Health news blog

Must this treatment be taken indefinitely?

This question has almost been covered in the preceding paragraphs. In most cases the answer is ‘no’. Some people have found that they achieved relief of symptoms after a given period of taking the extract but, that, after ceasing to take it, they would then regress to a point where, after only four or five days, the symptoms began to recur. They also found, however, that if they took regular small doses of the substance, usually one or two capsules per day, then they managed to maintain a good condition without trouble. Fortunately, it does not matter if this substance is taken on a regular basis because of the absence of adverse side-effects. This is a dramatic advantage because regression is a common occurrence with many of the present drug therapies, if terminated, and the side-effects of continual therapy with these can be very hazardous.

Finally, there is another group who experience benefit and enjoy this for months or possibly years but who then experience a return of symptoms. In such cases a rapid recover)’ has usually been accomplished by taking the extract again for a short period.

Is it harmful to take too much?

Taking too much of the mussel extract is not dangerous to health. If an attempt were to be made to consume very large amounts of this substance at one time the result would most probably be a feeling of being too full, nausea and flatulence. Nothing more serious would be likely to occur.

The question might also relate to the taking of normal doses over a long period of time. Long-term use of mussel extract is not likely to induce any form of addiction or to create undesirable ill effects.

Will it react with other preparations?

With regard to possible interactions with other forms of medication there are several comments to be made. First of all, there have been no reports of adverse reactions with other medications being used for arthritis when taken together with the mussel extract. Bearing in mind the composition of the extract, this is not at all surprising. Also no problems have been recorded when using pain-killing preparations in conjunction with the extract. Again, this is not surprising, because of the composition of the mussel extract.

Where other preparations for bodily disorders are involved it is advisable to seek the advice of one’s doctor, because even though there may be no adverse reaction between the mussel extract and the other medication, the doctor may have some particular reason for not wishing to influence the level of some other element in the body during therapy. Over the years, however, this extract has been taken in conjunction with many different forms of medication without adverse effects.

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If you have an eating disorder, or know someone who does, the time to get help is now. Don’t wait. The longer the disorder persists, the harder it is to eradicate.

By reading this crucial step: You’re educating yourself about the disorder. You know the dangers, you know the warning signs. You are also learning about treatment options. You know, too, that the end point of self-starvation or dietary chaos is chronic disability-or even death.

If your child has an eating disorder, you may feel you are helpless. Not true! You have more power than you realize. No matter how chaotic your family life, you are very important to your daughter. Use that importance, to assist your daughter in getting help. The same holds if you are the husband or roommate of the person with the disorder.

Sometimes, disturbed eating can actually be a cry for help. Does your daughter parade her skeletal form in front of you? Does she leave the table often during a meal to visit the bathroom, or does she “forget” to clean up after she vomits? She is sending a signal: Help me!

Children need limits. They trust parents to set limits, to reassure them that the world is a safe and loving place. Sometimes a girl is just waiting for her mother or father to confront her about her disorder, to ask what’s wrong and to insist on treatment. She can’t bring up the subject herself; she’s too consumed with guilt or shame.

That’s why you need to act. Sometimes just showing that you care enough to intervene can have a powerful therapeutic effect.

It won’t be easy. There may be denial, bitterness, angry confrontations. Expect these reactions. It’s natural that a threat to your daughter’s very identity should provoke resistance. But stay focused.

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Nica Russell was certain that she’d never get out of the negative mindset that allowed her weight to escalate to 270 pounds. Then she saw a talk show that completely changed her life.

“Television programs and infomercials about weight loss would bring me to tears, but they couldn’t inspire me to get off the sofa and dosomething,” says the 36-year-old Los Angeles resident. “Then I happened to catch an Oprah Winfrey show in which Oprah was crying and talking about her lifelong struggle with her weight. I felt that she was talking directly to me, that she knew exactly how I was feeling. She motivated me to tackle my weight problem.”

