Diabetes & heart disease improved by Safer Sauna....

Today's Post:  Friday, 3-15-2013

Alex Ortner is a health and raw foods writer. 

(Raw foods tend to be vegetables and whole fruit. 

So people who eat raw foods more or a lot most days are less fat, healthier, and eat fewer harmful and fattening foods as a result. 

And, though there is a separate way that many cruciferous vegetables prevent cancer that cooking and eating with extra virgin olive oil give you – it makes their carotenes more bioavailable, some of the most effective cancer fighting compounds in cruciferous vegetables are destroyed by heat.  Notably raw broccoli an cauliflower florets prevent the aggressive kind of prostate cancer BUT only if they are eaten raw.)

Earlier this week, Alex sent this email about the Sunlighten infrared sauna:

“If you suffer from type I or type II diabetes there may be a new tool to add to your healing arsenal.  We all know that an effective diet and exercise plan can help alleviate the symptoms of diabetes, but the treatment below might surprise you.

In a study published in the June 2010 issue of the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, Dr. Richard Beever of the Department of Family Medicine at the University of British Columbia in Canada found that infrared saunas help diabetics.

In another study at the Fraser Lake Community Health Center in rural British Columbia, all patients with type II diabetes were invited to participate in a study consisting of 20-minute infrared sauna sessions three times a week for three months. The study used Sunlighten infrared saunas.  

"Sauna use may be associated with improved quality of life in people with type II diabetes mellitus," the research concluded.

 "Uptake of infrared saunas use is greater than the uptake of other lifestyle interventions."

When I found out about this new treatment, I looked a little deeper into how infrared technology actually works to reduce the symptoms of diabetes.  Here's what I found out:

Infrared saunas have been shown to improve the condition of diabetic neuropathy.  Infrared lighting reduces the numbing conditions and causes molecules of nitric oxide to be released from hemoglobin in the bloodstream, which, in turn, increases blood flow.

This is particularly beneficial to diabetics who suffer from poor blood circulation to the feet and other extremities.

Saunas with infrared heaters are also less hot than typical saunas, so the heart does not have to work so hard in these saunas to manage the heat….”

My comments:

He goes on to say that he and health oriented friends have had very good experiences using the Sunlighten brand of infrared sauna.

Note that in order to use one you have to have the space to install it and time to use it on top of your other life and exercises you do.  Timewise, “20 minutes 3 times a week” is doable for many people however.

But if you do have, use of an infrared sauna may be even more beneficial than his article suggests.

“Infrared lighting reduces the numbing conditions and causes molecules of nitric oxide to be released from hemoglobin in the bloodstream, which, in turn, increases blood flow. “

Better blood flow and more relaxed blood vessels caused by this nitric oxide release does a lot more than that!

Nitric oxide release can help heal people with injuries heal faster once the swelling goes down. 

It lowers high blood pressure.  It can improve ED -- and done before lovemaking can make it work better from the better blood flow.  And, it can, like vigorous exercise, get more blood flow to your heart and brain.

So using one while doing slow breathing Yoga style or Resparate style or Qi Gong style while using an infrared sauna can be a superb way to de-stress or lower high blood pressure.

Though you sweat less, the sweating you do will help you remove organic and metal toxins.

Note that although you do sweat less, drinking 9 ounces of ice water before and 9 ounces of room temperature water after is likely a good idea.

And, on days that are already a bit too hot & for people taking diuretics or who are already a bit dehydrated before their session be extra careful! 

Have someone who can check during the 20 minutes and you can call for if you suddenly feel too hot or light-headed.

And be totally sure to have the 9 ounces of ice water right before you use it.

3 things brought me success lowering my blood pressure....

Today's Post:  Wednesday, 10-31-2012

At its worst, my blood pressure was running about 153 over 86.  That’s much too high for best health results but NOT high enough to take drugs to reduce it.

And, I was successfully protecting myself from heart attack and stroke with multiple methods and with the blood tests to prove it was working. Plus I was getting regular, vigorous exercise most days of every week that I’ve continued to do which is quite protective.

More recently, after my job stress went down and my income went up just a bit, I was running about 142 over 78.  That’s still too high but better.

Now it’s 131 over 70!  A bit lower would be nice.  But that reading is no longer high blood pressure even on the top or systolic number.  (That’s almost comparable to the 115 over 75 now thought to be ideal.)

I’m working to remove more of my abdominal fat.  If that works, I may see the 119 over 63 I’d prefer.

But this last drop to 131 over 70 is the one that was most protective and removed me from any level of high blood pressure.

What caused it?

The biggest cause was the  at my desk exercise bike  and the 5 pounds of fat it helped me lose.

I’ve used it now for 8 weeks. 

The two other things that may have helped are:

1.  We live in an area with a lot of traffic during our commute and the rest of our week.  Before, we had a car that I could just get to speed up enough to change lanes when needed. 

But it was often a nearer thing than I wanted.  The car wasn’t horribly short of power but it wasn’t quick either.  So I was more stressed over whether or not I’d make the space I was trying to get to.  And, I realized I was tensing up as if I could somehow boost its performance.

About 4 weeks ago we got a car that was both more crash safe AND which IS quick when you ask it to be.  (It’s an S60 Volvo.) So that kind of working our way through traffic is MUCH less stressful.

2.  My wife finally has enough money to feel financially safe or almost so.  That may have reduced her stress and mine.

More money and lowering stress from a bit too high to only somewhat high are proven to improve health and so those two factors may have done part of the job.

But at least 60 % was from the at my desk exercise and the resulting fat loss.

The 1,000 calories a week of exercise I was getting gave me some decent health benefits.

But adding 1600 to 2000 calories a week to total 2600 to 3000 a week plus sitting with no motion for shorter periods and less total time not only is a big improvement and makes my fat loss more likely and more permanent, it has proven added health benefits.

That apparently includes making my blood vessels more relaxed and responsive and may include removal of plaque to allow more blood to flow.

The bad news is that the recumbent bike and desk takes up a bit too much space to be easy to use or fit in smaller offices.

But if you can use it, it works very well.  It just takes getting used to using it.

To buy one, go to http://www.activoffice.net/ .

My hope is that the much more compact at your desk exerciser that fits most people’s existing desks and offices will be available at some point too.

Why and how to take in less salt....

Today's Post: Thursday, 1-28-2010

A few days ago several online health news sources reported that people in the United States and many other countries take in far too much salt.

They say the evidence suggests that if this was improved it would save thousands of lives and cut medical costs.

They go on to talk about efforts in Australia and New York City to have food providers cut back on the salt in their foods.

First, it’s important to know that the average person in the United States now ingests a truly HUGE amount of salt.

Some experts say that taking in 2500 mg a day of sodium or less is protective. Others say that 1500 mg of sodium or less is even more protective.

There’s some evidence this is the case.

In one of those stories I found that in the United States men consume an average of 10.4 grams a day and women 7.3 grams. That’s 4 to 7 times too much for men & 3 to 5 times too much for women.

The first key to fixing this for you as an individual is in this information that I found in the same article: It said that people get 75 to 80 % of their salt from processed food.

With the exception of canned vegetables to some extent, the most healthful way to eat has very little processed food.

It mostly consists of eating whole foods and works even better if the foods are organically and naturally raised.

But Not eating processed foods is even more valuable than just the salt you stop ingesting. Not eating the processed foods such as snacks, desserts, and other foods not only slashes your salt intake, it helps you avoid refined grains, excessive sugar intake, high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated oils (trans fats), other preservatives, artificial flavors and sweeteners and food coloring, MSG, oils high in omega 6, and corn and soy that has been genetically modified.

So, almost always NOT eating that stuff not only will slash your salt intake, it will make you less fat and dramatically improve your health.

The second key is that in the same way that restoring the balance between omega 3 oils and omega 6 oils to the ratio our bodies evolved to use improves your health, in addition to using less salt and ingesting less sodium eating far more foods that have potassium and magnesium has dramatic health benefits. In addition, supplementing with magnesium can help.

So, after you prune out the obvious sources of huge amounts of added salt from NOT eating processed foods for the most part, if you also eat some organic whole fruit and several servings a day of organic, nonstarchy vegetables and increase your potassium intake in your food, you gain in a host of ways.

Even people who have normal blood pressure find their readings go down when they switch to eating this way; & it does wonders for helping people with high blood pressure reduce it enough they can avoid medication or take less.

