Emphysema: Treatment Options

Emphysema is a progressive, chronic lung disorder which is recognized
as one of the Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Diseases (COPD)- others
from the group are- Bronchial Asthma and Chronic Bronchitis. This
group of lung disorders are known for presenting symptom of 'shortness
of breath'.

In Emphysema, air sacs- medically known as alveoli- get functionally
or structurally destroyed to keep up their function to transport the
oxygen to blood. Combined with narrowing of air-passages (as it
happens in Bronchitis) it becomes difficult to breathe out.

Emphysema is generally an irreversible problem but functional
improvement is achievable in most cases. A physician would normally
prescribe Bronchodialators and/ or steroids and in extreme cases
recommend the surgical removal of most affected part of the lung/s.

In Naturopathy, however- there are are two lines of treatment.

One, a more general form of treatment- which in every case, recommends
a thorough detoxification or removal of toxins from the body. Luke
warm water Enema or Colon Therapy is the first step. A diet rich in
antioxidants and dietary fibres is recommended. Freshly squeezed
seasonal fruit/ vegetable juices (especially of the citrus fruits) are
of great help.

Two, specific treatments. Warm water bags on the back help with
breathing difficulty as also the Feet soaked in a bucket of bearable
hot temperature before retiring to the bed (if there is no associated
swelling of the feet due to Emphysema). Use of Jala neti pot twice a
day, calm the nerves and help in broncho-dialation.

Nutritionally speaking, there are food supplements which can be tried
in this case. 200 mg of N-Acetyl Cysteine thrice a day and 2 gm of L-
Carnitine twice a day help with repair/ prevention of further loss to
the lung tissue. These derivatives of Amino Acids have shown
consistent results with Emphysema cases.

Most important intervention however is, to stop 'SMOKING' any further,
without which an improvement can not be expected.

The word 'WELLNESS'

“Wellness,” intoned Dan Rather in November 1979, introducing a “60 Minutes” segment on a new health movement known by that name. “There’s a word you don’t hear every day.”

More than three decades later, wellness is, in fact, a word that Americans might hear every day, or close to it. You can sign up for your company’s employee-wellness program, relax in a wellness spa treatment or even plan some “wellness tourism” for your next vacation. Your cat or dog can get in on the action, too, since the W-word has been pressed into service as a brand of all-natural pet food.

Wellness is here to stay, despite misgivings over the years that it isn’t such a well-formed word. How did it take over, and whatever happened to good old health?

Though the Oxford English Dictionary traces wellness (meaning the opposite of illness) to the 1650s, the story of the wellness movement really begins in the 1950s. New approaches to healthful living were emerging then, inspired in part by the preamble to the World Health Organization’s 1948 constitution: “Health is a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” Halbert L. Dunn, chief of the National Office of Vital Statistics, was looking for new terminology to convey the positive aspects of health that people could achieve, beyond simply avoiding sickness. In a series of papers and lectures in the late ’50s, Dunn sketched out his concept of “high-level wellness,” defined as “an integrated method of functioning, which is oriented toward maximizing the potential of which the individual is capable.”

Dunn collected his presentations in a 1961 book, “High-Level Wellness,” but it would take another decade for his work to resonate with a committed group of followers. An early acolyte was John W. Travis, who picked up Dunn’s book in 1972 from a $2 clearance table at the bookstore of Johns Hopkins Medical School, where he was enrolled in a preventive-medicine residency program. Travis didn’t think much of Dunn’s buzzword at first. “I thought the word wellness was stupid, and it would never catch on,” he recently told me. But Travis was enamored with the way Dunn presented his ideas, and he put those ideas into action — and reluctantly embraced the word itself — when he opened the Wellness Resource Center in Mill Valley, Calif., in November 1975. The center promoted self-directed approaches to well-being as an alternative to the traditional illness-oriented care of physicians.

Wellness was so unfamiliar at the time, Travis recalls, that he constantly had to spell the word when using it over the phone. It soon got national attention when a young doctoral student named Donald B. Ardell profiled Travis’s center in the April 1976 issue of Prevention magazine. In a sidebar, Prevention’s editor, Robert Rodale, welcomed the “exciting field of wellness enhancement,” promising that the magazine would “examine all aspects of wellness promotion.” Even greater exposure came with Rather’s “60 Minutes” piece, which focused on Travis and the Mill Valley center.

