Total Health Breakthroughs: Free Natural Health Newsletter and Alternative Health Articles

Most of us know we should reduce the salt (sodium chloride) in our diet to help control blood pressure and reduce the risk of having a heart attack or stroke. While the amount of sodium we eat is important, it’s not the whole story. A recent study has confirmed what other studies have suggested for years: sodium intake alone isn’t as important as the ratio of sodium to potassium.

The study was reported in the January issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.¹ It evaluated the records of 2275 patients who are being followed as part of the Trials of Hypertension Prevention (TOHP) studies begun in the early 1990s.

What the study showed was that over a 10-15 year period, 193 participants had a serious cardiovascular episode (heart attack, stroke, need for coronary artery bypass or death due to stroke or heart attack).

They then compared the risk of these problems to the level of both sodium and potassium in the diet. They measured these levels by looking at how much of each was excreted in the urine each day. This is an easier and more accurate way to get a handle on how much potassium or sodium someone is taking in than recording everything they eat. It works because our bodies maintain their internal balance of sodium and potassium by excreting any excess in the urine.

Do you struggle with painful itching — red, flaming hot rashes that irritate? If so, you may have eczema, an inflammatory condition often associated with allergens, sensitivities, or even the body attacking itself (autoimmune-related). You may be surprised to learn that eczema is not just a skin condition. It involves nutritional deficiencies and a build-up of toxins in your body that affect its severity.

Here’s why traditional treatments often fail miserably in treating eczema. They merely address the symptoms of the disease with prednisone (steroids), petroleum-based ointments, and synthetic anti-histamines. These only add to the already existing toxic load in your body.

But here’s the good news. Despite what you may have heard to the contrary, it’s possible to treat eczema in healthy ways, without potentially toxic drugs and chemicals. Let’s address what we can do from a prevention and alternative medicine standpoint to help heal eczema.

Understand Your Skin’s Basic Needs
First and foremost, you must identify the basic needs of your skin tissue. Your skin needs:

With the forced chemotherapy treatment of young Daniel Hauser from Minnesota in the news recently, the 15-year-old story of Billy Best and his survival from cancer has returned to mainstream media.

Billy Best suffered cancer of the lymph nodes. After one ineffective round of chemotherapy, he fled south from his home in Massachusetts leaving a note for his parents: “The reason I left is because I could not stand going to the hospital every week. I feel like the medicine is killing me instead of helping me.”¹

Billy explains in an interview with Mike Adams, that he only returned home after his parents agreed to alternative therapies.²

One of the therapies that Billy used was a natural immune enhancer injection called 7-X-14. I was excited to learn that it played a significant role in his recovery. I’ve used this same formula with many of my own patients.

Picture if you will, a garden with two things growing in it: flowers and weeds. If the weeds are kept under control, they really don’t do much damage and the flowers will bloom everywhere. If, however, the garden becomes overgrown with weeds, it’s a whole different story.

Your gut is exactly like that garden, but instead of being populated with flowers and weeds, it’s populated with what’s poetically called “gut flora,” the many organisms which reside in the intestinal tract.

In your gut, the part of the flowers is played by beneficial bacteria called probiotics, while the part of the weeds is played by a nasty little microbe known as Candida albicans —Candida for short.

Candida is actually a fungus, but in “normal” circumstances it lives in peace with the rest of the gut flora and isn’t much cause for concern. Unfortunately, this peaceful coexistence is often disrupted by a number of factors, resulting in an overgrowth of Candida which can wreak havoc everywhere in the body, affecting your immune system, hormone balance and even your thought processes.¹

Most common symptoms of Candida overgrowth include bloating, constipation or diarrhea, fatigue, brain fog, mood swings, sugar cravings and, most famously, “yeast infections.”

The brilliant sunshine streaming through my window reminds me that we can now spend more time outdoors. Just in time, too. After the gray winter doldrums, especially in northern latitudes, say above the axis between Boston and northern California, there is a silent, invisible epidemic: vitamin D deficiency. This is a major component of widespread osteoporosis and resultant hip and wrist fractures that orthopaedists are called upon to treat.

You see, as important as calcium intake is to your bone health and integrity, it can’t get into your bloodstream and your bones without vitamin D. This essential vitamin is necessary to allow calcium ions in food to cross the intestinal wall.