The name for this natural food with lots of whole produce and with far less salt way of eating is the DASH II diet.

Other studies show that combining eating less salt with added potassium and magnesium reliably lowers blood pressure.

Third, eat some foods raw instead of cooked so they need no spicing up; & use other spices such as curry, garlic, basil, and the like instead of salt. Salt imparts a more lively and warm feel to your food. But so do these other spices. That means that by using them well your food will taste good without any salt in some cases and far less in others. For convenience, I’ve found that powdered garlic and a store bought curry spice I like work best for this.

Some spices that work well are a bit too harsh if they are added to a nonfat dish; but if extra virgin olive oil is added you get the double benefit of a much mellower taste effect and many of the key nutrients in the food such as the carotenes actually become more bioavailable and you actually get more from your food. These spices tend to be hot such as chili powder and red pepper and some curries.

Fourth, have the food brought to you unsalted or only very lightly salted if you can. Then taste it & only add enough salt from a salt shaker that the food tastes right to you. That way you get the food salty enough to enjoy. But if the salt is added to the food before, it may well have five times that much salt. This is a great way to go. You get the better taste you want while your body gets a fifth as much sodium.

Fifth, avoid MSG in your food. The S stands for sodium and that sodium affects you just like the sodium in salt (sodium chloride.)

That can be hard to do since the people who make it and add it to your food would prefer to leave it in. The people who make it get paid when it’s used. And the people who add it do too since MSG tends to result in people eating MORE of that food.

So, they often do NOT list MSG on the label. They’ll list autolized yeast or hydrolyzed protein or “spices” instead.

(By the way, at Whole Foods recently, I FINALLY found a mustard that does NOT include “spices” on their list of ingredients. Annie’s Naturals brand has only real mustard and NO MSG or unnamed, “spices.”)

Many Chinese restaurants now no longer use MSG and will say so on their menu or outside signs -- and most of the rest will leave it out of your food if you ask.

And, there is a second reason to avoid MSG besides the sodium. Studies in China comparing places that used lots of MSG and those that used none or very little found the places where lots was used had far more fat people. In other words, you eat enough more when MSG is used to spice your food, you WILL be more fat. Since you can make foods taste good enough to enjoy without MSG, why use it?

So what does all this sodium avoidance and balancing get you?

Your chances of having a heart attack or stroke go down by quite a bit.

Your chances of getting stroke or one that causes lifelong disability go down by a lot.

And, your chances of getting kidney disease or having your vision harmed go down.

We even recently found out that your chances of getting Alzheimer’s disease go down.

And, last but far from least, your chances of needing the doses and kinds of hypertension drugs that quite literally can make you feel sick all the time go down too.

New info on how to lower high systolic blood pressure....

Today's Post: Friday, 10-16-2009

Yesterday, HealthDay News posted an article they titled:

“Air pollution appears to hit the obese hardest, causing significant increases in blood pressure, a new study finds.”

The actual article and study was a bit different. The study was a good bit more important than the headline suggested.

Here’s why.:

The researchers found that air pollution increased the systolic blood pressure (the higher reading listed first) and pulse pressure (the difference between the two readings ) in everyone who lived in polluted air.

They did find that both being obese and living in polluted air was worse bad news. It increased the diastolic pressure as well & the overall blood pressure more than it did for people of normal weight/.

To make this a bit easier to follow, here are some examples. (They are examples I made up & NOT from the study.)

Someone who has lived in unpolluted air and is not obese starting with a BP of 128 over 78 moving to an area with polluted air might then have a 143 over 80 BP after a while.

An obese identical twin might well start at 136 over 86 living in unpolluted air but by moving to an area with polluted air might wind up with a BP of 158 over 95.

The other point to make is that someone with moderate high blood pressure who moves from somewhere without pollution to a new location with high air pollution might well go from a level that can be safely brought down with eating right, regular exercise, and the supplements that work to do so -- to a higher level that makes taking drugs to lower their high blood pressure necessary.

For example 153 over 93 while living in clean air might become 168 over 95 when living in an area with polluted air or 175 over 105 in someone who also is obese.

Note that working somewhere with a high and continuous level of second hand smoke or smoking yourself or living with a smoker exposes you to polluted air as if you lived right next to a busy freeway or in an area with horrible smog.

We also know that living in an area with polluted air AND being exposed to tobacco smoke every day more than doubles such effects.

There are several ways to use the information in this study.

Try to live and work in places that have low levels of air pollution if you can.

For most of us, that’s a bit challenging if we don’t already live in a location with low levels of air pollution.

But there are some other things you can do.

Stay away from tobacco smoke. If you smoke, quit even if you have to try six times to get it done. Insist on working at a job that has a no smoking policy for the places their employees work and meet.

Vote for smoking bans in workplaces, restaurants, and bars. And, if you live in a location without such bans, spend all or 95% of your money on eating out at locations that are 100 % nonsmoking or don't eat out at all often.

If you encounter a smoker, try to move away from them or into a location where the wind blows from you towards them rather than the reverse.

If you move, if you possibly can, choose a place to live more that 400 yards from the nearest freeway or busy street even if it’s a bit smaller.

If you possibly can, institute a policy of no smoking in your house or near doors or open windows in your house.

And, if you do live less than 400 yards from the nearest freeway or busy street or in a city with high air pollution, get and use effective, powered, air-filters that run all the time, or all the time you are not there if you need quiet when you are there, in the rooms where you spend the most time.

If you get a chance to vote for higher or much higher taxes on cigarettes and tobacco, do so.

Similarly, if you can vote for increased pollution control in cars &/or industrial sites that now pollute the air by all means do so.

Lastly, if you are seriously overweight or obese, find out how to eat right and exercise enough better than you do now to improve that and lose some of your excess fat.

The good news is that eating right and exercising begin to improve your health and lower your blood pressure right away even before you lose a lot of fat. Even better, if you only lose 5 to 7 % of your current weight by doing so, you get massive improvements in your health even if you started out over 50 pounds overweight or more.

Why drugs are often NOT needed for high blood pressure....

Today's Post: Tuesday, 10-13-2009

Last Friday, 10-9-2009, Dr. Robert J. Rowen, in his Second Opinion Health Alert e-newsletter email had an article with this title: “Why you don't need to treat your blood pressure”

(His essay actually covers why you don’t need to treat blood pressure below 160 over 100 with drugs.) The brilliant point he makes is why that’s so.

I don’t agree with everything he writes but I agree with most of it; & this article is brilliant.

(You can subscribe yourself it you like at: http://www.secondopinionnewsletter.com .)

Back in 2002, he said that there was no medical evidence that treating blood pressure less than 160 systolic would help you live longer. (The research that has been done has found exactly that. Above 160 over 100, bringing down blood pressure increases longevity and lowers death rates. But below that, it doesn’t seem to have any noticeable effect on death rates – or helping you live longer.)

It is true that people who have blood pressure 115/70 who are simply healthy enough to have such readings have fewer heart attacks and other diseases than those with readings of over 140 over 90. But getting your blood pressure that low from moderately high readings such as 140 over 90 BY USING DRUGS alone -- doesn't help.

In my own writing on lowering high blood pressure without drugs, I’d written that my guess was that below 160 over 90 the side effects of the drugs tended to come close to equaling the benefit of the lower blood pressure.

I’d also written that using the nondrug methods removed the CAUSES of the high blood pressure and offered MUCH better health protection than the drugs. I even had written that just lowering the high blood pressure alone was pretty weak protection and ALL people taking the drugs should also be advised to do the things that act on the causes.

(For a brief review of some of the most effective ways to lower high blood pressure without drugs or without drug side effects, see my post on just that on, Tuesday, 8-11-2009.)

Here’s his statement on why drugs don’t help much. As you’ll see, his point is totally compatible with what I’ve written before. But it makes it crystal clear why its failure to treat the causes that makes treating moderately lower with drugs alone so ineffective.

I recommend it to you highly.

“Medicine” (using drugs) “is based on treating symptoms, not causes. High blood pressure is merely a symptom of an underlying cause. Just treating the blood pressure” (with drugs) “leaves the cause untreated. For example, lead toxicity or potassium deficiency can cause high blood pressure. Yes, you can drug the pressure down. But you don't fix the problem.

Medicine hasn't learned yet that suppressing symptoms with toxic drugs may not only do no good, but it might also cause harm. I prefer to look at high blood pressure as a symptom of a risk factor, and not a risk factor itself. So you don't need to treat blood pressure. You need to treat the cause of it.