Travis and Ardell found a kindred spirit in Bill Hettler, a staff physician at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. Influenced by their work, Hettler founded the annual National Wellness Conference at Stevens Point, now in its 35th year. The conference lent valuable academic prestige to the wellness movement. It also caught the attention of Tom Dickey, who was working with the New York publisher Rodney Friedman in the early 1980s to set up a monthly newsletter on health, based at the University of California, Berkeley. Friedman wanted the publication to compete with the Harvard Medical School Health Letter, and Dickey suggested using wellness in the title as a contrast. In 1984, the Berkeley Wellness Letter was born.

Joyce Lashof, then the dean of Berkeley’s School of Public Health, remembers that wellness was initially a tough sell at the school. Not much was known on campus about the earlier work of Travis and his fellow wellness advocates, but Lashof’s colleagues associated the term wellness with the “flakiness” of Mill Valley and surrounding Marin County. The NBC newsman Edwin Newman had televised an exposé of Marin County’s hedonistic lifestyle, which notoriously opened with a woman getting a peacock-feather massage from two nude men. The Berkeley Wellness Letter, however, managed to avoid such unseemly associations by publishing serious, evidence-based articles on health promotion, while debunking many of the holistic health fads of the day.

Though the Berkeley newsletter, which at its peak reached a million subscribers, did much to establish the credibility of wellness in the ’80s, language pundits continued to raise their eyebrows. Newman, who also moonlighted as a usage commentator, belittled wellness, calling it an example of “bloating” in the language. In 1988, a survey of the Usage Panel for the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language found that a whopping 68 percent of panelists disapproved of the word when used to refer to employee-wellness programs and the like, and a critical note was included in the dictionary’s 1992 edition.

But carping over wellness faded away in the ’90s as the term gained a foothold in everyday use. The American Heritage Dictionary silently dropped the usage note on wellness in its fourth edition in 2000, a decision that its supervising editor, Steve Kleinedler, chalks up to the growing prevalence of wellness programs in the workplace and beyond. A word that once sounded strange and unnecessary, even to its original boosters, has become tacitly accepted as part of our lexicon of health. Well, well, well.

Courtesy: New York Times. By BEN ZIMMER Published: April 12, 2010

Ban Trans Fats!

LONDON - Banning trans fats from all foods would prevent thousands of heart attacks and deaths every year and would be a simple way to protect the public and save lives, say senior doctors from the Harvard School of Public Health.

The authors say in their report that bans in Denmark and New York City effectively eliminated trans fats without reducing food availability, taste or affordability.

There is also no evidence that such legislation leads to harm from increased use of saturated fats. Their view follows calls by public health specialists to eliminate the consumption of industrially-produced trans fats by next year.

Trans fats (also known as trans fatty acids) are solid fats found in margarines, biscuits, cakes and fast food. Many studies demonstrate harmful effects of trans fats on cardiovascular risk factors.

For example, trans fats increase the amount of low density lipoprotein (LDL) or ‘bad cholesterol’ in the blood and reduce the amount of high density lipoprotein (HDL) or ‘good cholesterol’.

People with high levels of LDL cholesterol tend to have a higher risk of getting heart disease, while people with high levels of HDL cholesterol tend to have a lower risk.

A recent analysis of all the evidence recommends that people should reduce or stop their dietary intake of trans fatty acids to minimise the related risk of coronary heart disease.

Removing industrial trans fats is one of the most straightforward public health strategies for rapid improvements in health, the authors say in a British Medical Journal (BMJ) release.

Based on current disease rates, a strategy to reduce consumption of trans fats by even one percent of total energy intake would be expected to prevent 11,000 heart attacks and 7,000 deaths annually in Britain alone.

These findings were published in bmj.com.