The next day, Nica went to the nearest mall and headed straight for the video store. She scanned the rows of aerobic exercise videos and purchased a selection of tapes with workouts ranging from beginner to advanced. Every day for 4 months, in the privacy of her own home, she did a 45-minute video workout. “At first, I could do only about 1 percent of the routines. I felt like I was going to die,” she says. “But every time I thought about giving up, I remembered

Oprah’s words. I found myself going longer without a break and without feeling like passing out. Eventually, I could do my tape routines from beginning to end.” At that point, she felt confident enough to visit a gym.

With guidance from a personal trainer at the gym, Nica started lifting weights. Over time, she became an exercise fanatic, working out for 3 hours a day, 7 days a week. “I was obsessed,” she remembers. “But I had a goal to meet.” To help her get there, she also made some adjustments in her eating habits, giving up fried foods and filling up on fruits and vegetables. Within 7 months, she lost 135 pounds.

Satisfied with her new, slim physique, Nica began having second thoughts about going to the gym. She was tired of paying the high membership fee, fighting traffic to get there, and waiting in line for equipment. So she decided to create a gym at home.

Over a 2-year period, Nina invested in advanced aerobic exercise videos, sets of 5- to 25-pound dumbbells, and weight-training equipment with a stairclimber attachment. “My home gym definitely motivates me to stay fit,” she says. “Without it, I wouldn’t work out as consistendy or maintain my weight.”

Today, Nica works out for an hour, 4 or 5 days a week. She has maintained her weight at a healthy 135 pounds for 4 years.

WINNING ACTION

Build your own gym. If you’re not comfortable going to the gym, invest in some exercise equipment for your home. Start by purchasing aerobic exercise videos or a treadmill for walking or running. Then work your way up to dumbbells and weight-training equipment. You’ll have all the essentials you need to stay fit, without the inconvenience of packing a bag, jumping in your car, and driving to the gym. I invested in a treadmill, and I love it.

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Years ago I spent a great deal of time explaining the “doctor within,” Super Foods, and so on, to a patient of mine, a well-known sports figure. He was suffering from frequent colds and a depressed immune system. He listened very carefully, asked intelligent questions and took careful notes. He came back to see me periodically, each time assuring me that he was following the program I had outlined for him. But I could tell from the examinations that his health was disintegrating. His laboratory tests and other clues told me that he wasn’t following my advice. His wife called me one day to say that he hadn’t made any changes in his diet or his outlook. Indeed, she said, he continued to eat all the wrong foods and did nothing to alleviate his stress. This man practiced a form of denial, and he eventually wound up with cancer.

Let me tell you about another patient, a man with diabetes, which required daily insulin injections. This wealthy businessman loved to eat large, thick steaks, sweet-and-sour Chinese food and deli-sandwiches. He ate his way through the fanciest restaurants in Los Angeles and, for that matter, all over the U.S., as he traveled about the country. He came to see me regularly, listening attentively as I explained how and why he should start protecting his “doctor within.” Like the sports figure, however, he didn’t make the commitment to his health. Then a diabetes-related gangrene attacked his foot, and part of it had to be amputated. Now he was ready to make the changes. Unlike a salamander, he couldn’t grow back the part of his foot he had lost. But by adopting all the health-enhancement techniques I’ve described in this book, and others that I designed specifically for him, he brought his diabetes under control. He is doing well, feels well and is looking forward to many productive and healthy years.

I can’t slap your hand every time you reach for unhealthy food; I can’t force you to follow the Immune For Life program. But I can tell you that there is no more precious thing on earth than your good health. Nature has endowed you with the best doctor you can have: your “doctor within.” As a physician, my advice is to take care of it. You’ll be rewarded with long life, vibrant health and happiness.

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As a rule, you can’t feel good if your muscles are weak. Instead, you feel tired, below par. Feeling this way affects your emotional state. You probably feel depressed and unhappy with your inability to perform the activities you want to do. Many people tell me they can’t carry bags of groceries because their arms feel too tired.