Action to take: If you have high blood pressure, have an integrative physician find the underlying cause. If you don't have access to one, you can call my office for a telephone "education" consultation. I've found that diet and lifestyle changes work wonders. And for chronically high blood pressure, a water fast can lower your pressure very quickly and safely (you can read about how to do this treatment safely on my website).

Two warnings: First, I never tell patients to stop their blood pressure drugs for safety and legal reasons. Stopping the drugs cold turkey can cause severe reactions. However, I find that with diet and lifestyle changes, you can lower your blood pressure naturally. Once your blood pressure is in a good range, like 130/90 or less, your doctor can SLOWLY wean you off of them.

Second, if your BP is more than 160, you are at increased risk of stroke (blood vessels can break at high pressure). There is a clear place for medical intervention — to prevent a vessel from blowing out. So if you have extremely high blood pressure, you need medication until you can find the cause.”

X* X* X* X* X* X* X*

Yesterday, I emailed Dr Rowen this:

“Your essay on "Why you don't need to treat your blood pressure" was brilliant; and all doctors should know this information.

Many people take blood pressure medications that have marginal effects on protecting their health but do have dollar costs, and often unpleasant side effects, where their initial blood pressure was in the undesirable range but less than 160 over 100.

I wrote but have not yet published an eBook on how to lower blood pressure without drugs.

In it I note that research has found that using drugs to lower blood pressure of over 160 over 100 did reduce mortality rates but was close to ineffective in doing so when used to lower blood pressures much less than that even if over 140 over 90.

I theorized that this was due to the drug side effects offsetting any health benefits at the lower readings.

I also point out that if your blood pressure is over 125 over 75, it will be health protective to bring it down to levels below that; but the most health protective ways to do so, unlike drugs, work on the causes of the high blood pressure and have other health benefits. Similarly, even if you were at blood pressure over 160 over 100 and taking drugs, your health protection is quite modest if you do not ALSO take the steps that begin to remove the causes of the high blood pressure.

The drugs alone offer only very partial protection without doing anything to remove the causes.

But I did not take the next logical step as you did -- to say that much of the reason the drugs do so little below 160 over 100 was because they fail to address the causes.

Good job!”

Lower high blood pressure without drug side effects....

Today's Post: Tuesday, 8-18-2009

Though it remains unpublished, I wrote an eBook about this subject.

Here’s a few of the conclusions I reached and facts I learned.

Blood pressures of 160 over 100 are dangerous if not brought below about 150 over
80. And, if someone cannot do that quickly without drugs, blood pressure reducing drugs, when used to do so, lower the rate of stroke, heart attack, and death.

Below that level, the drug side effects tend to be hard enough on your body, the advantage of using drugs to lower your blood pressure tends to disappear.

But as you go from about 115 over 75 to over 140 over 90, your risk of dementia, other forms of mental decline, stroke, heart attack, and death tend to rise. These risks begin to be even higher between 140 over 90 and 159 0ver 99. Even worse, once someone gets to over 140 over 90, they often get worse if they do nothing until it’s over 160 over 100.

So, using nondrug methods to keep your blood pressure well below 140 over 90 and keeping it there are very desirable.

Eating right, or switching from eating a horrible diet to eating right, plus slight additional salt restriction lowers blood pressure reliably. See the research on the DASH diet plus salt restriction. This same way of eating is quite similar to the Mediterranean Diet with more emphasis on lots of vegetables and less starchy pastas plus avoiding most full fat diary, fatty meats, and heavily salted foods.

Regular exercise on almost every day of the week also lowers blood pressure. People who exercise only a few days a week in fact, have lower blood pressure on the days they exercise.

Combining eating right and regular exercise tends to prevent getting fat or obese. And, obesity tends to cause high blood pressure.

Combining eating right and regular exercise plus very modest but sustained calorie restriction will tend to help people lose excess fat. And, in fatter people, losing excess fat has often simply turned off high blood pressure.

Avoiding severe or chronic excessive stress if you can and using a method of physical stress relief reliably lowers high blood pressure. Tai Chi, if you once learn it and do it every day for a few minutes, both provides exercise AND physical stress relief and has lowered high blood pressure by 17 systolic and 11 diastolic.

Taking several kinds of vitamins along with a basic multivitamin plus minerals and adding 400 to 600 mg a day of extra magnesium helps lower high blood pressure.

If you do have blood pressure over 160 over 100, most doctors tend to give you one or more of their favorite drugs and in high doses. Then if that fails to lower your high blood pressure, they tend to increase the doses of the drug they know best.

That often causes such harsh side effects that the person treated goes from feeling healthy to feeling like hell.

Needless to say, doctors find many patients who refuse to stay on these drugs and the rest wish they didn’t have to.

There are two solutions.

Do all of the methods listed here and the one in the Total Health Breakthroughs article I include below first if your blood pressure is below 160 over 100.

That will protect your health, lower your blood pressure, and avoid ever needing the drugs in most cases.

And if you add all the methods in today’s post while monitoring your blood pressure, you can likely discontinue the drugs eventually even if you start out at over 160 over 100 and taking the drugs.

If not, a low dose ARB, a low dose calcium channel blocker, and if necessary, a low dose of a third drug that you tend not to get side effects from can often be enough to do the job with very few if any side effects. (Exforge is a drug that combines an ARB with a calcium channel blocker in one pill. If you don’t have problems with either of its components tried one at a time to check first, the lowest dose of Exforge can be a decent choice.) ARB’s tend to have fewer side effects than most blood pressure drugs and are what the doctor’s call, “well tolerated” even in slightly higher doses. And, in most drugs, lower doses tend to have far fewer side effects.

But many people can add a single supplement to lower their blood pressure enough to avoid drugs. Taking 200 mg a day of CoQ10, once early in the day & once at lunch time has often helped people lower their blood pressure by about 16 systolic and 9 diastolic within just a few weeks. (4 to 8 weeks in the studies I saw.)

For example, blood pressure of 158 over 96 is close to needing drugs to bring it down. Taking CoQ10 can lower that to 142 over 87 which is a level at which it’s very probably safe to use the other methods in this post to get lower blood pressure and thus avoid the drugs permanently.

AND, there is now a way to get even faster and possibly better results with this supplement!

It seems that in your body, CoQ10 is turned into the active form, Ubiquinol. For more on that and its effect on lowering high blood pressure, here is the article from THB from Friday last week.

"This article appears courtesy of Early to Rise's Total Health Breakthroughs, offering alternative solutions for mind, body and soul. For a complimentary subscription,
visit http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com ."

“Blood Pressure Meds for All?

By Al Sears, MD

I just finished reading the British Medical Journal ... there was an article by a group of researchers telling doctors they should put everyone over 40 on blood pressure drugs -- even if they don't have high blood pressure!1

According to the study's authors, “Guidelines on the use of blood pressure lowering drugs can be simplified so that drugs are offered to people with all levels of blood pressure. Our results indicate the importance of lowering blood pressure in everyone over a certain age, rather than measuring it in everyone and treating it in some.”

Can you imagine? Taking drugs every day when you're in perfect health? This is a sign of things to come. Drug companies aren't satisfied with controlling medical schools, the media and the FDA... now they want all of us to take a drug every day whether you need it or not.

Are they kidding?

Why You Need Ubiquinol CoQ10

Traditionally, all CoQ10 supplements use the active ingredient ubiquinone. But once this gets into your system, your body must convert ubiquinone into another substance called ubiquinol.

Ubiquinol is the form of CoQ10 that works miracles. But there's a problem... Your body's ability to convert ubiquinone into ubiquinol starts to decline after age 45. As a result, your body doesn't get the full effect. And in many cases -- if you're 50 or older -- traditional CoQ10 won't give you the same disease protection it gives to younger people.

But Japanese researchers have discovered a reliable way to skip the conversion process and take ubiquinol straight on its own. The idea has been around for some time. But until now, no one could figure out how to make ubiquinol stable enough to take on its own.

This new option provides 8 times higher absorption of CoQ10 and keeps your blood levels high over an extended period.

Just 150 mg of ubiquinol CoQ10 elevates blood levels to almost 4 mcg/mL. You would need 1,200 mg of the traditional form to match that effect.

