Day two of the conference I discussed in the last blog concentrated on the microbiome which is this enormous population of micro-organisms such as bacteria that live in and on us.  The microbiome has been known to exist for many decades but was poorly understood until heavily researched in the last 20 years.  One of […]

It Is More About How They Are Turned On Or Off I participated in a conference this past week on the role of epigenetics in health and disease and how our lifestyle affects that.  Epigenetics simply means “above the gene”.  Our 30,000 genes harbor many mutations that can increase our disease risks.  These risks, however, […]

The hallmark of good healthcare is that it is “evidence-based”.  This simply means that decisions in care and preventative strategies are largely based on quality scientific evidence rather than empirical information.  This is not to say that empirically based knowledge, that based only on practical experience, is not important but that scientifically derived evidence tends […]

There is a tendency for us to have progressive inflammatory activity as we age.  This inflammation is a part of virtually every chronic disease from heart disease to cancer to autoimmune disease.  As would be expected all of these diseases become progressively more common with age in parallel to what is happening with inflammation.  This […]

As sugar consumption was found to be strongly associated with health risks such as obesity and diabetes, a simplistic solution seemed to be the use of non-caloric artificial sweeteners (NCAS) – we could have most things taste sweet with no harm.  The problem has been that after 3-4 decades of consumption of NCAS, both diabetes […]

The discussion of the changes to our diet over the past 100 years that are driving the many chronic diseases common in society can be complex.  However, there are a few indicators which are key and relatively easy to look at.  Perhaps the most important indicator is the sugar to fiber ratio or sugar:fiber.  A […]

Omega-3 fatty acids (FAs) are essential fatty acids.  This means that the body needs them for different functions, and they must be consumed as the body cannot make them from other sources.  Systems that are particularly dependent upon the availability of omega-3 FAs are the immune system, the cardiovascular system and the brain. There are […]

Celiac disease is an autoimmune disease in which an immune antibody reaction to gluten begins to cause cross reaction against the lining of the small intestine. It is associated with intestinal symptoms such as abdominal pain, bloating and diarrhea as well as many symptoms outside of the digestive tract such as fatigue, anemia, osteoporosis, joint […]

Perhaps the greatest overlooked aspect of disease risk is the impact of stress.  A search of the topic “stress” in PubMed, the search engine for the National Library of Medicine reveals over 26,000 studies that have looked at stress and health.  The majority of these studies examine a disease risk that is associated with stress.  […]

Peripheral neuropathy (PN) is a disorder of nerves within the body, particularly in the legs/feet and arms/hands. Symptoms include: Loss of sensation to touch, vibration, and temperature Intense pain called neuropathic pain Muscle weakness. The various symptoms relate to the degeneration of different types of nerve fibers within the nerve; motor fibers in the case […]