LifeCare Chiropractic

The Best Chiropractic Care in Mesa, Arizona

lifestyle changes

PHYSICIANS ARE HUMAN AND CAN MAKE MISTAKES! – (05-08-05)

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Iatrogenic events resulting in intensive care admission: Frequency, cause, and disclosure to patients and institutions

Let’s face it…physicians are human. Mistakes will always happen.  However, when mistakes are made, we need to face up to it.  A simple “I’m sorry” can go a long way with patients.

In this study, 1.2% of patients in the ICU were there because of iatrogenic events (doctor-caused).  33% of these were because of their meds.  In only 5% of the cases, where the patients were in the ICU because of their prior medical treatment, were the patients or patients caregiver informed of this.

The sad case is that, if most clinicians were current on the medical literature, many of these conditions probably would’ve been managed differently with a much better outcome (lifestyle changes = less drugs = less likelihood for dangerous side effects).

Read entire article here

WHAT ARE THE SIDE EFFECTS OF METFORMIN? – (05-16-05)

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Effect of Metformin and Intensive Lifestyle Intervention on the Metabolic Syndrome

I’ve always said that, while metformin does indeed reduced insulin resistance, I strongly advocate lifestyle changes first and foremost.  Metformin reduced incidence by 17%, lifestyle by a whopping 41%.  So, lifestyle changes are much more effective and metformin carries significant risks of side effects.  The side effects of lifestyle change?  Lowered rates of diabetes, CVD, osteoporosis, osteoarthritis, cancer….

Read entire article here

THOSE STUPID LIFESTYLE CHANGES DON’T WORK ANYWAY…

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For many, at first thought, the idea of adopting a healthier lifestyle seems almost painful and certainly not worth it.  Many have tried and did not see results in what they thought was a reasonable time frame.  Many think they have made healthy changes, but in reality their choices were the wrong ones.

A frequent retort to the suggestion of making healthier lifestyle changes usually runs along the lines of “Well–Uncle George smoked 6 packs of cigarettes per day, drank Jim Bean like water and never ate a vegetable in his life and he still lived to 104 until he was taken out skiing off a cliff on Machu Picchu…” 

I call this the “genetic lottery” approach.  How many of us sit on our duffs watching Jerry Springer reruns from the couch, assurred that we are going to win the lotto?  Do some people win the lotto?  Of course.  But do you want to hang your hat on that miniscule chance?  Didn’t think so.  So why are you so willing to do that with your health?

I have covered the concept of flow mediated dilation and pulse wave velocity in a prior post, but suffice it to say that these are very important markers for looking at how healthy our blood vessels are (or are not..).

This particular article looked at prediabetic patient adopting a low sugar diet combined with a high intensity workout (>3 times per week at >75% VO2 max) and found that, after 12 weeks and again at one year, pretty much every marker they looked at had improved pretty dramatically.  64% of the participants no longer met the criteria for prediabetes.

This is not a complete lifestyle overhaul, but rather very straightforward changes in merely two aspects of lifestyle.  Before you begin to shake your head and think you can’t adopt these simple changes, remember that your fate is not likely to mirror Uncle George.

DOES INSULIN USE IN DIABETES INCREASE RISK OF DEATH?

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Insulin kills? Recent study found increase in risk of death the more insulin a diabetic needs.  In my personal opinion from my experiences with patients, if someone follows the medical model they will never improve-it will be a slow decline to worsening control of glucose.

The ONLY way to properly manage diabetes is through aggressive lifestyle changes. Exercise (and NOT just walking), absolutely no artificial sweeteners, no refined carbs, minimize omega 6 fats, increase omega 3 fats, low calorie / high phytonutrient intake. We have seen aggressive lifestyle interventions in studies getting pts off insulin in 2 wks. It CAN be done.

Read entire article here

 

BONE FRACTURES = HEART DISEASE?

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I’ve always contended that the human body cares not one squat about the artificial delineations we have created in Westernized medicine.  The body does not recognize that “cardiovascular” problem independently from an “endocrine” problem from a “gastroenterological” problem.

Instead, every single system in the human body interacts with other systems.  The degree of this is so complex as to make our division into “specialties” laughable.  Dr. Jeffrey Bland (a strong influence on the way I view health) always called it “knowing more and more about less and less.”

To me, helping patients to make lifestyle changes that will lower their risk of chronic disease, there is NO differentiation between heart disease and diabetes.  These two conditions are so tightly linked that anything that affects one affects both.  Heck, 70% of diabetics die of cardiovascular issues and we want to consider them separate conditions, both treated by different specialists.

So, the results of this study finding that, in those with heart disease there is a strong correlation with the risk of fractures.  This relationship has actually been getting stronger over the past decade or so–likely because we have more sick people with heart disease rather than dead people who had heart attacks.  Live people are more likely to suffer a fracture…

The bottom line is that lifestyle changes to improve a condition are nonspecific and will lower your risk across the board for all chronic diseases.  This is the beauty of lifestyle changes and the glaring failure of pharmaceutical dominated medicine, which touts one cure for one disease.

Read more…

SHOULD I TAKE ASPIRIN FOR MY HEART?

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There are a few things in society today that can be repeated with an almost mantra like quality when it comes to preventing heart attacks.  The first is that we need to lower our intake of sodium.  The curtains on this recommendation have recently been pulled back to reveal just how weak of a recommendation this is.  However, not nearly as weak as the other strong recommendation.