What may be even more important is how long ubiquinol stays in your body compared to the old ubiquinone. In one study using mice, the new ubiquinol was present in the blood at a 3.75-fold greater concentration after 8 hours. (A blood level of 4.5 mcg/mL after 8 hours of taking 100 mg.)6

This high concentration staying in your system for 8 hours is one of the keys to its blood pressure-lowering potential. The same amount of traditional ubiquinone dropped to a low level (just 1.2 mcg/mL) after 8 hours -- too low to have a powerful effect.

The truth is that you may not need blood pressure drugs -- even if you have high blood pressure. I see this all the time. Patients come into my office looking wrecked and demoralized, drugged up on blood pressure meds like beta blockers and ACE inhibitors.

Most folks don't realize these things make you fat... you blow up like a balloon. They can even cause heart failure.

Worried about high blood pressure? Today I'll show you what I've been using with my patients for years and the results are amazing. Here's what you do: check your blood pressure; start the simple strategy I mention below and then test again a few months later. You'll see what I mean.

Steer Clear of Dangerous Pills

Case in point: One of my patients, Roxanne, had been on an ACE inhibitor for 4 years. She had gained 10 lbs. and was tired all the time. And at 140/85, her blood pressure was still on the high side, even on the drugs.

I told her to stop taking the blood pressure pills immediately. They weren't working anyway. And I put her on a simple nutrient. After 9 months, her blood pressure was back to a healthy 118/80.

Plus, she told me she had more energy and was already working on losing the weight she had gained.

Roxanne's story isn't unique. Blood pressure pills typically make you weak and tired. Some patients have nasty side effects like depression, impotence, joint pain, and even kidney and liver damage.

What's worse is that blood pressure meds don't even work for the majority who take them. Only 42.9% of patients ever see acceptable blood pressure levels.2

Another study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine reveals just how worthless they are. In the group given the placebo, 30% lowered their blood pressure below the set goal. Apparently, just doing nothing will help close to a third of those with high blood pressure.3

Of course, I wouldn't advocate that you do nothing if you have high blood pressure -- it does raise your chances of heart disease, heart attack, and stroke. But you can treat your high blood pressure effectively without exposing yourself to the side effects that come with these drugs.

Get the One Nutrient That Eliminates Hypertension

The first thing I instruct my patients with high blood pressure to do is take 50 mg of ubiquinol CoQ10 every day. It's the only thing I told Roxanne to take. She made no other changes and watched her blood pressure return to healthy levels.

You'll probably never hear it mentioned by the medical establishment, but it's highly effective at reducing blood pressure without any dangerous side effects.

Over 50% of patients coming to my office with high blood pressure taking blood pressure drugs have been able to stop those drugs with CoQ10. Several double-blind clinical trials have corroborated CoQ10's blood pressure-lowering effects. For example, a team at the University of Texas found that CoQ10 is so effective, it enabled them to safely take patients off blood pressure medications.4

A double blind, placebo-controlled study published in the Journal of Human Hypertension followed two groups of people with high blood pressure. One group took CoQ10 for eight weeks while the other took a placebo. The CoQ10 group showed a significant reduction in blood pressure.5

A meta-analysis of studies that looked at CoQ10 and hypertension revealed that CoQ10 can lower systolic blood pressure by up to 17 mmHg and diastolic blood pressure by up to 10 mmHg without side effects.7

No matter what your blood pressure, insist on blood testing for CoQ10. If your levels are low, start with 50 mg of ubiquinol CoQ10 a day. After that, monitor your levels after three months.

If you only do one thing for healthy blood pressure, take CoQ10.

To Your Good Health,

Al Sears, MD

References

1. Law MR, et al. BMJ. 2009; 338: b1665.

2. Meeting of the American Society of Hypertension, May 2000; www.mercola.com/2000/may/28/blood_pressure.htm.

3. Arch Intern Med. 2000;160:1449-1454.

4. Langsjoena, P et. al. Molecular Aspects of Medicine. Volume 15, Supplement 1, 1994, Pages s265-s272.

5. Singh, et al. Journal of Human Hypertension, 13(1999):203-208.

6. CoQ10 reducing activity in rats. Unpublished data provided by Dr. Mae.

7. Rosenfeldt FL, et al. J Human Hypertension. 21: 297-306, 2007.

[Ed. Note: Dr. Sears is Chairman of the Board of Total Health Breakthroughs. He has written over 500 articles and 7 books in the fields of alternative medicine, anti-aging, and nutritional supplementation.]”

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If you’ve begun to use much of the information in this post, you may already be doing several things that help you keep your blood pressure low.

So, a good way to keep yourself informed and motivated to follow this lifestyle is to read our blog.

Why eat more kinds of fruits & vegetables....

Today's post: Monday, 4-6-2009

There are a number of key things you can do to keep or restore your health & live longer.

Some of those key things also help you get or stay thin.

Massive amounts of research show that people who eat a lot of vegetables and a moderate amount of whole fresh fruit most days and do it every week and eat very little “fast carbs” such as refined grain foods, foods containing sugar or high fructose corn syrup, etc are dramatically healthier than people who do the reverse. Five to seven servings of nonstarchy vegetables and one or two servings of whole fresh fruit each day is the ideal.

The research on the DASH diet proves eating that way lowers or prevents high blood pressure. You get more potassium, natural vitamin C, fiber, and the natural form of folic acid by eating this way, for example.

Weight Watchers has found that doing this is a key to losing fat and keeping it off. (They rate nonstarchy vegetables as having zero points. That means eating too much of anything else will make you fat; but eating lots of vegetables will not. And that means that eating lots of vegetables means you can still eat a lot of food and not be fat. This makes it dramatically easier to lose fat and keep it off.)

Lastly, we now know that fruits and vegetables are like natural, high quality supplements and, particularly if they are organically grown, contain literally hundreds of vitamins, minerals, and micro- or phyto- nutrients. And those nutrients do every thing from prevent heart disease to preventing cancer. For example, it was in today’s online health news that eating broccoli sprouts not only prevents cancer, if you eat broccoli sprouts often, it can wipe out the h pylori bacteria that causes stomach ulcers.

Even better, eating a lot of vegetables makes it far easier to NOT eat junky carbs that tend to make you fat AND cause type 2 diabetes.

So, anything that’s been discovered to increase the amount of vegetables you eat is quite literally worth its weight in gold or more.

So today’s Early to Rise health article was both interesting and important. Here it is.:

“This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, a free newsletter dedicated to making money, improving health and secrets to success. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com .”

“A Great Diet for Your Heart

By Craig Ballantyne

One of the easiest and most effective things you can do to improve your health is to eat a variety of fruits and vegetables.

Researchers from Iran's Obesity Research Center examined fruit and vegetable intake in 840 men and women from Tehran - and the results were dramatic. The subjects who ate a lot of different fruits and vegetables were significantly and inversely associated with cardiovascular disease risk factors.

Specifically, it appears that eating a variety of fruits and vegetables leads to lower LDL cholesterol in a dose-responsive manner. That means you'll get more benefits from eating an apple, an orange, a banana, and some broccoli than you will from just eating an apple and an orange.

So every time you are at the grocery store, add at least one new fruit and one new vegetable to your cart. You can choose from kiwi fruit, avocados, asparagus, pears, spinach, and so many other amazing foods.

Try to be a little better every week with your fruit and vegetable intake and you'll reduce your risk of heart disease in one of the simplest possible ways.

[Ed. Note: Extending your life and living out your years in tip-top health is really a matter of making simple lifestyle choices - like eating a wider variety of fruits and veggies. ….]”

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The reasons for this effect are pretty simple. If you know and have eaten a wide variety of fruits and vegetables that you like or at least find edible, you’ll be more likely to eat some each week. To find out what they taste like in the first place you, or the person who buys your food, have to make a regular habit of going by the produce section in your store and buying food from it. And, if you have eaten enough of a vegetable or eaten it often enough, you’d like a change of pace, you’ll already know a decent size list of things to get instead.

For example, the cruciferous vegetables, particularly if eaten raw, prevent cancer. But if you get tired of broccoli or simply don’t care for it, you can eat broccoli sprouts or raw cauliflower or coleslaw made with both red and green cabbage and some diced onion, you get as much, or more in the case of the broccoli sprouts, of the cancer fighting ingredients.

And, that’s just the tip of the iceberg, you can also try radishes, water cress, Brussels sprouts, or kale.