Swasthya Rakshak Panchatantra

Dr B. Venkat Rao has all the credit to organize Naturopathy as a 'System of Medicine' in India. A Gandhian himself and a devout Naturopathy Practitioner, he established India's first (and probably world's first, too!) university recognized curriculum in Naturopathic Medicine in 1969 which was called Diploma of Naturopathy: awarded by Osmania University in Hyderabad. In 1989, the course got upgraded as a Bachelors Degree, BNYS (Bachelor of Naturopathy and Yogic Sciences, now offered by 12 Naturopathy Schools and 6 Universities in India).

Dr Rao summarized the basic 'Principles' which can enable majority of the people Sickness- Free, which he called 'Swasthya Rakshak Panchatantra' or, Five Principles of Health Preservation.

Two Meals a Day.

Dr Rao was of the opinion that eating two balanced meals a day is great healthy routine. The Meals must include whole grains, nuts, seasonal fruits and vegetables. Meat, Fish, Eggs and Dairy add too much of toxins to the system and metabolic costs of eating protein from the animal source was much higher, according to him. Last meal should be taken ideally about 3 hours before the sleep.

10 Glasses of Water a Day.

One must Drink 10 Glasses of Water a Day. Water is a very good cleanser and detoxifier of the body. It also helps metabolism and maintains body temperature.

Water should not be taken during meals, half an hour before and 2 hours after the meal as it dilutes the digestive enzymes and hampers the digestive process.

Exercise an Hour a Day.

Exercise has a great role in keeping the body fit by activating Circulation and Breathing. It also helps eliminate metabolic wastes and improves healing. It keeps the body away from extra calories keeping you lean and also gives you a stress- free mind. Brisk walk, Yoga and Gardening are good exercise options for majority of the people.

Pray/ Meditate at least once a Day.

Arrange a 10 minutes silence in the form of meditation or prayer either around sunrise or before going to the bed. This time is important for you to connect with your inner self and charges you with the hope and confidence to go on in challenging parts of your life.

Fast at least once a Week.

Fasting once in week has a lot of Physical and Spiritual detox advantages. Depending on the requirement, a fast for the day could be arranged as a Fruit Diet fasting, Juice fasting or Water fasting.

ASH GOURD: Healing Properties

Ash gourd, also known as ‘Petha’, is generally cultivated for its nourishing and medicinal values. Its mineral and vitamin contents are calcium, phosphorus, iron, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin and vitamin C. It’s green in colour from outside and white inside.

Petha is generally used for making sweets, preparing sambar and other curries of South India. Ash gourd / Petha juice is highly recommended for maintaining general good health and in curing diseases of any order.

Method

Petha juice can be prepared by crushing the pieces (without the seeds but with the peel intact) in the mixer-grinder. The pulp can then be wrapped in a fabric and the juice can be squeezed by hand. One should drink it daily in the morning on an empty stomach.

The juice should be taken fresh and in small sips instead of gulping it down so that the saliva mixes with the juice. Some quantity of water can be added to facilitate smooth extraction of juice in the grinder.

Benefits

• Being extremely low in calories, the ash gourd is used to treat obesity as it promotes metabolism and prevents sugar (carbohydrates) from being converted into fat.
• It is alkaline and has a strong ‘antacid’ action. It maintains the pH of the body and counteracts the acidity created in the stomach because of the intake of acidic foods like soft drinks, fried and denatured food.
• It helps in treating constipation and tones up the general digestive system.
• Cough, common cold, fever, influenza, bronchitis, sinusitis can be controlled without any side effects.
• Any kind of severe and chronic asthma can be cured with regular consumption.
• It can help treat thyroid problems.
• It can also help treat mouth cancer and protect the life of teeth and gums when a mouth gargle of the juice is done regularly.
• It is also an effective cure for pyorrhea i.e. bleeding of gums.
• Being grown on creepers, it has the highest prana or ‘life force’ which helps in making meditation practice more effective.

Nutritional Considerations in Kidney Diseases

Kidney diseases kill 60,000 Americans a year and afflict at least 8 million more. Dialysis and transplants are expensive, costing taxpayers over 2 billion dollars annually. To that, add the emotional and physical costs in pain.

How Do Your Kidneys Work?