For these and other reasons, it’s important that you tone the large-muscle groups in your arms and legs. Brisk walking or jogging tones your legs. Swimming tones arms and legs. For my arm exercise I keep two barbells near my bathroom sink. I turn on the Physician’s Radio Network in the morning to hear the latest medical news and do these three exercises for the muscles of my arms and shoulders. Start with light weights; three or five pounds is fine. I believe it’s better to do more repetitions with light weights than to struggle through fewer repetitions with heavy weights. You can always increase the weight as you get stronger.

Bicep Curl: The biceps are the muscles on the “inside” of your upper arm, the muscles that tighten when somebody rolls up their sleeves and “makes a muscle.” Hold one weight in each hand, with your arms resting at your sides. Your little fingers should be closest to your body, your thumbs furthest away. Keeping your elbows firmly at your sides, lift your hands, bending your arms at the elbow, and bring the weights up until they almost touch the front of your shoulders. Then lower your arms back to the starting position and repeat. Do five to start. Gradually work up to 20 to 30 curls without stopping.

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CRUNCHY POTATO SALAD

2 lbs. potatoes 1/2 cup celery 1/2 cup sweet red peppers 3/4 cup scallions 1/4 cup parsley 1/2 cup nonfat yogurt

2 tbls. cider vinegar

1 tsp. curry powder

Wash all vegetables. Skin potatoes, chop celery, pepper and parsley; thinly slice scallions. Steam or boil potatoes until tender, then drain. Cut potatoes into 1/2-inch cubes, and combine with chopped vegetables. In a small bowl, mix yogurt, vinegar and curry powder. Stir yogurt mixture into potato mixture. Cover and refrigerate until serving time. Excellent for carry-out lunches.

Serves 4 to 6.

OKRA STEW

1 large onion

4 medium tomatoes

1 clove garlic, minced

1 six-oz. can tomato paste

2 tsps. lemon juice 1/2 tsp. oregano

1 lb. okra

Wash vegetables. Chop onion and tomatoes. Saute onion and garlic in water until tender. Add tomato paste, tomatoes, lemon juice and oregano. Cover and simmer for 20 minutes. Wash okra and cut off the cone-shapped top. Add to tomato mixture. Simmer, covered, 20-30 minutes. Serve over hot grains.

Serves 4.

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Take care of your “doctor within” and your immune system— starting now. Don’t wait for the trouble signs to appear, because by then it may be too late. The road to lifelong immunity starts right here, right now, with the Immune For Life program.

The Immune For Life program begins by acknowledging the importance of your “doctor within.” I designed the program to, first, stop harming the good doctor and, second, to begin strengthening this ally. Whatever your immune status, you can begin—right now—to make the changes in your habits and lifestyle to stop harming your “doctor within” and put you on the road to vibrant health and happiness. Here are the basics of the Immune For Life program:

1. Do you know if your diet is sabatoging your “doctor within”? Or how many health-destructive negative thoughts pass through your mind every day? Knowledge is power. Find out whether your life-style and daily habits are helping or harming your “doctor within.” In the Immune For Life Workbook that starts on page 149, you’ll find a series of quizzes that will help you evaluate your daily habits and thoughts. Taking the quizzes will teach you a great deal about yourself and will point to potential trouble spots for your “doctor within.”

2. Stop harming your “doctor within” and immune system with the dangerous Standard American Diet. Instead, add years to your life and life to your years by switching to the Super Food diet. Find out which foods are the Super Foods, with extra power to protect you against cancer, heart disease, strokes, diabetes, depression and other diseases.

3. Make sure your “doctor within” is getting all the vitamins and minerals it needs by adopting a Nutri-Prevention program of supplements best suited to your needs. Your program may include DLPA—dl-phenylalanine—a natural and safe nutrient that bolsters the immune system, blocks chronic pain and relieves certain types of depression by protecting and enhancing the endorphin hormones.