Or, if you want to have take in a lot of natural carotenes, you can eat broccoli; but you can also eat pasta sauce with garlic, other spices, and extra virgin olive oil and get even more carotenes. Or you can eat carrots or sweet potato.

Even better, you can try several kinds of berries, blueberries, strawberries, black berries, raspberries, and more.

(The book, SuperFoods, is incorrect on its information about soy foods. But it’s superb on everything else; & it contains extensive lists of similar foods for each fruit and vegetable it lists as a superfood if you need a good starter list for reference.

Another good place to look is a large book of salad recipes.)

Eating these real foods that are very low calorie and high nutrition is like any other skill. The more you practice it and the more variations you try, the more skilled you become at using it.

And the benefits to your health and pocket book are extremely large.

Doing this improves and protects your health better than any prescription drug can other than antibiotics when you have dangerous bacterial infection. Eating a wide variety of fruits an vegetables costs far less than the doctor and hospital visits and statin drugs and type 2 diabetes drugs and high blood pressure drugs that it can make unnecessary! And other than making you less hungry it has no bad side effects.

How sleep apnea boosts your blood pressure & harms your heart....

Today's post: Friday, 10-24-2008

It seems that even mild sleep apnea causes high blood pressure and can lead to heart disease and stokes and more.

Today on Yahoo’s online news in the Health Day section I found an article called, “Even Mild Sleep Apnea Hikes Heart Risk.”

The researchers in the British study reported there found that even mild sleep apnea created endothelial dysfunction, harm to the inside surface of your blood vessels, and, as a result it created increasing arterial stiffness which in turn significantly increases the blood pressure of the people it happens to. That increases the risk of the people who this happens to for heart attacks and strokes and can also help cause peripheral artery disease, PAD, kidney failure, and erectile dysfunction.

Previously we knew that people who have sleep apnea bad enough to make them too sleepy during the day had this risk. But this study found that this happened to people who had mild sleep apnea and may not even have known it. That is the news this study reported.

The study was done at the Oxford Centre for Respiratory Medicine; and the press release was from the American Thoracic Society news.

The study is also in the November issue of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine.

What the story did NOT report is how the researchers found out these people had mild sleep apnea when some of the people studied may not have initially known they had mild sleep apnea.

Here are three clues to look for:

1. Are you fatter than you should be and fatter in your face and neck than looks good or as you did when you were much younger? (Pictures of famous people who live in Tennessee, Kentucky, and other parts of the American South often show this look. Something in the regional diet from that part of the United States seems to cause this effect.)

This makes sleep apnea much more likely.

2. You often snore loudly enough to wake or bother your significant other.

When people snore loudly the same airway restriction often causes sleep apnea.

3. You have high blood pressure. Sleep apnea is far from being the only cause of high blood pressure. But if you have sleep apnea, as this study found, you also will develop high blood pressure.

If you have #1 or #2 or more two or more of these 3 clues, you may well have sleep apnea.

What to do if you have sleep apnea?

Something called CPAP, Continuous Positive Airway Pressure, works but requires you to sleep connected up to a machine that forces air into you.

There’s an alternative that I would check out more thoroughly if I were to get sleep apnea that may well do the job and which does NOT require you to be connected up to anything while you sleep.

The company who produces it says that the doctors who have used it have gotten excellent results; and it can be done one day and you can be back at work the next as it is not very invasive.

“Stop Snoring and Obstructive Sleep Apnea with The Pillar Procedure.”

www.pillarprocedure.com

We are also about to publish an eBook on how to lower high blood pressure without drugs that has some ways to improve or reverse the endothelial dysfunction that causes the high blood pressure. These ways help your blood vessels relax and become more flexible which has been shown to lower high blood pressure. These ways also have other health benefits.

We’ll announce this eBook here when it is available.

5 ways to protection from stroke....

Today's post: Thursday, 10-16-2008

A stroke can kill you or disable you. The disability can include becoming a prisoner in your own body, unable to talk or unable to move or both.

So, the result to want is to never get one and/or to recover without disability if you do get one.

There are five different ways to do achieve this.

1. It was recently found and reported in the online health news that taking ginkgo biloba protects you from the worst damage if you get a stroke and sharply improves your chance of recovery. Even better, that was true in the people they studied who got a stroke when they were already taking ginkgo biloba before the stroke; it was true of the people who were given ginkgo biloba soon after a stroke; & it was even true of people who took ginkgo biloba a bit later after the stroke when other treatments tend to be too late to work.

(You do have to be quite careful in taking ginkgo biloba if you are taking prescription blood thinners however. This is because taking ginkgo biloba can multiply the effect of prescription blood thinners. How careful? If you need to take both, you might need a day or two in the hospital to be able to have your doctor safely adjust the dose of the prescription blood thinner you are taking. And, even then it’s a bit risky.

The good news is that if you take gingko biloba and follow other good health practices, you may well avoid needing to take prescription blood thinners)

It’s been known for years that taking gingko biloba can help you stay mentally sharp as you get older. But that taking gingko also protects you from any strokes you get is new and incredibly welcome news.

2. It’s also been shown that eating blueberries tends to prevent you from getting strokes in the first place. Eating blueberries tends to protect your blood vessels from oxidation or accumulating plaque due to their very high antioxidant levels. They also do this by increasing your beneficial HDL cholesterol. Also, since they have been reported to improve the mental sharpness of older people who eat them they may share some of the protective properties of gingko biloba. Blueberries also have vitamin C and other micronutrients that directly keep your blood vessels smooth and healthy. That also tends to prevent plaque from building up in your blood vessels enough for strokes to occur. (The small tears in your blood vessels that your body tends to patch up with plaque tend not to happen if you eat blueberries and take enough vitamin C. These small tears can also help cause hemorrhagic or “bleeding inside the brain” stokes.)

Lastly, blueberries taste great. So this is an easy method to use. I find they go very well with Quaker’s Old Fashioned Oatmeal and 1% lowfat milk.

3. The second way to recover from a stroke is to get really fast treatment.

The acronym to remember is FAST.

FACE If you look in the mirror or you look at the person you think may be having a stroke and when you or that person smiles one side of the face stays frozen while the other smiles, take action.

ARMS If you or the person you think may be having a stroke can raise only one arm out to the side or straight in front and the other doesn’t move, take action.

SPEECH If you or the person you think may be having a stroke cannot say a simple sentence, “I was very hungry at times yesterday.” or “I got to work late because my train was late.” would be two examples, take action.

TIME If someone is having a stroke, getting them to home treatment immediately if it can be done and to medical treatment within an hour can prevent death or serious damage.

A longer wait than an hour can cause avoidable death or serious damage and prevent recovery.

So fast action is critical. If you or the person you think may be having a stroke has one or more of these F, A, S signs, take action NOW.

First. Call 911 or an ambulance immediately. That ensures reasonably prompt arrival at the Emergency Room. And have the ambulance personnel or yourself phone ahead at the Emergency Room you are going to so they are ready when you arrive there.

Second. If you or the person you think may be having a stroke can swallow and you have them on hand, taking aspirin and ginkgo right away can be protective against strokes.

4. Work to keep yourself healthy and keep your blood pressure at healthy levels. Avoid smoking, exercise regularly, and avoid getting or staying fat. And, if you get high blood pressure, take action to lower it. It’s essential to include drugs if it gets over about 150 or 160 over 100.

(We are about to publish an eBook on how to lower high blood without drugs. By doing this with no drugs or with lower doses of fewer drugs you can have safe blood pressure without quality of life harming side effects. We will announce it in this blog when it is published and available.)

Bad heart and blood vessel health and high blood pressure cause strokes. So to avoid them keep your heart and blood vessels healthy and your blood pressure down to low normal levels.

5. Keep your brain flexible and healthy. Good circulation to your brain and a healthy well- functioning brain will be less likely to get a stroke and will be more likely to recover.

In addition to the other methods we’ve already covered in this post, keep your brain sharp and its circulation good with regular exercise, learning new things, and socializing with friends often.

Regular exercise literally grows new brain cells. It improves your brain’s blood circulation. And, it tends to relieve stress and optimize your neurotransmitters. The result is that people who exercise regularly including some exercises that cause you to be a bit out of breath at the end, of course without overdoing it., result in people with larger, better functioning brains who think better and make better decisions and are simply more competent.

Learning new things and conversation give your brain exercise just like running or strength training exercise your body.

