A recent study shows that, statistically speaking, every hour of television watching shortens your life.

Maybe it’s all of those pharmaceutical commercials!

On a serious note, television watching has been linked with obesity, diabetes and other risk factors. This study didn’t specify if it was due to the impossible to duplicate body images and negativity that permeates television, or if its the general lack of movement that is common with television watching. Either way, a little bit more exercise and positive thinking are important parts of holistic health and illness prevention.

To read about the study on television watching and health visit the article through this link to The British Journal of Sports Medicine.

Modern medicine’s response to allergies? Suppress them through pills, sprays and shots without dealing with underlying causes, conditions, or triggers. Maybe add on an inhaler just in case allergies worsen and lead to breathing complications such as asthma.

Alternative medicine’s response to allergies? Boost the immune system, look for underlying conditions, steam, removing allergens, and treating the whole person.

To read about some simple and natural home remedies for allergies read Saman Nizami’s column at The International Herald Tribune.

For those of us with the travel bug the question might come up of how to deal with illnesses that are common in other parts of the world but virtually unheard of back home.

If you know where in the world you might be headed it never hurts to find out what type of natural as well as allopathic (conventional) doctors and medical facilities are available where you will be  as well as the cost of utilizing them. Don’t assume that your insurance will follow you across borders or that countries with free medicine will always offer medical without cost to visitors.

Also be aware of what type of illnesses are in the area, what type of supplies are available if you do get ill, and what needs to be done to local water to make it drinkable. While you may want a filter to remove chlorine in more industrialized nations to make the water purer, you may find that, aside from boiling, the water in less developed nations might only be safe to drink if you DO put chlorine tablets in it (it never hurts to look for safer alternatives to chlorine as well).

Christine E.V. Gonzalez, a naturopathic medicine practitioner with a Ph.D. in natural health and holistic nutrition found herself in a sticky situation when she contracted dengue fever, a common illness in many countries that includes a high fever that can go on unabated for weeks.

Even with her experience she still found herself near death. She shares what she has learned including natural remedies that can help as well as when to seek conventional medical assistance (the illness has a lower morbidity rate when intravenous fluids are used).

Her advice ranges from what over the counter pain killers to avoid (the dengue virus causes transitory hepatitis and the impact of Tylenol and other common drugs can do lasting and sometimes fatal damage when the liver is in that state), to nutrition, hydration, aromatherapy, and signs that conventional intervention is needed.

To find out more about Christine’s experience and advice with Dengue you can read the rest of the article by clicking here.

Image by o5com

Antibiotics, while beneficial in some circumstances, are overused like most other medications.

It’s understandable. Sometimes we just don’t feel that we have the time to let an illness run its course because we have the obligations of work, school, family and more so we run off to the doctors at the first sign of an illness and knock it ou early with antibiotics. Or maybe we have a toothache but can’t get into the dentist for full treatment right away so we end up relying on antibiotics to keep infection down until we can deal with the problem. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of uses for antibiotics these days including being utilized long term for persistent yet non life threatening conditions such as acne.

It’s generally known that these antibiotics, while fighting the illness ,will lower or eliminate the healthy bacteria in our stomachs and bodies. So we take care of ourselves, eat yogurt, or try to avoid getting sick again while our body regains its natural balance of healthy bacteria. And it works, right?

As it turns out evidence is coming to light that shows that some of those healthy bacteria may never return once killed, meaning that the next time a treatment ends up being antibiotics we might want to ask if its truly the only way to get better. Maybe a few extra days of best rest for less serious illnesses is worth keeping the body’s natural balance.

” Early evidence from my lab and others hints that, sometimes, our friendly flora never fully recover. These long-term changes to the beneficial bacteria within people’s bodies may even increase our susceptibility to infections and disease. Overuse of antibiotics could be fuelling the dramatic increase in conditions such as obesity, type 1 diabetes, inflammatory bowel disease, allergies and asthma, which have more than doubled in many populations. ”

-Martin Blaser of New York University’s Langone Medical Center as quoted in Wired.

To read more about this research you can view an article on the subject by going through this link to Wired.

Big Pharma seems to be taking the brunt of the joke in the online comic and cartoon world. Here are a few favorites for the week:

from Pharma Geo Forum

from Toothpaste for Dinner

Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper has proclaimed Friday, August 26, 2011 as “Natural Medicine Awareness Day” in honor of The Run across the United States, which is meant  to educate and empower Americans about natural health care options in preventing disease, creating health, and finding and treating the cause of illness.

To read more about Natural Medicine Awareness Day visit PRWeb.com

Or to learn more about The Run you can visit TheRun.org

Part of holistic and alternative medicine is bringing the control of health and medicine back into the hands of the patient. It makes the physician the teacher rather than the magician doling out magic that cannot be replicated outside of the pharmaceutical giant’s labs.

