28Sep 2011 by Marjorie No Comments

Good example of the thinking behind our health and nutrition policies

US healthcare system
Updated August 7, 2012: After reading Seth Roberts' review of my blog, I realized that this post could use some clarifying and that Ancel Keys, author of the maligned Seven Countries study Dr. Lustig refers to, could use some equal air time. My edits are in bold. Raw Food SOS presents a closer look at the study here (via Primal Girl). There's a quick summary after the first two graphs and the photo of Keys. ____________________ In this July 2009 video, "Sugar: The Bitter Truth," Robert H. Lustig, MD, UCSF Professor of Clinical Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology, goes over the reasons why argument that sugar, and specifically fructose and high-fructose corn syrup, are behind the obesity epidemic. (Sugar itself is half fructose and half glucose.) You've probably heard…
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22Sep 2011 by Marjorie No Comments

Find out if your doctor is getting money from Big Pharma

reference
Thanks to Beyond Meds' 9/8/11 post on the updated ProPublica database, I was able to check all the doctors I've seen over the past five years to see if they've received money from pharmaceutical companies. The ProPublica database has information from 12 companies about $760 million in payments over the period 2009 to 2nd quarter 2011. Two of my doctors were in the database. The insomnia specialist received $185,000 in one year from Pfizer for research and the GI surgeon received $133,000 in speaking fees over two years, also from Pfizer. I'm not sure a GI surgeon who DOESN'T foist drugs on you after you've had your bowels sliced open is someone I'd want to meet. As for Dr. Insomnia, he did say he had no further ideas for me…
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18Sep 2011 by Marjorie 3 Comments

Tinnitus: a product of low GABA?

nutritional therapy, specific health issue
Updated June 21, 2013 According to this ScienceDaily article on a new study about tinnitus, when a hair cell is damaged or dies, the neurons usually receiving input from it keep firing anyway, even though there's no data coming in. They "become more excitable and fire spontaneously," as if they have a quota to fill. Thus the constant ringing. The study in question showed that "tinnitus is correlated with lower levels of the inhibitory neurotransmitter GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid)." GABA supplements are available over the counter, but this article implies that drugs to raise GABA in humans are not available, which is confusing. Anyway, I've put it on my list of things to try. Update: See my March 24, 2013 post for results of my experiments with this. As to my…
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07Sep 2011 by Marjorie No Comments

Diagram of how various deficiencies can egg each other on

nutritional therapy
Soon after I discovered that typical guidelines about iodine are outdated and wrong (1), I came across information about vitamin K that made me realize the amounts I had been experimenting with were pathetically small. Also, it is possible that vitamin D supplements affect vitamin K, which for me would explain a lot (2). This is yet another example of how difficult it is to find reliable info about all the nutrients and how they work in the body and interact with each other. Here's a diagram of how I suspect my iodine, vitamin K, vitamin D, zinc, and iron deficiencies have been interacting. 1: You can find a list of iodine references at the bottom of this Breast Cancer Choices' iodine investigation page. 2: From the World's Healthiest Foods…
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