Do all these 5 things or be ready to do them and you can usually avoid strokes or dangerous ones you don’t recover from.

Get enough vitamin D but not too much....

Today's post: Tuesday, 9-9-2008

Recent studies have come out showing that vitamin D has very large health benefits of several kinds. If you take in enough vitamin D from sun exposure, food, & supplements you are less likely to get virtually all cancers or autoimmune diseases; you’ll be less depressed, particularly in the winter, and you may even get less hardening of the arteries & calcium loaded plaque in your blood vessels. That last benefit is significant as the evidence is doing that helps prevent high blood pressure, strokes, & heart attacks.

But, since many people in the United States, Canada, & Europe live far enough North to not get much vitamin D from sunshine for about half the year & increasingly people work indoors all day, the number of people who do not get enough vitamin D today from sun exposure is extremely large. And many of the most educated people have avoided going in the sun or always use sun block to attempt to prevent skin cancer in addition to where they live and work giving them less sun exposure.

Third, the original RDA for vitamin D of 400 iu is less than a fifth of the amount most people use or need to use each day from what I’ve read. And, in the summer, people who spend time outdoors during the day can get 10,000 to 15,000 iu a day of vitamin D from sun exposure.

From this set of information it seems clear to me that taking a total of 2,000 to 3500 iu a day of vitamin D3, the active form, is likely to be enough vitamin D to be beneficial but not too much. And, getting less than 2,000 iu a day may not be enough to protect your health.

However, when the benefits of retinol, the animal sourced kind of vitamin A were first understood, many people decided if 5,000 or 10,000 iu was good, 25,000 to 50,000 or more would be better & took too much for safety and good health.

So, I have wondered for quite a while what for sure was enough vitamin D & how much would you have to take to be unsafe & how, in your individual case, could you be sure you were taking enough for optimum health & health protection.

Read that exact information below. Today it was in an article on today’s Total Health Breakthroughs email.

"This article appears courtesy of Early to Rise's Total Health Breakthroughs, offering alternative solutions for mind, body and soul. For a complimentary subscription,
visit http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com"

“Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Catch Some Healthy Rays

By Jon Herring

Have you ever noticed how you feel happier when you have a chance to sit or walk in the warm sun? Doesn't just going outside on a sunny day calm your nerves and lift your spirits?

By contrast, consider what happens and how you feel during the cold and dreary winter months. Many of us experience darker moods. We are more likely to become sick with colds and flu. We often gain weight and crave carbohydrates.

Then, come spring and summer, these symptoms magically disappear without treatment. Well, there is a reason for this.

Your body needs sunlight just like it needs nutrients. In many ways, your physiology is as closely linked to the sun as that of plants. Plants use sunlight to photosynthesize chlorophyll. By a comparable process your body uses sunlight to photosynthesize vitamin D -- a molecule that is vitally essential to almost every aspect of your biochemistry and physiology.

Decades of scientific research prove the importance of vitamin D. In addition to the noticeable lift it gives your mood, it also helps lower blood pressure, cholesterol and blood sugar; improves your immunity; regulates your weight; increases muscle strength; normalizes sleep cycles; and boosts brain function.

It has also been shown to prevent many chronic diseases, including the three biggest killers of our generation -- heart disease, cancer, and diabetes.

On the other side of the coin, a deficiency of vitamin D is clearly associated with increased risk of a long list of health conditions, including everything from Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and autism, to bone and muscle pain, behavior disorders, depression, gluten intolerance, arthritis, multiple sclerosis, infertility and tooth decay... just to name a few.

And here's why this should matter to you:

It is estimated that more than 90% of the population is deficient in this vital nutrient (technically, it is a hormone), at least part of the year. That means there is a good chance that YOU are deficient, putting your health at risk, including potentially doubling your risk of cancer. With fall and winter weather coming soon, this is something you should address right away.

There are several risk factors for vitamin D deficiency. The most obvious is your lifestyle and the amount of sunlight you are exposed to. If you work indoors, spend most of your time indoors, and get very little sunlight on your skin, you are almost certainly deficient.

Three to five days per week, you should aim for at least 15 to 20 minutes in the sunlight (with as much of your skin exposed as possible).

Where you live is also a factor. In the mid to higher latitudes, UV-B radiation is extremely limited during the fall, winter and spring. In his book, The UV Advantage, Dr. Michael Holick shows that any area north of 35° latitude (or south of the corresponding latitude in the southern hemisphere) will not receive enough UV radiation to trigger adequate vitamin D production for approximately six months out of the year. In the US, this is anywhere above Atlanta, Georgia.

That means even if you spend a significant amount of time outside, about half the year the sun is too low in the sky for your body to produce vitamin D. Likewise, if you usually wear sunscreen when you are exposed to the sun, you are likely to be deficient. A sunscreen with an SPF of 8 reduces vitamin D production by 95%!

Other risk factors for vitamin D deficiency include your age (as you age, you need more sun to produce vitamin D), your skin type (darker skin types need more sun to produce vitamin D), and even your weight (vitamin D becomes trapped in body fat and cannot exert its effects).

In any case, the only way to really know if you are deficient is to have your blood tested for levels of 25-hydroxyvitamin D, also called 25(OH)D. It's best to measure twice a year -- once at the end of winter when your levels are lowest, and once at the end of summer when your levels are highest. At the very least, you should get an annual measurement. The gold standard vitamin D test is from the company DiaSorin.

To get an idea of what "normal" is, let's look at populations living near the equator where we all evolved from. At or near the equator, the average person has vitamin D levels around 50 ng/mL. This is considered optimal.

Here are the generally accepted graduated levels of vitamin D deficiency:

Extreme deficiency: 20 ng/mL (high risk of various conditions)
Clinically deficient: below 32 ng/mL (increased risk of various conditions)
Borderline deficient: below 35 ng/mL
Acceptable: 35-45 ng/mL
Healthy: 45-55 ng/mL, or
Optimal: 55 ng/mL
Excess: greater than 100 ng/mL
Intoxication: greater than 150 ng/mL
Ideally, you want to maintain a healthy year-round level around 50 ng/mL. The question now is, how much vitamin D do you need... and how can you get optimal levels when the sun is low in the sky?

The government says if you are a male or female between 1 and 50 years of age, you need only 200 IU of vitamin D per day. But according to current research, the government is dead wrong on this point. The recommended daily allowance will only serve to prevent the most serious deficiency.

In one study performed at Creighton University in Omaha, researchers found that adults will use 3,000 to 5,000 units of vitamin D per day, if it is available to the body.1 In other words, the amount your body actually uses on a daily basis is 20 times more than the government says you need!

Also consider how much vitamin D your body makes when exposed to sunlight. During the summer months, if you expose most of your body to direct sunlight until your skin turns very slightly pink, your body will produce approximately 20,000 IU of vitamin D. This is 100 times greater than the recommended daily allowance (RDA).

After a review of numerous studies, it appears that 4,000 IU of vitamin D per day, from all sources, is about optimal. If you get some (but not a lot) of sun exposure, then you probably only need to consume about 2,000 IU per day from food and supplements.

Finally, let's address how to get enough vitamin D when you cannot get it from sunlight.

It is important to recognize that very few foods naturally contain vitamin D. Those that do, provide only a small amount. For example, a 3.5 ounce portion of salmon (one of the richest food sources) contains just 360 IU. The same amount of sardines contains 270 IU. One egg delivers just 25 IU. You should definitely be consuming these foods, but don't expect them to affect your vitamin D status very much.

Cod liver oil is the most concentrated natural food source of vitamin D. But cod liver oil also contains a significant amount of vitamin A. And too much vitamin A can be harmful. To get the vitamin D you need from cod liver oil, could mean that you are consuming too much vitamin A. That's why I strongly suggest taking fish oil for the omega-3s (fish oil has no vitamin D), and getting your vitamin D from sunlight and dedicated supplements.

Most people should supplement with vitamin D in the late fall, winter, and early spring. You should also consider supplementing year round if you have darkly pigmented skin, are over 65, if you're overweight, or if you just can't bring yourself to go into the sun without sunscreen.

You can start by adding a good quality multivitamin to your daily routine. But most multivitamins are only a start. The average multi contains 400 IU of vitamin D -- only about 10 to 20% of what you need.

There are two companies that make dedicated vitamin D supplements I would recommend -- Carlson's and Bio-Tech Pharmacal. Carlson's brand is carried in many health food stores and they have products that contain 2,000 or 4,000 IU in small, easy to take gel caps.

