Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients articles from February 2001

Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients archives from February 2001

The War on Cancer.
February 1, 2001... Germany: A Mecca for Cancer Patients I recently returned from a three-week tour of European cancer hospitals. My 3,000-mile journey took me and my staff to holistic clinics in Germany, Switzerland and Denmark. This tour reinforced my...

Alternative Medicine 2000: Highlights and Challenges for Assessing and Treating Chronic Inflammatory Syndromes.
February 1, 2001... Whatever the future of health care holds, it is gratifying that there are now so many assessment and treatment options for patients with chronic inflammatory syndromes. It is likely that, in years to come, many of these alternative methods will...

The Year in Review.
February 1, 2001... Dare I say it? We've won. All that remains now are for the laws and the lawmakers to catch up. Let me give you some reasons for my unbridled optimism: * We won a landmark First Amendment victory over the FDA and are now reaping the fruits...

Year 2000's Best from the Mainstream in CAM Integration.
February 1, 2001... Prelude: Watching and analyzing the trends as hospitals, managed care firms and research organizations institutionalize the consumer's complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) movement is, for me, a fascinating, if not always happy-making...

"The (Holistic) Doctor Is In" Seattle Sets National Pace in Alternative Medicine.
February 1, 2001... It's a defining moment for me in what makes Seattle, Seattle. One wintry afternoon recently, I'm rooting around in my kitchen, deep in the throes of carbo-loading for my light-deprived, Seasonal Affective Disorder, moaning that I ever moved...

Radical Healing and the Rebirth of Science.
February 1, 2001... Introduction Holistic medicine is on the verge of becoming mainstream. We no longer need to cite studies to show that it has become popular. That's evident everywhere. Hospitals are scurrying to establish "Alternative Medicine" departments...

The Synergistic Approach: The Future of Nutrition Therapy.
February 1, 2001... There is no cell in the body that requires one nutrient only, yet single nutrient therapy has comprised the bulk of all nutrient intervention studies. This is understandable, because the goal of research is to isolate the activity of nutrients...

Conference Report: Third International Congress on Phytomedicine.
February 1, 2001... One of the highlights of the year 2000 from an herbal perspective was the 3rd International Congress on Phytomedicine held in Munich, Germany from October 11 to 13. This scientific conference, jointly organized by the Society of Phytotherapy,...

Alternative Medicine Coverage Expanded Nationally for Employees of Any Sized Business with New Health Plans.
February 1, 2001... Additional health benefit programs are now available to members of the International Union for the Natural Health, Complementary & Alternative Medicine Professions (IUNH), based in West Hills, California. "Like the existing health plans...

The "Aging Defiantly Couple" Offers Ideas for Not Getting Older in the Year 2001.
February 1, 2001... Dick and Peggy Purdue, authors of Aging Defiantly, the new book on human aging and how to deal with it, offer some great ideas for anyone who is coming into the geriatric cross hairs (they think that includes everyone over 21). Fighting...

The American Biologics' Forthcoming 13th International Integrative Medicine Symposium 2001 Will Take Place in Malta with a Post-Conference Excursion to Tunisia.
February 1, 2001... Might you wish to participate in truly advanced health care educational experiences amidst the ultimate in elegance in a European and North African setting? Exactly such an Elegant-Education-Excursion (E-E-E) is scheduled by Bridget G....

Homeostatic Soil Organisms for One's Primal Defense.
February 1, 2001... During 1996, at the age of nineteen, Jordan Rubin of Palm Beach Gardens, Florida had arrived at death's door, suffering from the most severe symptoms of Crohn's disease. This condition is a chronic, inflammatory, abnormality of the bowel...

Pelvic Mechanics and Prolotherapy.
February 1, 2001... Part One This is the first of a four part series prepared for The Townsend Letter for Doctors and Patients. It will cover some of the basic concepts current in modern Orthopedic Medicine. Future sections will deal with the tools for...

Dietary Supplementation with Chlorella pyrenoidosa Produces Positive Results in Patients with Cancer or Suffering From Certain Common Chronic Illnesses.
February 1, 2001... Randall E. Merchant is a professor of anatomy and neurosurgery at Virginia Commonwealth University's Medical College of Virginia. Cynthia A. Andre is a clinical research coordinator and social worker at Virginia Commonwealth University's...

