Monthly Boost September 2005

Welcome to September, only the other day did I put away my winter wear and take out my summer wear and already the clothes stores have changed their window displays for some warmer ‘gear’ this makes me slightly apprehensive. Yes, I love the summer with a capital ‘L’…and I do envy you Southern Californians, Australians, South Africans, Indians! …anyway, let me get on with my news for this month as I take my heart off my sleeve.

In the month just slipped by there was plenty of news in the UK on the two drugs Vioxx and Seroxat (also known as Paxil in the US)…mainly not good news (for the makers more specifically). It was mentioned in the The UK Times that a gentleman by the name of Kenneth Wood, age 71 years died of a heart attack whilst taking part in a trial to see if the pain killer (Vioxx, known to work by inhibiting an enzyme called COX-2) could also be effective in treating colon cancer! Still on the hunt for a superbug, sorry superdrug.

Coming from a pharmacological background it all makes great logical sense and why would not these drugs be effective, the science makes incredible sense…but this is where it all seems to end... not everything that exists in life is proven by science, so does that mean it does not exist, or do the scientists (or left brainers) amongst us, need to carry out a double blind placebo study before we commit to anything?......

Vioxx is used mainly to ‘treat’ arthritis and other ongoing inflammatory conditions. I would like to highlight the fact that I have put the word ‘treat’ in inverted commas and as you read on you will understand why….

I would naturally ask the question WHY do you have this condition?

When I trained at University as a clinical nutritionist I was not taught (sadly) to ask ‘WHY’? ..lets use an example here, before it gets a bit too ‘fuzzy’. Say Mr. Chaudhuri (rather hip to be multi-cultural) has arthritis.

Scenario one: he goes to see his traditional doctor and he is prescribed Vioxx (an anti-inflammatory that is not supposed to have the side effects of other more broad anti-inflammatories, such as aspirin).

Scenario two: he goes to see a practitioner of natural medicine and he is ‘prescribed’ a diet low in fat (I could go on about this, but will save it for another day), avoidance of all sugars and hydrogenated fats (absolutely!) and some supplements, one of which is an omega 3 oil and another is a natural version of Vioxx (such as resveratrol, flavonoids, curcumin).

Believe it or not both methodologies above are the same, the only difference between these two scenarios is that Mr Chaudhuri will experience less or no side effects to the natural supplements and also his loyal liver will be quite pleased in not having to clean up the toxic bi-products of the synthetic drugs and he experiences a reduction in his symptoms…well ‘marvellous’ you may say, but hold on…both practitioners (traditional and natural) are practicing allopathic medicine..in other words treating the symptoms and NOT the cause. It is more than likely that if Mr Chaudhuri comes off all his supplements his symptoms will re-appear (and the same with Vioxx, needless to say).

I had one of those eureka moments (don’t you love those!), sitting in a conference when I realised that if someone is displaying symptoms of any kind, we need to understand that the inner body is communicating with our higher centre, the brain (now I am not taking you into airy fairy land..stay with me) literally saying ‘hey brain, I am sending out some arthritic type symptoms as something is not quite right down here’ …now that was a eureka type moment for me anyway.

So I will use one of my case studies as scenario three here….(name changed of course) Scenario three: Mr Chaudhuri is tested over several visits (during which his nutritional intake is fine-tuned and various supplements are recommended) to reveal that he has some parasites …for those of you who may think parasites are for the unclean and to be picked up in the tropics or developing countries, please rewind and erase this totally false information. Having dealt with the parasites and cleaning up Mr Chaudhuri’s liver he is now medication free (he was on low dose steroids for 12 plus years with low dose aspirin to boot…by the way this low dose aspirin thing, really gets my inner side communicating with my higher bran centre….again a topic for another Monthly Boost).

So next time you get a headache or joint pain or any symptoms (which usually become chronic if not addressed at the ‘root cause’) remember to ask the question WHY? …if your health advisor (be they naturopathic or traditional) does not address the WHY then you will be going around the ‘merry go round’ and this merry go round can unfortunately be the beginning of ill health. …this is not doom and gloom folks just educational, so here is some ammunition to help yourself.

Another very common scenario is taking anti-diarrhoea medication when on holiday to stop the ‘runs’. ..stop and ask the question…

‘WHY? do you have the diarrhoea in the first place?’ Diarrhoea is not a ‘bad thing’ (of course it should not be going on longer than 3 days). Imagine you’ve eaten a food that was not properly cooked or contaminated or drank some contaminated water…these critters suddenly decide to have a rave in your gut causing major chaos, your intelligent miraculous body increases the gut motions..as if on a ‘highway to heaven’ to eliminate these critters as rapidly and as effectively as possible.

But hold on you don’t want to be the ‘party pooper’ so you take one of those anti-diarrhoea pills…this basically creates a pile up on this ‘highway’ (no pun intended)....but at least you don’t have to keep running to the ‘WC’ every few minutes..right?...have you ever wondered where on earth in your body do these critters end up? When their only way out has been closed off? ….hhhmmm I am sure next time you reach out for these bowel stoppers you may just think twice. …ever though that by suppressing diarrhoea you may well show signs of arthritis later on in life?

Our bodies are an amazing creation that science will always be trying to work out till the funding runs out… but science can not prove everything.

Always listen to your inner voice!

Here’s to a great autumn (or spring depending where you are)!

Khush Mark