For larger amounts, consider Bio-Tech Pharmacal, a federally licensed, FDA approved manufacturer that produces pharmacological doses of vitamin D in 1,000, 5,000, and 5,0000 IU strengths.

However, please note: you should never take more than 5000 IU of vitamin D on a regular basis without consulting a physician and having your blood levels tested. You want to measure your vitamin D levels periodically to make sure that you bring your levels into a healthy range, without overdoing it.

Don't wait. Arrange today, to have your vitamin D levels checked. If they're low, it's easy to fix. By taking these steps in the wintertime, you can boost your vitamin D to a healthy level year-round and dramatically reduce your risks of many chronic diseases.

Reference

Heany RP, et al. Am J Clin Nutr 2003; 77(1): 204-10.
[Ed. Note: Dramatically reduce your risk of heart disease, cancer and diabetes... by spending just a few minutes each day in the sun? Yes you can! Achieving optimal vitamin D levels is one of the most important (not to mention one of the cheapest and easiest) ways to ensure great health. And Jon Herring and Dr. Al Sears tell you everything you need to know in their groundbreaking new book, Your Best Health Under the Sun.]”

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In the paragraph above, "For larger amounts, consider Bio-Tech Pharmacal, a federally licensed, FDA approved manufacturer that produces pharmacological doses of vitamin D in 1,000, 5,000, and 5,0000 IU strengths.", I believe that the last strength number is a typo because 5 with 5 0's after it is correctly written as 50,000. And, I think that is what was meant.

In my case, I decided to take two capsules a day of a 400 iu vitamin D3 supplement from fish oil that does have about the same amount of vitamin A as retinol since my multi has beta carotene only for A. And, twice a day, I take 1,000 iu of D3 using the Carlson brand Jon Herring recommends in his article. So I’ve added 2800 iu a day of D3 to the 400 iu I get in the multi I take. So, even on a day when I get less vitamin A & D fortified milk than usual and little or no sun exposure, I get at least that 3200 iu of vitamin D3 every day.

Since both kinds of vitamin D I take cost about $6 for 100 capsules, buying both costs abut $12 including sales tax. That means the 2800 iu of vitamin D3 I started taking in addition to my multi vitamin costs me about 24 cents a day or $7.20 a month.

And, now that I know my blood level can be measured and what I’d like it to be from this article, I’m curious to find out if the vitamin D I’m getting puts me closer to 30, which is a bit too low, or closer to the 50 to 55 this article says is the optimum level.

Since I don’t get outside a lot, I may find that my level is 28. If that happened, I’d certainly try taking another 1,000 iu of vitamin D. But since I’ve been taking what looks close to the correct amount of vitamin D for several months, it may be in the 42 to 56 range already. If I measured there, I think I’d not take more.

However, it may be that amounts in the 50 to 60 range have therapeutic effects. If I find that is the case & test at 28 I might add 2 or 3,000 iu; and I’d add 1 or 2,000 iu at the 42 level.

Between what I ate growing up and as a young man, my family history, and accumulated stress effects, I likely have some calcified plaques in my blood vessels to get rid of even though my HDL & triglycerides are close to optimum now. So, if getting my blood levels to the 50 to 60 range would help get rid of some of those calcified plaques in my blood vessels I may want to take more vitamin D than I would otherwise.

Similarly, if I were diagnosed as having slow growing prostate cancer or any fast growing kind of cancer, I might well want to boost my blood level of vitamin D to the 50 to 60 range.

Restricting SUGAR lowers high blood pressure….

Today's post: Thursday, 8-28-2008

As some of you read in our earlier posts, we are about to publish an eBook that reveals the methods that have been tested to work to lower high blood pressure & that do NOT use drugs.

(We'll announce that here when it's ready.)

One of the really nice things about these methods is that virtually all of them also provide abundant protection to your health in addition to lowering high blood pressure. That way you get both the lower blood pressure AND the health protection that you are trying to lower your blood pressure to achieve.

(This will also help many people to avoid the nasty side effects of the drugs that lower high blood pressure.)

And, in several places we recommend that you avoid high glycemic & fattening foods & nonfoods such as high fructose corn syrup, refined grain foods, and to minimize eating real sugar. We also strongly recommend avoiding most commercially produced snacks & baked goods that are made from those foods.

This protects your health. And just from the lower amount of excess fat you’ll carry, it will lower your blood pressure compared with what it would be if you kept eating this stuff.

We also point out that you need to take action to protect your health & lower the readings if your fasting glucose goes over 99 or your HBA1C goes over about 5.8. And we give methods that work to do this including the foods to avoid just listed.

And, we also list the abundant evidence that shows that eating a lot of fruit and vegetables that are high in potassium and taking enough magnesium PLUS keeping total salt to about 1500 mg a day lowers blood pressure effectively.

Doing that set of things even lowers blood pressure a bit in people with OK readings in the 120 over 80 range. And, it definitely lowers blood pressure that’s high and helps keep your blood pressure from going up.

In addition, about 30 percent of black people in the Americas whose ancestors survived coming to the Americas without adequate water to drink during their voyage and 10 or 15 percent of other groups are salt sensitive. And for all those people, salt restriction is even more effective and important to protect their health and keep their blood pressure at desirable levels.

It’s also worth noting that the commercially produced snacks & baked goods that are made from refined grains and sugar and high fructose corn syrup that we suggest lowering to keep your blood sugar levels down also contain enough salt that avoiding them can cut the salt intake by more than half in many people who still eat them now & who stop eating them.

So, as you can see, we do suggest limiting salt because of these facts. But we also suggest limiting sugar & eliminating refined grains & the junky foods made from them.

We did not however, have the information that limiting sugar & eliminating refined grains & the junky foods made from them directly lowers blood pressure also.

That made me intensely interested an article in last Tuesday’s Total Health Breakthroughs.

It not only says that lowering sugars and other high glycemic carbohydrates lowers blood pressure directly and effectively, it has evidence this may be even more important to do than restricting salt for many people.

(By the way, restricting salt has such a strong track record, we still recommend restricting salt in addition to restricting excessive sugar & high glycemic carbohydrates. It helps that the commercially made snacks and baked goods we suggest hardly ever eating have both.)

Here’s the article itself.:

"This article appears courtesy of Early to Rise's Total Health Breakthroughs, offering alternative solutions for mind, body and soul. For a complimentary subscription,
visit http://www.totalhealthbreakthroughs.com"

Rethinking Sodium Restriction for High Blood Pressure

By Laura LaValle, RD, LD

If you have high blood pressure, you more than likely have been told to try to lose weight and to reduce your sodium intake. But have you ever been told to reduce your sugar and starch intake? More than likely you haven't. In fact, some people in the medical community believe that it's a myth that high carb intake can contribute to insulin resistance and high blood pressure. What a disappointment.

Many studies over the last decade have shown improvements in blood pressure as a byproduct of low carb diets. However, not many studies have looked specifically at blood pressure as an endpoint on a low carb diet. One study completed in 2003 and reported to the American Association of Clinical Endocrinologists in 2006, found that changing the diet to reduce insulin secretion resulted in a drop in diastolic blood pressure (the lower number) from 96 to 88.5 mmHg after six weeks.1-2

The diet used in this study was a low carb, high fat and animal protein diet. The only dietary restriction was sugar and starch, the two food groups that elicit the highest insulin secretion. There was no calorie or sodium restriction on the diet.

Although the study's lead researcher stated that they discouraged the participants from consuming too many high sodium processed meats like hot dogs and bacon, some participants ignored that advice and in so doing were consuming as many as 20 grams of sodium per day. (Current medical guidelines are to try to eat no more than 2.3 grams [2300 mg] of sodium per day.)

Despite increased sodium intake, blood pressure came down, and that's not the only thing. Fasting blood glucose and insulin, triglycerides, and VLDL all came down -- and there was an average of 12 pounds of weight loss. And finally, there were positive effects on LDL -- the particle size increased. (Larger particle size LDL is not as likely to become plaque in the arteries as small particle LDL.)

Participants were all patients who were overweight, had elevated blood pressure and blood sugar, and were considered to be at very high risk for heart disease and strokes. By the end of the six weeks, some patients were able to stop their high blood pressure and blood sugar medications altogether, and others were able to reduce their dosages.