The answer is, constantly! 24 hours a day, your two kidneys filter your blood somewhat like an aquarium filter filters the water in a fish tank. The functional unit of the kidney is the nephron, a tissue unit that not only filters, but also recycles and excretes. The nephron filters blood (except red blood cells and protein); maintains the body's acid-base ion balance; recycles needed substances (water, minerals); and excretes wastes in a concentrated urine. In a manner of speaking, urine is filtered blood, or more exactly, blood is filtered urine.

Kidney Diseases and Problems:

Inflammation and Infection

The role of massive doses of vitamin C is profound in this case, providing prevention and treatment at saturation levels. Since vitamin C is filtered and "wasted" through the kidneys, it is a virtually custom-made therapy.

Degeneration (resulting from inflammation, etc.)

A chronic excess of dietary protein almost certainly taxes the kidneys and leads to gradual degeneration. (Williams, SR Nutrition and Diet Therapy, page 856, "The Aging Western Kidney"). Vegetarianism is a virtually automatic solution to our nation-wide pattern of protein abuse. Protein restriction is generally considered to be an important treatment for progressed glomerulonephritis. Reducing protein intake is obviously an ideal way to prevent a protein-breakdown induced nitrogenous overload in the first place.

Increasing carbohydrates is recommended. “Carbohydrates should be given liberally. This will also reduce the catabolism of proteins and prevent ... ketosis." (Williams) Again, a regular vegetarian diet, which is high in complex carbohydrates, will assure just this.

Nephrotic Syndrome (swelling and protein in the urine)

This condition results from tissue damage and impaired nephron function. Its association with collagen diseases (rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, etc.) is hardly accidental, for chronic deficiencies of vitamin C (and vitamin C’s helpers, the bioflavinoids) cause the very event described by Williams on page 851: "The primary degenerative lesion is in the capillary basement membrane of the glomerulus which permits the escape of large amounts of protein into the filtrate." This is because capillaries, those tiniest and most numerous of all the blood vessels, get leaky in the absence of ample vitamin C. Easily-bleeding gums are a visible example of this, but easily-leaking glomeruli (part of the nephron) are a greater, hidden, but similar problem.

Acute Renal (Kidney) Failure

Early successful management of infectious disease greatly reduces the likelihood of renal failure. Saturation with vitamin C is very effective, broad-spectrum treatment for infectious diseases (Klenner, Stone, Pauling. Cathcart). Vitamin C does not cause kidney problems; it prevents them. For example, vitamin C stops the formation or oxalate stones, and actually dissolves phosphate and struvite kidney stones (see below). If kidney failure is suspected, see your doctor early in the game, and insist that vitamin C therapy is employed. Even conventional food-groups nutrition texts (correctly) mention the need for supplemental vitamin C and the B-complex for kidney tissue healing. Just up the doses if you want best results.

In early renal failure, no protein should be given. Vegetable juice fasting may work well here. If liquids are restricted, put the vegetables through a blender and eat as a salad puree. It tastes better than it sounds.

HOW TO MAKE A BLENDED SALAD according to Dr. Christopher Gian-Cursio, who was a New York City-based, circut-riding naturopath for over 50 years. I met Dr. Gian-Cursio some twenty years ago. Here’s his recipe:

1 each small tomato, red or green pepper

1/2 small cucumber

juice of 1/2 lemon or lime

5-6 leaves romaine lettuce

3-4 stalks fresh fennel or celery

Place cut up pieces of tomato, pepper and cucumber along with lemon juice into blender. Blend until smooth and liquid. Add romaine leaves one at a time. Add celery or fennel; blend additional 2-3 minutes. (The consistency depends upon personal taste; some like it smooth and watery, others thick and crunchy.)

I will add that you should eat your blended immediately. Fresh, wholesome food does not “keep,” and crushed raw food does not keep at all.

Chronic Renal Failure

Continued deterioration means loss of vital kidney participation in the activation of vitamin D-1. The result can be osteodystrophy (loss of calcium from bone or poor bone formation in childhood). Supplementation with vitamin D and calcium are therefore required.

Amino acid supplements have shown promise in treating chronic renal failure, when coupled with a greatly curtailed amount of dietary protein of only 20 to 25 grams/day. As an advocate of vegetable juice fasting, I personally think the protein restriction may have done as much as the amino acid supplementation. Why? Because typical hospital “protein restricted diets” provide 40g/day of protein!

