M-I-S-S-I-S-S-I-P-P-I is the top-ranking state when it comes to life-threatening health issues like diabetes and heart disease. You could say that if a healthy diet can make it there, it can make it anywhere. And, that is just what Rev. Michael O. Minor, at Oak Hill Baptist in North Mississippi has in mind…God willing! Rev. Minor has not only “risen above” the worldly fact that fried foods taste heavenly, in order to point out that what’s pleasurable to the body is not necessarily good for it, but he’s had to overcome the cultural challenge that such tasty fried and heavily-salted food, and their accompanying age-old family recipes, have been part of the way of life for the people of Mississippi for generations. However, Rev. Minor’s evangelism about health food over the past ten years has not gone unsung by the heavenly hosts of the National Baptist Convention, which represents approximately seven million people in over ten thousand churches. Their goal is to have a “health ambassador” in every member church by September 2012.

So, Rev. Minor, I just want to thank you for putting the “fear of God” into eating healthy. May the goal of the National Baptist Convention be reached at…God-speed!!

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All too often we huddle the masses of various ethnic groups in this country into whatever has become the “norm” for Americans in general, and then try to monitor everyone’s health by a “standard” measure that actually has no real standards with which to measure. This type of healt hcare can’t be done in a country like the U.S., where the wonderfully diverse mixture of cultures and ethnic expression makes standard brand medical treatment invalid. And, apparently this type of medical model doesn’t work world wide either! World Health Organization BMI categories tailored for specific regions and races to define who was overweight and obese indicated that foreign-born South Asians had a higher rate of diabetes at lower BMI levels than all other racial and ethnic groups.

These results, according to the researchers, is important because it demonstrates that standard BMI cutoffs typically used in the U.S. and Europe do not accurately capture the health risks of being overweight or obese for South Asians. An associate investigator not involved in the study added that the findings highlight the importance of understanding the health differences between different Asian sub-populations.

I have to agree… everybody in every body is individual in every way, including the way that their body responds to food, drink and environmental agents, and though there are some things that may seem “groupable,” assumptions in medicine are dangerous!

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Back to the drug snaffu…it appears that some bottles of the anti-depressant, Citalopram, may have been labeled inaccurately as Finasteride, a drug used to treat benign prostatic hyperplasia — and, you guessed it, Finasteride may have been labeled Citalopram.  Greenstone warned that women who are pregnant should not even handle, much less ingest, Finasteride as its risk factors include fetal abnormalities. Talk about a depressing situation no matter which drug a person ended up with!

So, heads up out there: The company has advised patients to return any suspect bottles to their pharmacist. Great idea, but I have a better one. See a chiropractor for all of your health needs!!

Technorati Tags: chiropractic, chiropractor, good health, natural solutions, pharmaceutical mislabeling

It used to be, when I was a kid, my mom would say, “No pop before dinner!” And, of course, no pop with dinner either, but few kids back in the day had anything but milk with dinner. But, ever since I became a chiropractor, I could see Mom’s wisdom about surgery, carbonated drinks not actually being “food” and, therefore, not belonging on the dinner table. But, today’s kids, and teens in particular, face a more significant problem. With American teens chugging energy drinks like there was actually some value in the chugging, fears are growing among health care professionals that the ingredients might be putting some kids (and adults) at risk. These so-called beverages contain a mix-match of caffeine, sugar, and (believe it or not) dietary supplements such as vitamins and herbal extracts. I am a great supporter of vitamin supplementation, but vitamins, like any other non-food addition to the diet, need to be monitored and their  effects well-understood.  But, for the very reason that these beverages are classified as nutritional supplements, they have received much less scrutiny and are under fewer restrictions than both foods and drugs.

In fact, in a  new report issued Monday, Florida pediatricians described cases of seizures, delusions, heart problems and kidney or liver damage in children who had downed one or more non-alcoholic energy drinks.

Common parents, you are the ones who are supposed to know what’s good for your kids. Are you too busy drinking these beverages, and getting the added “zip” from them that could lead to your own health problems that you are not even interested in considering the damage that these energy beverages might be doing to your kids?

The report called for regulatory action, in addition to more research. But, “money talks” and U.S. sales of non-alcoholic energy drinks are expected to hit $9 billion this year, with children and young adults accounting for half the market.
Source: reuters.com

Technorati Tags: childrens health, chiropractor, delusions, energy drinks, heart problems, kidney damage, liver damage, new study, pediatric chiropractic, seizures

All I can say is that it’s about time the global warming has moved from “colorless” to at least an “orange” security alert. In my opinion, it should have been put on “red alert” years ago!

Source: The Kansas City Star

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I’m pretty sure that Fluffy didn’t knowingly volunteer for vivisection any more than any human would no matter how altruistic the goal might be.  And, I doubt very much if Fluffy was induced by a can of tuna. No, Fluffy was probably handed over for experimentation by someone who was no longer interested in a fluffy kitten once it grew into a full grown cat, or else Fluffy was raised in captivity for the purposes of “torture” for the “higher good of humankind.”

It seems to me with all of the “virtual” assistance available today that the archaic practice of using “real” animals as guinea pigs for medical research would have been abandoned.

As a healthcare provider I respect life, all life, animal as well as human.  As the debate continues as to what constitutes torture, perhaps it is time that we define the nature of torture as it pertains to animals as well as to human beings.

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If we, humans, pulled by our noses by unconscionable scientists, hadn’t been so busy chemical-coating and irradiating natural fruits and vegetables (and at this point and the current growing methods, I use the term “natural” loosely) after growing them in mineral-depleted soil or confining them to artificially-lit greenhouses, fruits and vegetables today would taste fabulous (the way they used to…even before I was born), and it goes without saying that they would be far more healthy for the human body.

Perhaps it would be more advantageous for every living thing on the planet, if scientists would just come up with a way for industrialized human beings to be “tricked” into feeling satiated and satisfied with the naturally diverse and abundant cornucopia that is health, itself, within their reach every day in the industrialized world. Maybe they could just be “zapped” so that they would once again love the smell of roses, appreciate the taste of broccoli, and savor the taste of strawberries to such a degree that the overfed and over-pampered classes wouldn’t continue to crave more and more. Instead of the recurrent chant “give me something I don’t have,” (like a rose that smells like rootbeer!) there would appear a quiet contentment. Then scientists and researchers could focus on  those things that have transformative power, ways to assist the rest of the world’s people who every moment are lacking even the basic necessities of life.

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As the story goes, after “The Catcher in the Rye” sold millions, with Salinger’s picture (such an intriguing, seductive face) looking out from each dust jacket, Salinger became “sick of seeing” himself and demanded that his photo be removed from future editions. I guess you could say that the vivid face he left us with, instead, was not his, but that of Holden Caulfield. No doubt, that teen-aged face is etched differently in the mind of each of us, but even through the veil of diverse gray matter, we’d all recognize him still.

It is strange that we feel such a collective loss of someone whose face we haven’t seen in over half a century. But, I suppose it is because we know that along with the loss of his vivid face, we’ve forever lost his vivid mind as well.

Technorati Tags: Holden Caulfield, J.D. Salinger, vivid face