This finding led the authors to conclude that medicine needs to stop paying so much attention to sodium and more attention to insulin as the cause of high blood pressure. You would think that news like this would travel fast, yet I have found that almost no one has heard of it.

Those of you who regularly read my husband Jim's and my articles, know that we are big advocates for low carb diets. I just want you to know that in reducing your carb intake, you are not only choosing a diet that is good for your weight, your lipids, and blood sugar, you are benefiting from one of the most powerful ways to reduce blood pressure as well. And by making that change you don't need to be nearly as strict with the salt shaker.

References

Abdul-Rahman, M et al. Abstract 201, Endocr Pract. 2006; 12(Suppl. 2), 50.
Hays JH et al. Mayo Clin Proc. 2003:78; 1331-1336.

[Ed. Note: Laura B. LaValle, RD, LD is presently the director of dietetics nutrition at LaValle Metabolic Institute (formerly part of Living Longer Institute). She offers personal nutritional counseling at LMI for clients who need help with their diet in relation to illness or disease. Laura also provides educational services in the areas of health promotion, wellness, and disease prevention…..]”

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This is good news indeed in many respects.

But the important news is how effective lowering bad carbs turned out to be in lowering high blood pressure.

I’ve not seen the study but the average reduction they got in the “diastolic blood pressure (the lower number) from 96 to 88.5” suggests that as a group these people started at about 162 over 96 and wound up at about 151 over 89.

That’s still too high for the best health protection, which is why we recommend salt restriction and several other methods to get further reductions as well.

But it does produce enough of an improvement it may help many of these people avoid or get off of blood pressure drugs.

Virtually all doctors will write a prescription for blood pressure drugs if they see readings of 162 over 96 & above. Research shows this lowers death rates. So that’s as it should be.

But they hope to get the resulting blood pressure to 150 over 80 or below with the drugs. So 151 over 89 is close enough to that, they may be a good bit more willing to have someone with those readings or a bit less work at lowering them without drugs.

And, all these these improvements reported in this study are extremely heart protective.

Eating a diet with at least moderate levels of health OK protein foods and fats including whole eggs, wild caught fish, beef fed only grass, and extra virgin olive oil & avocados is one good way to get or keep high HDL levels. Though the fats and protein foods in this study may not have been as good for the people as that, they probably did at least maintain or increase their HDL levels.

And, combining that with the lower triglycerides reported in this study is direct proof that the amount of the heart harmful small particle LDL they had in their blood went down.

So, that improvement plus the lower blood pressure means that the low carb diet did indeed improve their protection from heart attacks and strokes.

That’s nice to know.

New information on Qi Gong & Tai Chi....

Today's post: Tuesday, 7-8-2008

It’s well known that Qi Gong & Tai Chi are both systems of controlled, patterned movement. When done slowly & gracefully over a period of time, they are known to produce stress relief & can also improve coordination, flexibility & strength. Surprisingly, a fifteen to twenty minute session tends to burn as many calories as walking that amount of time – or more.

The stress relief is significant. Studies have found that doing Tai Chi regularly reduced high blood pressure by an average of 17 systolic & 11 diastolic. This is higher than other forms of relaxation test as doing, including meditation.

When you add the exercise you get to the stress relief from Tai Chi, it’s clear this is a very valuable practice to take up.

(Qi Gong is very similar to Tai Chi but my understanding is that it focuses more on breath control & mental self-discipline.)

Now there is some interesting news about Qi Gong & Tai Chi. It seems they increase your blood level of serotonin.

This compound provides significant feelings of calm & can produce feelings of depression or anxiety if it’s too low. In fact, the aim of the most used class of anti-depressants is to help ensure that the person taking them has a decent blood level of serotonin.

Here’s the article I got yesterday, containing that news.

This article appears courtesy of Early To Rise, the Internet’s most popular health, wealth, and success e-zine. For a complimentary subscription, visit http://www.earlytorise.com.

“Qi Gong for Stress Reduction and More

By Jonny Bowden, PhD, CNS

You may have never bothered to wonder why a cat grooms itself all day. But you should. The answer could impact your health.

Princeton researchers inserted electrodes into the brainstems of cats, and then recorded what was happening over the course of the cats' day. Not much. Until they started grooming themselves. Then their levels of serotonin - a feel-good neurotransmitter involved with stress-reduction and overall well-being - went through the roof. It actually increased 40-fold! How's that for a stress reliever?

There's a lesson here. Concentrated, repetitive motion raises serotonin activity. Which brings us to one of the best stress reducers in the world: qi gong.

Three decades ago, Herbert Benson, MD, the pioneering doctor who helped introduce the concept of mind-body medicine to the U.S., studied qi gong while he was researching what he termed "the relaxation response." He concluded that to reach a state of deep relaxation, all you have to do is control your body, your breathing, and your mind.

Qi gong is a family of mind-body exercises that share all of those elements: regulation of the body, regulation of breathing, and regulation of the mind. In qi gong, as in many meditative practices, you control your mind by concentrating on a single thought. It can be a word, a mantra, a sound, a letter. You regulate your breathing in some controlled way (such as breathing in on a slow count of 4 and breathing out on a slow count of 4), and you add some regular, specific movement to handle the body part of it. Those three components are the trifecta of increased serotonin activity - and with it, greater energy and well-being.

At the University of Southern California, Irvine, Dr. Shin Lin (a visiting professor from Shanghai University) has found significant, measurable beneficial effects on the nervous system from doing qi gong. Other researchers have demonstrated that when you practice certain movements - such as those in qi gong - you get enhanced blood flow. Couple that with an increase in serotonin levels, and you've got a great prescription for lowering stress while increasing your overall energy.”

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For more things that lower high blood pressure without drugs, keep reading our blog. Within a few weeks, we will announce an eBook on how to lower high blood pressure without drugs listing the most effective things that do this & many others.

The really good thing about these nondrug methods is that they all tend to help remove the causes of high blood pressure to lower it. And, virtually all of them protect or improve your health in many other ways.

Chocolate helps lower high blood pressure....

Today's post: Thursday, 7-3-2008

We’ve posted before on how dark chocolate & unsweetened cocoa have been shown to lower high blood pressure & increase blood flow.

We’ve posted that this only works if you eat or drink the chocolate without milk.

And, we’ve posted that the effect of the unsweetened coca is greater than the dark chocolate. (Apparently, the added fat & sugar in the dark chocolate candy slightly interfere with the effect. The effect still happens but not quite as strongly.)

Kelley Herring is an expert on nutrition for good health & recipes containing OK & health beneficial foods.

She writes for the health section of Early to Rise & for its Total Health Breakthroughs also.

I checked out her website & found an article on the health effects of dark chocolate & unsweetened coca.

I liked it enough that I’ve reprinted it here.

If you like it or want new ideas for recipes containing OK & health beneficial foods, by all means check out her website.: http://www.healinggourmet.com/

Here’s the article:

“A Sweet Way to Lower Blood Pressure More benefits of decadent dark cocoa

More good news for chocoholics: dark chocolate, a good source of powerful antioxidant phenols can help reduce blood pressure.

A recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association included six men and seven women aged 55-64 with mildly high blood pressure. On average, the participant’s systolic blood pressure (the top number) was 153 and diastolic blood pressure (the bottom number) was 84.

Every day for two weeks, the study participants ate a 100-gram piece of dark chocolate. They balanced its hefty 480 calories by not eating other foods similar in nutrients and calories. Half of the participants received dark chocolate, while half got white chocolate.

At the end of the study, those who ate dark chocolate saw a significant drop in blood pressure (by an average of 5 points for systolic and 2 points for diastolic blood pressure). Those who ate white chocolate experienced no benefit.

To enjoy the health benefits and delicious flavor of dark chocolate, you don't need to eat a 480 calorie candy bar. In fact, 1 tablespoon of dark cocoa has a mere 80 calories, with all of the chocolatey goodness and health benefits.”

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This shows a definite but small effect on lowering high blood pressure.

And it explains why it may be best to use unsweetened cocoa a good bit more often than dark chocolate candy. You not only take less calories, you take in less sugar. Both of these things help you get the health effect without becoming fatter if you mostly use the unsweetened cocoa.

For more things that lower high blood pressure without drugs, see our post for this coming Monday.

And, keep reading our blog. Within a few weeks, we will announce an eBook on how to lower high blood pressure without drugs listing the most effective things that do this & many others.