Back Pain from Osteoporosis
If you suffer from severe back pain and your doctor has not found a cause, ask him or her if you need a bone density test to determine if you have osteoporosis. All women and most men will suffer osteoporosis if they live long enough.
Manipulation for Low Back Pain
An article in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that spinal manipulation is at least as effective in controlling low-back pain as the standard medical treatments of ultrasound, antiinflammatory drugs, anti-pain drugs, diathermy heat treatments, hot or cold packs, use of a corset or transcutaneous nerve stimulation.
Treatment of Low Back Pain
Your choices for treatment of back pain are surgery, steroid injections, pain medications, exercise strengthening and stretching programs, or techniques that place external force on the back such as deep massage, manipulation and passive stretching. Because surgery has such a high failure rate, it is usually recommended only when there is danger of permanent injury such as loss of feeling, loss of muscle control or intractable pain.
Total Knee Replacement
When all the cartilage in your knee is gone, the only effective treatment is to replace the whole knee. The ends of bones are soft, so they must be covered with a thick white gristle called cartilage. Once damaged, cartilage can never heal or re-grow. Small holes in cartilage can be repaired, but usually once cartilage is damaged the person spends the rest of his or her life losing cartilage until it is completely gone and the knee hurts 24 hours a day.
Diet and Arthritis Pain
A diet loaded with cooked vegetables and olive oil helps reduce the pain, swelling and discomfort of rheumatoid arthritis, according to a study from Harvard School of Public Health.
Ankylosing Spondylitis (Reactive Arthritis of the Spine)
If your back is stiff and hurts when you move, if it hurts to touch two points at the side of the top of...
Recovery Heart Rate
A study in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that one of the best tests to predict your risk for having a heart...
Cholesterol Guidelines
The current cholesterol guidelines recommend that everyone should have a blood level of the bad LDL cholesterol below 100. If you live in Canada, divide the American number by 40.
Mitral Valve Prolapse
One in ten Americans suffers from mitral valve prolapse and the vast majority have no symptoms and will never know that they have it....
Treatment of Insulin Resistance
Most people who develop diabetes in later life can be controlled so that they are not at increased risk for the many complications of diabetes such as heart attacks, strokes, blindness, deafness, amputations, kidney failure, burning foot syndrome, venous insufficiency with ulceration and stasis dermatitis.
Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia
If you are a man who finds it difficult to start your stream, check with your doctor to see if you have an infection or a benign or cancerous enlargement of your prostate.
Testosterone Replacement for Older Men?
As men age from 50 to 70, their testosterone levels drop more than 40 percent, causing them to become fatter, and less sexual, muscular and assertive and have smaller, weaker bones (7,11). Twenty percent of men aged 60-80 years have testosterone levels below the lower limit of normal.
Ringing in the Ears – Tinnitus
Tinnitus means that you hear a sound that no one else hears. It can be a buzzing, roaring or ringing and it can even sound like a heart beat. If the sound is pulsatile like a beating heart, the doctor may look for obstructions or widening in the arteries in the brain such as those caused by arteriosclerotic plaques or a ballooning of an artery called an aneurysm
Fungus Toenails – Deformed Toenails
Fungus infections cause less than five percent of deformed nails. Drying of skin and skin conditions such as psoriasis are more common causes. The part of nails that you see is dead. Living nails are located underneath the skin at their base.
Getting Rid of Dark Spots on the Skin
With aging, many people develop dark spots on their skin, particularly in the sun-exposed areas of the face and back of the hands. Others develop dark spots after pregnancy or trauma, such as an abrasion, insect bite or cut.
Grapefruit Juice Effects on Drugs
Several reports show that taking certain medications with grapefruit juice can cause problems by markedly increasing absorption of the medication.
Many drugs are broken down...
No Way to Grow Taller After Puberty
Bones do not grow throughout their length. They grow from growth centers, called the epiphysis, near their ends. When a person reaches puberty, growth centers close one after the other until all the growth centers are closed forever and a person's bones can never grow again. After that, a person can grow wider, but not taller.
Permanent Birth Control Methods: Vasectomy or Tubal Ligation?
Will a vasectomy increase risk of prostate cancer? Whether the husband gets a vasectomy or the wife gets a tubal ligation is usually decided by who has the strongest will. Vasectomies and tubal ligations are safe surgeries, but the operation on a man is a simple cutting under the skin in an office, while the operation on a woman requires going into her belly in an operating room. Over the long haul, they both are safe and effective in preventing pregnancies.
Why Women are More Likely Than Men to Develop Autoimmune Diseases
Women are three times more likely than men to develop lupus, multiple sclerosis, or rheumatoid arthritis, currently thought to be autoimmune diseases that are caused by a person's immunity attacking her own body, instead of doing its job of killing germs. This increased risk may be caused in some way by the process of pregnancy, or it may be due to the fact that women are twice as likely as men to become infected with a sexually transmitted disease.
Irregular Periods – Amenorrhea
Women who menstruate more often than every 21 days or less often than every 35 days need to be evaluated for a cause. Women are supposed to have two hormones, estrogen and progesterone.
Radon
After cigarette smoke, radon gas is the second leading cause of lung cancer, causing more than 15,000 deaths each year. Radon-222 is a colorless, odorless gas that forms from the decay of naturally occurring uranium-238. Since U-238 occurs in soil and rock throughout the world, radon gas seeps into homes through the soil.
Duct Tape for Warts
A study from Cincinnati Children's Hospital showed that common duct tape is significantly more effective in curing common warts than the standard treatment of liquid nitrogen.
Colon Cleansers Can Harm
A popular natural health newsletter tells you that toxic sludge builds up in your colon, and of course they will sell you a product...
Pepper Cream for Pain Control
Pain messages are passed along nerves by a neurotransmitter called "substance P." Capsaicin, the component of chili peppers that makes them hot, blocks substance P and the resultant pain. A cream containing .025 percent capsaicin has been shown to block pain in joints, nerves and skin
Varicose Veins Helped by Exercise
A regular exercise program may be the most effective treatment for varicose veins. Veins are supposed to contain valves that keep blood from backing...
Preventing Alzheimer’s Disease
A study from Brown University Medical School showed that Alzheimer’s disease may be another form of diabetes, and all the recommendations for avoiding diabetes may also protect your memory.
Itching with no visible cause
Itching can be caused by nerve damage associated with diabetes or lack of vitamin B12, skin diseases, an allergy to something touching the skin or inside your body or a hidden tumor or infection. See my report on neuropathy. Often doctors cannot find the cause. When more than one person in a family itches, the usual cause is scabies
Your Liver Does Not Need to be Detoxified
Your liver is the organ that picks up breakdown products of your own metabolism and removes them from your body. The promoters of liver-detoxifying supplements tell you that their products "support healthy liver function" and help it do its job better.