4. Meld your mind and body into an invincible barrier against depression, negative thinking, physical and emotional disease. Learn how not to be a stress seeker who risks heart disease and other problems by trying to take on the world single-handed. Find out whether you’re a stress phobic, with depressed, unhappy thoughts that increase your risk of cancer and other diseases. Learn to make affirmations and visualizations a part of your everyday Immune For Life program.

5. Discover how brisk walking and other simple exercises can strengthen your “doctor within,” bolster your immune system and fight depression.

6. Soothe and simultaneously energize your “doctor within” with Meditative Relaxation. This is an excellent way to dispose of the stress, anger and frustration that are so destructive to your health and happiness.

The Immune For Life program is relatively simple. But it all depends on your making, here and now, a firm and irrevocable commitment to zestful health, happiness and longevity.

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Unfortunately, there are several major drawbacks to this study. Firstly, the number of patients involved was very small, and they were probably what doctors call ‘a highly selected group’: that is to say, they were not representative of IBS patients as a whole, for reasons that have already been discussed. Secondly, 59 per cent of the patients studied refused to undertake a full elimination diet, and according to the authors ‘wheat was not excluded in all these patients’. Thirdly, and most seriously, the method used for double-blind testing was highly questionable. In order to disguise the taste of the foods being tested, the Manchester team used dried, powdered foods and placed them in gelatine capsules. It has been calculated that a single tablespoonful of food would fill 12 such capsules, yet only one capsule was used for each test. It is widely accepted, by orthodox and unorthodox doctors alike, that food intolerance reactions do not occur with such small amounts of food. Food allergy reactions can, of course, and the test procedure was probably designed with these sort of reactions in mind. It is significant that the three patients who showed consistent positive reactions also had a range of atopic symptoms – asthma, eczema, urticaria or hay-fever. In other words, the double-blind test was probably detecting those with IgE-mediated allergic reactions to food and missing others with food intolerance. As the authors themselves admit ‘… even patients with clear evidence of immunologically mediated sensitivity may not react every time they are exposed, particularly if the dose is limited.’

Another trial of IBS patients, carried out two years later by a different group of doctors, produced similar results. In this study, only three out of 49 patients were found to be food intolerant. Unfortunately, this study followed a similar procedure to that of the Manchester group – wheat and citrus fruits were not excluded, and capsules were used for double-blind testing.

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When you pay more than 50% of the support for an individual, tax benefits can result… • When the individual’s income doesn’t exceed $3,200 in 2005 or $3,300 in 2006 (excluding tax-exempt income, such as from municipal bonds and the tax-free portion of Social Security),

you may be able to claim him/her as a dependent to obtain a tax exemption of $3,200 in 2005 and $3,300 in 2006.

note: New rules apply to a qualifying child. Income may not matter and support only becomes critical if the child pays more than half.

• Even if the individual has income exceeding the limit, you may be able to deduct medical expenses you pay on his behalf if the individual is a relative. (Ë “relative” is a parent, grandparent, sibling, child, grandchild, aunt, uncle, niece, nephew or in-law.)

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Consider asking your doctor not to include especially sensitive information in your record. You might say, “If I tell you something very personal that may be relevant to my care but that I don’t want to be written in my chart, would you respect my wishes?” If your doctor is unwilling to honor your request, you’ll have to decide whether you still want to reveal the information.

Keep in mind that keeping important information out of your chart could compromise your care down the road—especially if you see another doctor or if your doctor fails to remember what you said. Keep information out of your record only if you feel doing so is absolutely essential.

Be wary of any medical information you give out, no matter how innocent it seems. A TV ad once offered free information on pollen counts to anyone who called an 800 number. The names of those who called were then used by the drug company that had sponsored the ad to market an allergy medication.

Get a copy of your medical records to make sure all information is factually correct. An error in your chart could lead to the loss of employment or future insurance coverage.

In most states, you have a legal right to your medical records. In the rest, you can ask your doctor for a copy of your chart. If your doctor won’t provide it, you’ve got to wonder whether your doctor views health care as a democracy or a dictatorship.

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