Consider this: the typical American eats over 100g, and frequently exceeds 120g of protein daily, which is WAY too much. So a so-called “restriction” to 40 g/day is simply a correction. Most of the world’s peoples would be pleased as punch to be able to eat 40g/day of protein. But we happily chow down three times that, call it normal . . . and then line up for dialysis.

Dialysis

The cost of too much meat may ultimately be over $10,000 per year for dialysis at home... or more than $35,000 per year at a dialysis center. And these are 1990 prices.

During dialysis, the water soluble vitamins (B-complex and C) are lost from the blood. Supplementation is essential, and must be both high-potency and FREQUENT.

Obstruction: Renal Calculi (stones)

There are five types of kidney stones:

1. Calcium phosphate stones are common and easily dissolve in urine acidified by vitamin C.

2. Calcium oxalate stones are also common but they do not dissolve in acid urine.

3. Magnesium ammonium phosphate (struvite stones) are much less common, often appearing after an infection. They dissolve in vitamin C acidified urine.

4. Uric acid stones result from a problem metabolizing purines (the chemical base of adenine, xanthine, theobromine [in chocolate] and uric acid). They may form in a condition such as gout.

5. Cystine stones result from a hereditary inability to reabsorb cystine. Most children's stones are this type, and these are rare.

The Role of Vitamin C in Preventing and Dissolving Kidney Stones:

The very common calcium phosphate stone can only exist in a urinary tract that is not acidic. Ascorbic acid (vitamin C's most common form) acidifies the urine, thereby dissolving phosphate stones and preventing their formation.

Acidic urine will also dissolve magnesium ammonium phosphate stones, which would otherwise require surgical removal. These are the same struvite stones associated with urinary tract infections. Both the infection and the stone are easily cured with vitamin C in large doses. BOTH are virtually 100% preventable with daily consumption of much-greater-than-RDA amounts of ascorbic acid. Think grams, not milligrams! A gorilla gets about 4,000 mg of vitamin C a day in its natural diet. The US RDA for humans is only 60 mg. Someone is wrong, and I don't think it's the gorillas.

The common calcium oxalate stone can form in an acidic urine whether one takes vitamin C or not. However, if a person gets adequate quantities of B-complex vitamins and magnesium, this type of stone does not form. Any common B-complex supplement twice daily, plus about 400 milligrams of magnesium, is usually adequate.

Ascorbate (the active ion in vitamin C) does increase the body's production of oxalate. Yet, in practice, vitamin C does not increase oxalate stone formation. Drs. Emanuel Cheraskin, Marshall Ringsdorf, Jr. and Emily Sisley explain in The Vitamin C Connection (1983) that acidic urine or slightly acidic urine reduces the UNION of calcium and oxalate, reducing the possibility of stones. "Vitamin C in the urine tends to bind calcium and decrease its free form. This means less chance of calcium's separating out as calcium oxalate (stones)." (page 213) Also, the diuretic effect of vitamin C reduces the static conditions necessary for stone formation in general. Fast moving rivers deposit little silt.

Furthermore, you can avoid excessive oxalates by not eating (much) rhubarb, spinach, or chocolate. If a doctor thinks that a person is especially prone to forming oxalate stones, that person should read the suggestions below before abandoning the benefits of vitamin C.

Ways for ANYONE to reduce the risk of kidney stones:

1. Maximize fluid intake. Especially drink fruit and vegetable juices. Orange, grape and carrot juices are high in citrates which inhibit both a build up of uric acid and also stop calcium salts from forming. (Carper, J. "Orange Juice May Prevent Kidney Stones," Lancaster Intelligencer-Journal, Jan 5, 1994)

2. Control urine pH: acidic urine helps prevent urinary tract infections, dissolves both phosphate and struvite stones, and will not cause oxalate stones.

3. Eat your veggies: studies have shown that dietary oxalate is generally not a significant factor in stone formation. I would go easy on rhubarb and spinach, however.

4. Most kidney stones are compounds of calcium and most Americans are calcium deficient. Instead of lowering calcium intake, reduce excess dietary phosphorous by avoiding carbonated soft drinks, especially colas. Soft drinks contain excessive quantities of phosphorous as phosphoric acid. This is the same acid that has been used by dentists to etch tooth enamel before applying sealant.

