humans.
This study is unique because it is the “first evidence for the putative beneficial effect of green tea on cognitive functioning, in particular, on working memory processing at the neural system level by suggesting changes in short – term plasticity of the parietal – frontal brain connections”, as stated by the authors.
The special thing about this study is that they used Functional MRI (fMRI), to actually view the subjects brains functioning when they were given green tea in different concentrations or a placebo. The subjects in this study were 12 healthy male students in their early 20’s. The researchers were so careful to avoid any placebo effect, that they did not let the 12 students in the study even drink the green tea drink! They were required to to swallow a feeding tube and given the drink through the tube so that they could not taste it!
Functional MRI scanning allowed the researchers to actually watch the brain working after each of the students “drank” their drink and then did the tasks that they were asked to do while in the fMRI machine. The researchers specifically noticed that there was an increase in connectivity between the parietal lobe of the brain and the frontal lobe of the brain, which went along with the improvement in the performance of tasks that the students were given while they were in the MRI machine.
To me, this is extremely exciting research! With the new technologies including functional MRI, scientists are now able to prove in very objective ways much of the traditional “folklore” that has been handed down regarding nutritional supplements. This is the gateway to the future of healthcare, where we can individualize treatment for each patient according to their needs.
Certainly, if you have older friends or family who are complaining of memory issues, you can recommend them to have some green tea to help!
Let me know your thoughts!
References
Green tea extract enhances parieto-frontal connectivity during working memory processing.
Vitamin D is back in the news again with three new articles about the benefits of vitamin D in the last few months. All three of the articles show that higher vitamin D levels improve longevity.
The first article recently out came from researchers at the prominent German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg. The researchers looked at five studies that involved a total of 4413 breast cancer patients and five studies that included 2330 colorectal cancer patients. After analyzing these studies they showed a 38% average lower risk of dying from any cause, and a 42% lower risk of dying from breast cancer, when they compared the highest to the lowest levels of vitamin D blood levels. In this study, looking at colorectal cancer there was a 29% lower risk for all causes of death and a 35% lower risk for colorectal cancer death again when the highest to lowest category of vitamin D levels was compared.
The authors of the article, Haafi Maalmi, M.D., [and colleagues are quoted as saying “The rather consistent results found in our meta-– analysis suggest vitamin D supplementation might bear potential to improve prognosis among colorectal and breast cancer patients, a suggestion that should be followed up and tested in randomized controlled trials.”
Again, this study was epidemiological and the gold standard by conventional medicine is the double-blind crossover placebo-controlled trial which they are encouraging to be done.
The second recent article on the benefits of vitamin D was published in the prominent British Medical Journal. The authors, Rajiv Chowdhury. M.D., and colleagues did another meta-analysis and found that those with higher blood levels of vitamin D had a lower risk of death from any cause over follow-up periods that range from .3 to 29 years. This team of researchers also found a reduction in the risk of premature death in association with the use of vitamin D supplements.
In all, they looked at 73 studies and the association between vitamin D levels and cause of death in 849,412 men and women over the follow-up period of time.
This research also showed a 35% higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease or from any cause over the follow-up period of time in those patients whose vitamin D levels were in the lowest one third of all patients in comparison to those whose levels were in the highest one third.
The authors stated in the article that “Supplementation with vitamin D3 significantly reduces overall mortality among older adults; however, before any widespread supplementation, further investigations will be required to establish the optimal dose and duration and whether vitamin D3 and D2 have different effects on mortality risk”. Again like the Institute of Medicine, they say to keep waiting until the studies are done before you take Vitamin D ! I do not agree at all, as there is no harm in normalizing your vitamin D level!
The third recent study, that in my opinion put the icing on the cake about taking vitamin D was just published this month in the American Journal of Public Health. This article was authored by Cedric Garland, DrPH, and colleagues. Dr. Garland is one of the doctors who wrote a frontispiece for my recent book on vitamin D.
In this article they looked at the relationship between vitamin D levels and all causes of mortality. They researched articles from the year 1996 to January 2013. They identified 32 studies that looked at this information and they pulled the data together.
When they compared those people with the lowest levels of vitamin D to the highest level of vitamin D, the risk of death for the low vitamin D patients was almost 200% higher! This is an astonishing finding. In the article, their definition of the highest levels of vitamin D was simply to have a blood level over 30 ng/mL. Dr. Garland and co-authors say that simply taking 1000 thousand IU of vitamin D per day could achieve this level of 30 ng/mL for the entire population of the United States.
As my patients and readers know, I still recommend that my patients keep their blood levels between 40 and 70 ng/mL for optimum health. In order to achieve this, a level higher than 1000 IU per day will be required. Blood tests will also need to be followed when using these higher doses.
I recommend to all my patients and readers that they get a vitamin D blood test along with their annual physical every year. Just like you will get a cholesterol level every year, please get a vitamin D level as well. Also remind your friends or family who may have cancer to check with her oncologist to see if vitamin D would be helpful to them.
References
1.Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels and survival in colorectal and breast cancer patients: systematic review and meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies PMID: 24582912
2.Vitamin D and risk of cause specific death: systematic review and meta-analysis of observational cohort and randomised intervention studies. PMID: 24690623
3.Meta-analysis of All-Cause Mortality According to Serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D
For most dads it’s not about doing more. In fact, it is likely more about doing less and just being there by his side, sharing your memories of times spent together. Your appreciation and love will say it all.
Enjoy finding ways to express who you have become by sharing those things your dad has influenced and wonderful lessons he brought to your life. Pointing out personality traits that you value in him that you too have can also be fun and meaningful. Imagine what you would have missed if he hadn’t been there ever in your life and how much those moments he was there meant to you!
Consider these gift ideas as a starting point to make the day even more special. Your dad will appreciate knowing its from your heart!