What is a better way to celebrate this shift in thinking than by putting the power of medicines into the hands of all?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e095va7iAX0&feature=player_embedded

Biomagnetic practitioner Moses Durazo was a featured practitioner at one of our mixers.

The theory behind Biomagnetism is to adjust and correct pH balance in our system so that pathogens, dysfunctions, and toxins and diseases can be eliminated.

Do the magnets actually kill the diseases? Moses described it as if a vacuum came and sucked out all the air that was in the room where we were located. The vacuum would not actually kill us directly, but it would alter the environment in such a way that we could no longer breathe so we’d die.

What types of conditions can possibly be affected? Lots of things from, skin conditions, to bacteria and viruses, to pain and cancer.

The session: Fill out a form with the conditions you have. I couldn’t think of anything. I don’t tend to label my ailments, and when it was time to write them down, I was blank.

However, when I was lying there, I started to think of all my problems. I have something wrong with my throat. It’s difficult to swallow sometimes, and if I don’t eat slowly, then the food can get stuck in my throat. I have a fallen arch in my foot and it hurts when I walk too much. My wrist is sore from twisting prescription bottles for too many years. My stomach is often unsettled, it needs digestive enzymes. I have a rough patch of skin near my elbow…

But Moses didn’t really need to know what a patient thinks is wrong with them; he has his own system to test the body to see what’s wrong, what’s off balance. He puts magnets on various locations and observes how the legs react, whether one of them shrinks, or pulls inwards, or not. Hard to understand, or explain, but he has a process…

My issues were not too complex, but he could tell that I had a thyroid dysfunction, the bacteria H.pylori in my stomach, and a small rough patch of skin near my elbow.

And then he strategically places magnets on various locations in the body. I had two on my throat, one on my collarbone, one by my side, and a few others.

I laid there for 20 minutes or so.

I went for two sessions. Did it work? Since my conditions were mild I think many of the changes were subtle; although the rough patch of skin near my elbow is much softer, yet not quite completely gone. My stomach seems a little more settled, and my throat feels different although I will have to see over time if I have any issues when I swallow food.

The principles behind biomagnetism were first discovered by Dr. Isaac Goiz, a Mexican physician, more than 20 years ago when treating an AIDS patient. For more information, http://www.faim.org/newfrontiers/biomagnetictherapy.html

Although basically unknown in the United States, it is commonly practiced in South America and some European countries. With only 5 practitioners in California, Moses has clients coming to his office in Santa Ana all the way from Santa Barbara and even visitors from out of State. And with a full 100% money back guarantee if you don’t feel relief.

Moses Durazo is enthusiastic and a gentleman and takes pride in his profession. He has been able to observe patients that make big progress in their health.

Biomagnetism to me was a reminder of how pharmacy, doctors and drugs has become a profitable business, and how there are many simpler and more effective ways with holistic, or alternative treatments. I wonder how often a mild change in pH, or environment, to regain balance, may be all that’s needed to treat some of western medicine’s long-term conditions or diseases.

To contact Moses:

(714) 824-9998

magnethealing@gmail.com

I know there are plenty of us hunched over mugs of coffee even as we read this, so I thought I would pass on advice from California health writer, Judd Handler.

Her advice consists of practical advice on how to cut down as well as how to detox from the toxins in coffee.

Read the rest of the article at Mother Nature Network

Several studies have proven that positive thinking is one of the factors leading to prolonged life for people that are fighting tough illnesses from cancer to AIDS. While negative thoughts can actually shorten life expectancy.

This is one of the areas in which conventional medicine and the terminal prognosis can do more damage than no prognosis at all. Once we are told that there is no cure, that there is no way out, we often take it to heart and assume the worst causing us to give up hope and make that diagnosis true. Just because a doctor doesn’t have the solution doesn’t mean there is no solution, and they should never claim such.

I know of one woman that has had cancer since the age of 12. Over the years she has gone through conventional treatments with varying levels of success and adheres to what works for her holistically (mainly an organic home and diet, exercise, and stress management).

She has come out of remission multiple times. After the first diagnosis (which came with a life expectancy of about 5 more years) she panicked and spent several years of depression trying harsh treatments that, aside from surgery, only seemed to make things worse. She felt and looked terminal.

It was only by luck (and research) that something she did finally worked. She removed all of the cleaning chemicals from her home, the cancer shrunk, and her health slowly returned.

Now, when she has a relapse she simply adjusts her life and diet to bring her health back into balance. It takes a few months and is relatively pain-free. When friends and family say “But you have cancer” as if it were a death sentence she replies “It’s only cancer. If it hasn’t beat me by now it’s not going to.” She doesn’t get morbid, she doesn’t assume the worst, she just does the best she can with the tools she has to make sure that she is as healthy as can be. She’s 35 now. That’s 23 years with cancer, and 18 more than the doctor’s prognosis gave her.

For ideas on how to move away from negative thoughts and focus on the positive and the possible visit: Action for Happiness

They offer advice for breaking the cycle, taking action, and working out warning signals.