For many years now Bayer and mainstream medicine have led you to believe that aspirin is good for our heart and will protect against heart attacks.  While this may be true, the data is so weak as to be pointless.

There is, of course, concern over the dangers of aspirin.  These principally focus on bleeding events such as ulcers and strokes.  Rarely is it brought up that aspirin is suspected to increase the risk of pancreatic cancer as well.

So, as with any intervention, we need to balance the benefits with the risks.  Take broccoli for example.  It can lower your risk of any number of chronic diseases, and the strength of prevention of heart attacks is probably on par with aspirin.  But the side effects!  You know–the dangerous ones associated with broccoli intake like…I’m sure some will come to me in a minute….side effects of broccoli or on the tip of my tongue…Well, I’m sure I read about them all the time………

The point is that lifestyle changes have protective effects that far, far outweigh those of standard recommendations like avoiding salt and taking aspirin.  But we seem to be so darn soft on these recommendations that I don’t think society really takes them seriously.

Getting back to the current study.  Just how effective is aspirin at protecting a first heart attack?  Are you ready for this?

Treat 1,000 people for 5 years.  Do the math–this is an awful lot of money for Bayer…  Ok, so after these 5 years we’ve probably prevented hundreds of heart attacks, right?

Wrong.  2.9 people will have been protected.  Another 2.8 will experience major bleeds as a result of taking the aspirin.  These numbers flat out suck and again highlight our society’s morbid obsession with picking out the really bad interventions like lowering salt intake, taking an aspirin and taking statins and putting them up on a pedestal rivaling Mount Olympus.  All the while burying the real recommendations somewhere in the realm of Jules Verne

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OBESITY AND CANCER, REVISITED…

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I know.  I know.  Eat your fruits and veggies.  Exercise.  While we all kind of agree that this MAY lower our risk of cancer, just how much seems to get glazed over.  After all, Grandpa Joe smoked and drank Jim Bean until he died in a brothel accident at 106.  So just how much of an impact does a good lifestyle have on cancer rates?

Something important to consider.  The weight of cancer prevention seems to be towards quitting smoking.  This is, of course, a no-brainer.  But, as this article mentions, 80% of the population are never or former smokers, this recommendation falls on the deaf ears of the bulk of the population who are already following this recommendation.

This particular study looked at adherence to an ideal body composition, physical activity, diet, and alcohol consumption on cancer rates, heart disease fatality rates and all-cause mortality (risk of dying from anything).  Those with the highest adherence had a 42% lower risk of all cause mortality, 48% lower risk of dying of heart related causes (58% for women!!!!) and a 30% lower risk of dying of cancer.

These are general lifestyle recommendations.  General.  As in very simple to accomplish.  I could expand on the specifics in a hundred ways to make them more effective.

The bottom line is that NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING, is a powerful as lifestyle changes in lowering your risk of dying from anything.  The strength of this message seems to continually be drowned out by “this for a cure” and “that for a cure” and prevention promotions sponsored by Coke (Basha’s Heart Smart T-shirts proudly promote Coke).

As a society we need to put our collective feet down and stop funding these organizations that promote a “cure” while shoving prevention with simple lifestyle changes to the fine print.  Only THEN will they wake up and realize that this is what their individual charters

IS “LOWER BETTER” TRUE FOR DIABETICS?

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Ever since the ACCORD trial, the quiet undertones in diabetic treatment have suggested that maybe aggressive lowering of blood sugar and HbA1c levels with insulin may not really be too good of an idea.  Given that, in the ACCORD trial, those who tried to aggressively lower their HbA1c levels with diabetic drugs DIED at a 22% higher rate, I’d suggest that “not too good of an idea” is a little weak.

In reading the interpretation of the findings of the researchers, they are unaware how this happened.  They have looked at medications.  At hypoglycemia.  At cause of death (all causes were increased, although cardiac deaths had the greatest risk).  Nothing seemed to be a factor.

Wow.  We just really, really, really don’t get it.  The conclusion from this article’s authors is that less aggressive control of blood glucose may be the more appropriate way to manage a diabetic, and that “as low as possible” is not defensible.  Sounds like this correlates with the research, but they left out the massive pink elephant in the room.

Lowering HbA1c “as low as possible” WITH DRUGS is not defensible.  That little prepositional phrase can mean the difference between life and death for a diabetic patient.  When will be begin to understand that blood sugar is not the problem, but rather the symptoms of a poor relationship between the action of insulin and the cells of our bodies?

Lowering HbA1c “as low as possible” using the tools of exercise, stress management, environmental detox and a low calorie, high phytonutrient diet will produce wonderful outcomes.  Despite looking closely at the medical literature as it relates to diabetes, I have yet to come across any study that finds that eating more brussel sprouts and broccoli increased the risk of death.  And personally, within my small sampling of patients, I have yet to experience the death of a patient from conscientiously cutting back on calories.

So, when the researchers of ACCORD scratch their heads and the medical community can’t figure out what to do, except use less drugs, remember that diabetes is a CHOICE.  (Need to clarify Type 2 here, lest the Type 1 diabetics rise up and throttle me)  We choose to eat diabetes causing foods.  We choose to live a sedentary lifestyle.  We choose to stress out and let it impact our health.  We choose to consume the Venti size at Starbucks and take in too many calories overall.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0002914911010071