Letters to the Editor.
February 1, 2001... Nutrition Should be Prescribed, Not Peddled! Editor: Beware of any company that sells opportunity and not product: Nutrition should be prescribed, not peddled! This is one reason why reputable companies sell only to health care...

Bias Against Alternative Medicine Strikes Again.
February 1, 2001... The case was recently reported' of a 27-year-old male who experienced recurrent kidney stones that, upon analysis, were found to be composed primarily of ephedrine, norephedrine, and pseudoephedrine. Upon further questioning, it was discovered...

Welcome to the Revolution!(Review)
February 1, 2001... Radical Healing: Integrating the World's Great Therapeutic Traditions to Create a New Transformative Medicine by Rudolph Ballentine, MD 612 pages, $27.50, Harmony Books, 1999, ISBN 0-609-60137-7 Clothed in the innocent guise of an...

Postmodern Herbalism.(Review)
February 1, 2001... Principles and Practice of Phytotherapy by Simon Mills and Kerry Bone Available from American Botanical Council 800-373-7105 or Harcourt Health Sciences 800-545-2522 Principles and Practice of Phytotherapy (hereafter PPP) is a book that...

A Fundamental Mind--Body Technique.(Review)
February 1, 2001... Guided Imagery for Self-Healing by Martin L. Rossman, MD H.J. Kramer Inc., P.O. Box 1082, Tiburon, California 94920 USA Lge. softcover, 2000 2nd Edition, $14.95, 288 pp. In the current climate of lethal pharmaceuticals and high...

The Double--Edged Sword of Oxygen.(Review)
February 1, 2001... Oxygen and Aging by Majid Ali, MD Aging Healthfully, 1-800-633-6226; www.aginghealthfully.com ISBN 1-879131-21-8, Softbound, 472 pp., 2000, $14.00 "Oxygen is the organizing influence of human biology...." writes Majid Ali, MD...

Science or Stonewalling?(Review)
February 1, 2001... Complementary/Alternative Medicine: An Evidence-Based Approach by John W. Spencer, PhD & Joseph J. Jacobs, MD, MBA foreword by Nancy Dickey, MD Mosby, Inc., 11830 Westline Industrial Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63146 USA 1999, large...

Supermarket to the World.(Review)
February 1, 2001... Rats in the Grain: The Dirty Tricks and Trials of Archer Daniels Midland by James Lieber Hardcover, 418 pages, index, photographs Published in 2000 by Four Walls Eight Windows, 30 West 14th St., New York, New York 10011 USA, $26...

Death by HMO: The Jennifer Gigliello Story.(Review)
February 1, 2001... Perhaps there is no greater regret than when you choose one direction over another, then at the end of a long and difficult journey you realize that you have made the wrong choice and have paid the ultimate price. This is what happened to...

HP STETHOS[TM], Electronic Stethoscope.
February 1, 2001... Is an electronic stethoscope in your future? The historical background regarding the development of the stethoscope is quite interesting. The first auscultation was initiated by the placing of the ear, on the breast, awkward and socially...

The Pharmacist and Homeopathy.
February 1, 2001... Herb Rothouse, RPh considers himself a conventional pharmacist with an interest in complementary approaches to health care. I had the opportunity to talk with him about homeopathy in his pharmacy practice. Allen Kratz, PharmD (AK): I...

Natural Products from the Sea: Ethnopharmacology, Nutrition and Conservation.
February 1, 2001... Introduction: Chemical Diversity and Evolution The sea represents the most promising source of medicinal and nutritional natural products of the future. Traditional peoples have used natural products from the sea for medicinal and...

Psychoneuroimmunoendocrinology Review and Commentary.
February 1, 2001... Psychoneuroimmunoendocrinology is the term describing the unity of mental, neurological, hormonal and immune functions with its many potential applications. PNIE addresses the influence of the cognitive images of the mind (whatever its elusive...

Plastics: The Sixth Basic Food Group -- Part 2.
February 1, 2001... Health Risks and Environmental Issues "Plastics -- An Important Part of Your Healthy Diet," touts the American Plastics Council in a full-page ad in National Geographic 2000 Magazine, suggesting that plastics could be thought of as "the...