Remember that Americans get only about 500 mg of dietary calcium daily, and the RDA is 800 to 1200 mg/day. Any nutritionist, doctor or text suggesting calcium reduction is in serious error.

5. Take a magnesium supplement of at least the US RDA of 300-400 mg/day (more may be desirable in order to maintain an ideal 1:2 balance of magnesium to calcium)

6. Be certain to take a good B-complex vitamin supplement daily, which contains pyridoxine (Vitamin B-6). B-6 deficiency produces kidney stones in experimental animals. Remember:

* B-6 deficiency is very common in humans

* B-1 (thiamine) deficiency also is associated with stones (Hagler and Herman, "Oxalate Metabolism, II" American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 26:8, 882-889, August, 1973)

7. Additionally, low calcium may itself CAUSE calcium stones (L. H. Smith, et al, "Medical Evaluation of Urolithiasis" Urological Clinics of North America 1:2, 241-260, June 1974)

8. For uric acid/purine stones (gout), STOP EATING MEAT! Nutrition tables and textbooks indicate meats as the major dietary purine source. Naturopathic treatment adds juice fasts and eating sour cherries. Increased vitamin C consumption helps by improving the urinary excretion of uric acid. (Cheraskin, et al, 1983). Use buffered ascorbate "C".

9. Persons with cystine stones (only 1% of all kidney stones) should follow a low methionine diet and use buffered C.

10. Kidney stones are associated with high sugar intake, so eat less (or no) added sugar (J. A. Thom, et al "The Influence of Refined Carbohydrate on Urinary Calcium Excretion," British Journal of Urology, 50:7, 459-464, December, 1978)

11. Infections can cause conditions that favor stone formation, such as overly concentrated urine (from fever sweating, vomiting or diarrhea). Practice good preventive health care, and it will pay you back with interest.

REFERENCES:

Cheraskin, Ringsdorf Jr., and Sisley: The Vitamin C Connection, Harper and Row, 1983.

Pauling, Linus "Are Kidney Stones Associated with Vitamin C Intake?" Today's Living, September, 1981.

Pauling, Linus "Crystals in the Kidney," Linus Pauling Institute Newsletter, 1:11, Spring, 1981.

Pauling, Linus How to Live Longer and Feel Better, Freeman, 1986.

Williams, S. R. Nutrition and Diet Therapy, 6th ed. Chapter 28.

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* Courtesy - Andrew W Saul. http://doctoryourself.com

Role of Vitamin C in Gout

WASHINGTON: Men with a higher intake of vitamin C appear less likely to develop gout, a painful type of arthritis, according to a study.  "Gout is the most common type of inflammatory arthritis in men... The identification of risk factors for gout... is an important first step in the prevention and management of this common and excruciatingly painful condition," wrote the study's authors.  Hyon K Choi, then of University of British Columbia, Vancouver, and now of Boston University School of Medicine, and colleagues examined the relationship between vitamin C intake and gout in 46,994 men between 1986 and 2006.  Every four years, the men completed a dietary questionnaire, and their vitamin C intake through food and supplements was computed. Every two years, participants reported whether they had been diagnosed with or developed symptoms of gout.  During 20-year follow-up, 1,317 men developed gout. Compared with men who had a vitamin C intake of less than 250mg per day, the relative risk of gout was 17% lower for those with a daily intake of 500 to 999 mg, 34% lower for those with an intake of 1,000 to 1,499mg per day and 45% lower for those with an intake of 1,500mg per day or higher.  Vitamin C may affect re-absorption of uric acid by the kidneys, increase the speed at which the kidneys work or protect against INFLAMMATION, all of which may reduce gout risk, a Boston University statement quoted the authors as saying.  These findings were published in the Archives of Internal Medicine. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Source: IANS, Jan. 10, 2009

Health and Wellness Tourism in India

India offers their visitors access to some of the world’s highest-qualified professionals and top-class biomedical facilities, offering world-class health care in facilities that vary in size from small, specialized clinics to large hospitals. Britain’s "The Telegraph” newspaper reported that 150,000 medical tourists travel to India each year, and that in response, authorities there are in the process of introducing a system of medical visas to streamline visitors’ entry. The Confederation of Indian Industry released a study in August 2006 forecasting that medical tourists will contribute $5 billion to the country’s economy.