Vitamin D is really not a vitamin though in the usual sense of the word. In fact, it is a steroid hormone, with an amazing array of bioactive properties.^2,4 More recently discovered functions of this exotic vitamin include:

• Regulation of a number of genetic functions that help to reduce cell proliferation (dangerous cell growth).
• Promotion of cell differentiation (transformation of different cell types).
• Prevention of cancerous transformation and modulation of apoptosis (cell death). This means that vitamin D seems to prevent and even treat a variety of cancers, including breast, colon, prostate, lung, and lymphoma.¹

And that’s in addition to its regular functions like maintaining serum calcium and phosphate levels, promoting the normal mineral growth of bone, and preventing tetany (spastic contraction of muscles due to low levels of calcium).

It seemed like it happened every time, and for the longest while I didn’t think I could do anything about it. I’d be going along feeling fine and healthy. Then I’d have a critically ill patient under my care. After a few days of stress and interrupted night’s sleep, WHAM — I’d come down with a heck of a cold.

At first, I didn’t know what specific steps anyone could take to keep their immune function at an optimal level.

As a physician, I was of course aware of the components of the immune system and their functions. However, like many aspects of wellness, traditional medical training doesn’t emphasize how we can support immune function in normal day-to-day life.

When I starting exploring complementary medical treatments, I was surprised at how much research had been done in this area. Once I started applying what I learned, those stress-related colds became a thing of the past. I’d like to share some of what I learned about building up a healthy immune system and fighting off those nasty bugs with you now.

Our immune system is a complex, interacting web of chemical and cellular components that serves to protect us against potential invaders such as bacteria, viruses and cancer cells. Although we often talk about immune “boosting,” what we really want is a perfectly balanced immune system (an overly active immune system can damage the body, but that’s another story).

A healthy lifestyle supports vitality, including immune health. It’s the foundation of any wellness program.

Summer is upon us and for many folks that means spending time outdoors, hiking, camping, walking and exploring forests and wooded areas. It also means working and playing in your own backyard.

No matter where you live in the continental United States, you are at risk for the tick-borne illness known as Lyme disease. Lyme disease is caused by the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi. Deer ticks harbor these bacteria and spread it when feeding on animals and humans. People in the Northeast, Midwest and Northwest are at highest risk, but these ticks can be found in any grassy or heavily wooded area — even your own backyard!

Signs and Symptoms
Most cases of Lyme disease start with a rash that looks like a bump, and then grows into something like a bull’s eye, as illustrated below.

© DermAtlas; http://www.DermAtlas.org.

This rash is called erythema migrans, and can start where the tick bite occurred. It happens in 70-80% of Lyme disease cases. Flu-like symptoms can also occur, such as fever, chills, fatigue, body aches and headache. The symptoms and pattern of Lyme disease can vary from person to person because the illness can affect many different body systems.

If you develop a rash and flu-like symptoms and feel that you may have contracted Lyme disease, you should seek medical attention. At this point in time, treatment is easy and can prevent the serious and sometimes severe complications of Lyme disease. Your doctor can fully evaluate and examine you for the illness. There is a blood test that can check to see if you have Lyme disease, but this test does take a few weeks after exposure to show a positive result.

The recent outbreak of swine flu is causing widespread panic and concern among many people, but by all indications, it is no worse than the seasonal flu that usually strikes every winter.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has determined that the current strain of swine flu is caused by a new type of influenza A virus. There are four viral sub-types, one found in humans, one in birds and two in swine. The swine sub-type is causing the flu in humans in the United States. It is spread from pigs to humans and then from humans to humans.

The CDC believes that the current outbreak of swine flu (officially called the H1N1 flu) started in March 2009 in certain areas of Mexico. Mexico is currently reporting the largest number of cases at 727, with 26 deaths confirmed at this time. There is one confirmed death in the United States and 403 total cases. These cases are spread among 38 states in the continental US.

People do not normally get the swine flu. The CDC has determined that this swine sub-type is contagious and is spreading from human to human, through large airborne droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes. These droplets contain the virus and spread the illness fairly easily.

Have you been exposed to swine flu? New York, Texas, California, Delaware and Arizona are the states reporting the most number of cases. Recent travel to Mexico and contact with an infected person there are also risk factors.

Signs and Symptoms of Swine Flu
The signs and symptoms of swine flu are:

Part 2 of a 2-part article

Natural Topical Therapies

Part 1 of a 2-part article

The real truth is that unless you live in a bubble, it is impossible to avoid germs. And, germs, bacteria, viruses, fungi, are EVERYWHERE.