A Way of Eating for Pleasure and Health.
February 1, 2001... I recently stopped at the North American Vegetarian Society's annual conference (NAVS, Dolgeville, NY; 518-5687970), held in nearby Asheville, North Carolina. I was mostly interested in seeing the exhibits and displays; being a heartfelt...

A Spidery Kind of Kid.
February 1, 2001... Six-year-old Jack was a very poor and picky eater. Nearly indifferent to food, he rarely got hungry. He was quite averse to meat and was a strict vegetarian (unlike his family), because he did not like hurting animals. He especially liked dogs....

How Do You Treat Heartburn and GERD?
February 1, 2001... Andrew Gaeddert[C] The most common symptom of GERD, gastro-esophageal reflux disease, is heartburn. Heartburn is usually experienced as a burning sensation behind the breastbone that may rise all the way to the face. Discomfort is caused...

Current Health News You Can Use.
February 1, 2001... This column will highlight recently published articles in the major peer-reviewed medical journals that have practical relevance for you. If you have access to e-mail you can receive the most recent and expanded weekly version of this column....

Preventing side effects of radiographic contrast agents with N-acetylcysteine.
February 1, 2001... Eighty-three patients with chronic renal insufficiency (mean serum creatinine, 2.4 mg/dl) who were undergoing computed tomography with a contrast agent were randomly assigned to receive N-acetylcysteine (NAC) or placebo (blinding not...

Herbal treatment for pain.
February 1, 2001... Two hundred-ten patients with an exacerbation of chronic low back pain were randomly assigned to receive, in double blind fashion, 393mg of an oral willow bark extract (containing 120 mg of salicin) once or twice daily, or placebo for 4 weeks....

DHEA effective against osteoporosis.
February 1, 2001... Seventy women and 70 men between the ages of 60 and 69 years, and an additional 70 women and 70 men between the ages of 70 and 79 years, were randomly assigned to receive, in double-blind fashion, 50mg/day of DHEA or placebo for 1 year. At the...

Potential hazard of colloidal silver.
February 1, 2001... A 56-year-old man presented with a several month history of bluish discoloration of the proximal areas of the fingernails, characteristic of argyria (silver poisoning). The serum concentration of silver was markedly elevated at 85 mcg/L (normal...

Fish oil plus vitamin B12 relieves dysmenorrhea (menstrual discomfort).
February 1, 2001... Seventy-eight Danish women (aged 16-39 years) with dysmenorrhea were randomly assigned to receive, in double-blind fashion, one of the following for at least 3 menstrual cycles: 1) placebo (consisting of "average" Danish fat), 2) 2.5 g/day of...

Red yeast rice: natural treatment for elevated cholesterol.
February 1, 2001... Eighty-eight patients with hyperlipidemia who were consuming a diet similar to the American Heart Association Step 1 diet were randomly assigned to receive, in double-blind fashion, 2.4 g/day of red yeast rice (Cholestin, Pharmanex, Inc.) or...

Successful alternative treatment for pancreatic cancer.
February 1, 2001... Eleven patients with inoperable pancreatic adenocarcinoma (stage II-IV) were treated with 25-40 g/day of a lyophilized porcine pancreatic enzyme product, taken in capsule form, between meals, and spread evenly throughout the day. The enzyme...

Niacin raises homocysteine levels.
February 1, 2001... The Arterial Disease Multiple Intervention Trial, a multicenter randomized, placebo-controlled trial, examined the effect of niacin compared with placebo on homocyst(e)ine(Hcy) levels in 52 individuals (mean age, 68 years) with peripheral...

Interstitial Cystitis: A New Approach.
February 1, 2001... Interstitial cystitis (IC) is a multifactorial syndrome characterized by pelvic and/or perineal pain, urinary urgency, nocturia, pain increased by holding urine (which leads to frequency), and a constant sensation of urge to void. The pain of...

Is Chocolate a Health Food?
February 1, 2001... Most people love chocolate, and numerous psychoactive chemicals have been found in it that may explain its attraction. These include caffeine (a stimulant), theobromine (structurally similar to caffeine), serotonin (a neurotransmitter with...