YourHealthMatters

The Cost of Taking Care of Your Health Just Went UP!

Dr. Mercola on his excellent website just highlighted another way in which good health will cost more, not less under the health care reform coming. He notes that this act will change what you can use an HSA or Flex account for. Up to now if I prescribed a supplement for someone with a medical problem they could use their tax-protected money in an HSA to purchase the supplement. The new legislation will limit the HSA funds to be used only for "prescribed drugs or insulin". If this means that prescribed supplements which are not drugs are no longer eligible for HSA money, then the cost of good health just went up and you will all be under subtle pressure to buy more drugs than supplements. When I practiced in Ontario most people would choose a drug paid for by their drug plan rather than buy a supplement they had to pay for.

This article also gives the cost estimates of what health care will cost in the country over the next 10 years - a staggering figure that will result in tax hikes in coming years.

What is not mentioned is how  much state income taxes will rise to pay for increasing state-funded Medicaid fees to the same level as Medicare fees which is a requirement of the new legislation. Try and get any elected official or person running in the MidTerms to discuss this issue and see what happens.

Click here to read this chilling article by Dr. Mercola.

drBob

Change Your Mind, Change Your Weight

In June last year one of my patients told me how he lost 60 pounds in 6 months using no special diet, no pill, no supplements. I posted his description of what he did and since then have referred many people to this program. I am repeating this information in case you missed it the first time.

The program is web-based, free and based on Biblical teachings. It is called The Lord's Table and the link to the program is right here:

http://www.settingcaptivesfree.com/courses/lords-table/day1/

Recently another patient of mine signed up for the course and in 6 weeks dropped 25 pounds. She told me the course had helped to change the way she thought about food, her weight and her health. She had never had results like this before.

To repeat, the course is free and needs only your willingness to do the lessons and submit them online. You also are assigned a free telephone mentor/coach to help you throughout the course. This support can be very beneficial.

I know of no other program that can help you change your thinking about food the way The Lord's Table can.

drBob

Stop The Thyroid Madness

This is a great book describing what is wrong with how thyroid disease is treated all too often in this country. Most physicians do not evaluate the freeT3 test in determining if your thyroid works properly. I learned to order this test years ago and have used it for every patient I am testing for thyroid function. The Emeritus Professor of Endocrinology at the School of Medicine in Wichita strongly supported the use of this test as well when I heard him talk 3 years ago about thyroid evaluation.

From a review on Amazon the following quote about this wonderful book -

"If you have thyroid issues, you HAVE to read this book. It truly is the Thyroid bible and if you care at all about actually getting better this is the way to do it. Doctors will leave you sick based on your blood work. This book lets you know in no uncertain terms that if you still feel sick, you still ARE sick. Listen to your body and not a ridiculous and meaningless number on a sheet of paper."

Click the image below to buy the book now from Amazon.

drBob

Where Are The Bodies??

With the FDA desperate to take away our freedom to purchase vitamins and supplements over the counter, a very relevant question should be: If vitamins and supplements are too unsafe to be available over-the-counter, Where Are The Bodies of all those have died as a result of taking vitamins or supplements? GUESS?

This is not an idle question and there is an answer readily available if you look. The 2008 statistics released by the American Association of Poison Control Centers National Poison Data Centers in its latest report show that exactly NO ONE died in 2008 from taking vitamins and/or supplements. This huge number of deaths of course would justify what the FDA and Big Pharma want to do, wouldn't it?? And it would justify Sen. McCain's sponsoring the DSSA Act.

If you believe as I do that the FDA must not be granted this unbridled power, then read this page and take action to email your members of Congress and Senate and urge them not to vote in favor of the DSSA, which has been sponsored by Sen. John McCain.

And if The Tea Parties Organization is really looking for an issue to go after government over, why not take on this issue and protect some of our fundamental essential rights - the right to choose what we take to improve our health, reduce our dependence on Big Pharma, and extend our healthspan.

I am indebted to Dr. Jonathan Wright for first posing this question in the latest issue of his excellent "Health And Nutrition" newsletter.

drBob

Do You Know About the DSSA?? - Pay Attention to This Law

Would you like the FDA to remove most vitamins and supplements from the open market, then make them available for Big Pharma to sell at inflated prices? I don't see any hands going up out there! If you doubt this can happen, read what has happened already to pyridoxamine as an example that has already happened. The price of this natural safe supplement just got elevated to brand name drug status.

Sen. John McCain has co-sponsored an act called the Dietary Supplement Safety Act of of 2009 which will do just that. The FDA will be able under this legislation to remove any vitamin or supplement from the market without scrutiny or appeal. Don't think for a moment they will act in your best interests with this new found power.

It will be very interesting to see the recorded vote on this Act. Any member of Congress or Senate who supports this vote should find out how many voters they will lose at their next election. Taking away your freedom to choose safe supplements over drugs should be remembered when you are next in the Federal Election voting booth.

Please send an email to your elected officials about your position on this DSSA bill. Click this link NOW.

In the next post I will report on the research that shows just how SAFE over-the-counter vitamins and supplements are. Stay tuned.....

drBob

Vitamin D - The Sunshine Vitamin

Here is a book explaining all the uses of Vitamin D, how to test and how to treat the epidemic insufficiency that exists in North America. Written by my long-term friend, Dr.Zoltan Rona has provided plenty of references for everything he writes about. The most amazing part of the book is the exhaustive long list of diseases that have research backing the impact of Vitamin D treatment, each referenced to the medical literature. I learned many more uses for Vitamin D for my office practice as a result.

This is a small inexpensive paperback that should be in your library. Buy it now by clicking the image below.

drBob

Do You Have Dumping Syndrome?

Have you had your gallbladder removed and yet still have symptoms of bloating, gas and urgent diarrhea after meals? These are common symptoms occurring after gallbladder surgery and are known as dumping syndrome. A change in diet is often recommended but is not very effective.

Some years ago I reasoned that it was a lack of enough volume of bile mixing with food at meal-time that led to the symptoms. The purpose of the gallbladder is to store bile between meals and then contract and pulse a large volume of bile onto the food as it enters the small intestine. Obviously without a gallbladder this concentrated pulse of bile can not happen at meal-time.

 I looked around for a way to increase or improve the bile and found a product called LV-GB. This natural product contains the herbs that improve bile production and also contains some bile salts.

LV-GB is made by Designs for Health and is only available through health-care practitioners. It is very safe and inexpensive. It must not be taken by anyone with known gallstones.

I have also used the product successfully many times to improve a sluggish gallbladder that is producing lots of symptoms as noted above but has no stones. This condition is called biliary dyskinesia and is the most common reason for gallbladder removal in this area.

drBob

Don't Quit Video

Here's a YouTube video based on the famous poem "Don't Quit". Well worth watching whenever you need some motivation to keep going on.

Crestor™ For Every Adult?

Do you think healthy adults should take Crestor™ to reduce their risk of heart attack and stroke? Leave me a comment with your views.

The FDA has approved Crestor™ to be used to reduce risk of heart and stroke in people with certain risk factors for these diseases, even if their cholesterol is not elevated. This is based on a study of 25,000 people who had risk factors but normal cholesterol. The study group had a lower risk of heart attacks and stroke while on Crestor™. Read about this decision on the CBS News website.

BUT - this action of Crestor™ could be achieved in other ways. Crestor™ lowers hsCRP, a marker in your blood of inflammation. Ten years ago Dr. Paul Ridker,MD showed that an elevated hsCRP level is a better indicator of your heart disease risk than elevated cholesterol. He published a series of papers on this subject and now he has been the lead investigator on this Crestor™ study.

Lowering inflammation levels in the body can be achieved with diet and lifestyle changes which have none of the potential side effects of Crestor™. At the end of this post I've highlighted my two favorite books showing how to do this.

What is not known yet is whether any drug insurance plan will even pay for the expensive Crestor™ to be used as a prevention treatment when cholesterol is normal. I bet not even BlueCross will cover this use of Crestor™.

In the meantime if you have a family history of heart disease, smoke, are overweight, have high blood pressure but normal cholesterol, consider having an hsCRP test done on your blood. Then take steps to lower your overall inflammation using the methods in these two books both of which I highly recommend.

drBob

H1N1 Is Still Around

The CDC released a report yesterday that H1N1 infection is  occurring in the southeast states - and especially in Georgia. People hospitalized with H1N1 complications in the past few weeks there have equaled the September hospitalizations when the outbreak was quite universal in the US. Read the transcript of their press release in the above link. The report is also here on MSNBC.

The vaccine is still available but few people if any are asking for it now. I have privately told a few people that if we were going to see a return of this virus, it would re-appear when spring temperatures were over 45-50 degrees. Liberal is definitely warm enough for a new outbreak. I have seen only a very few cases of the typical winter flu in the past months, far less than in usual winters past. But yesterday someone came in who had had classic symptoms of H1N1 last week. This was the first probable H1N1 infection I had seen since November.

The vaccine is safe, effective and free. It takes 4 weeks to build up immunity to the virus. Because healthy people can die suddenly of H1N1, as we have seen right in Liberal last year, I recommend everyone over the age of 6 months be immunized. Allergy to egg is the only contraindication.

drBob