Those in search of advanced medical care find that, in India, health care prices are competitive with world markets, and that it’s easy to schedule procedures. As the CII study asserts, "heart surgery in the US costs $30,000, while it costs $6,000 in India.” While each patient’s charges differ, in general, the difference in costs varies between one-fifth to one-twenty. Certain surgeries and orthopedic procedures (such as hip resurfacing) not provided in North American hospitals, are available in India.

Travelers interested in wellness find many reasons to journey to India, such as the ancient Ayurvedic therapies. Health tourism includes naturopathic treatment, spa visits and yoga, as well. Agencies offer specialized travel packages for those who consider health maintenance alongside surgical intervention.

Before or after their treatment—or both—medical travelers can enjoy India’s many popular tourist destinations. Whether they enjoy heritage tourism, or viewing wildlife, a beach vacation, or rounds of golf, India has a great deal to offer.

What is GLYCEMIC INDEX?

By now, most people have heard of the glycemic index, but I’ll take a moment to explain it.

• The way the glycemic index works is that a scientist will measure the blood sugar of a volunteer and then feed that volunteer a single food. After two or three hours, the volunteer’s blood sugar is measured again. What scientists have discovered through this kind of testing is that certain foods increase blood sugar a little, others increase blood sugar moderately, and still other foods increase blood sugar dramatically.

  While there are complicated glycemic index charts that show hundreds of foods, here is a typical one:

  

  What you want to notice about this list is that sugars (left-hand column) are mostly in the high top part of the chart. Sucrose (table sugar) and glucose are always found near the top, but, here is the kicker: so are white rice, pancakes, bread, corn flakes, crackers, parsnips, potatoes and many other foods. These are the Foods That Act Like Sugar in your body.

  A Sugar is a Sugar

  The take home message from the studies done on glycemic index is that a sugar is a sugar, no matter what the source. To your body, it doesn’t matter if you pick up a table spoon of sugar and put it in your mouth, or if you pick up a baguette and start munching on it: the results are the same. Up up up goes your blood sugar every time you eat these foods.

  If you want to maintain good blood sugar control, I always recommend eating low or below the glycemic index.

  Below the Glycemic Index

• 
  

  You may have heard of high and low glycemic index foods and that you should eat as many low glycemic foods as you can if you want to keep your blood sugar low or if you are diabetic, but you may not have heard of the concept of Eating Below the Glycemic Index.

  A typical glycemic index chart looks something like this:What you should notice about this chart, or any glycemic index chart, is that there are a number of foods that are missing. The reason why these missing foods are not on the chart is that they don’t have any effect on your blood sugar at all. But just because these foods are not on the glycemic index doesn’t mean they are not important, in fact the opposite is true.

  Below the Glycemic Index Foods:

  Here are the foods that are below the glycemic index. You can safely eat as much as you want of them and they will have no impact on your blood sugar:

  • Onions and garlic
  • Cruciferous vegetables: Broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, chard, kale, and cabbage
  • Lettuce of all kinds: red leaf, green leaf, iceberg…
  • Mixed greens: spinach, arugula, endive, dandelion greens, escarole, radicchio, red mustard and various lettuces: red leaf, green leaf, romaine
  • Avocados
  • Meats: fish, chicken, beef, pork, wild game
  • Eggs
  • Mushrooms: Shitake, Maitake, Reishi and others

  What is amazing about all these foods is that they are not only low on the glycemic index, but many of them are what I call Disease Busing Power Foodsbecause they pack that additional nutritional punch that makes them not only good for you, but can actually prevent (and maybe even treat) many common diseases (such as cancer, heart disease, diabetes and others).

  By choosing foods from below the glycemic index, you are picking the very best nutrition you can find. You are not only keeping your blood sugar low, but you are also giving your body that extra boost it needs to navigate our stressed-out over-processed and sometimes toxic world.

  Cannot Live on “Below” Alone?

  You may look at the Below the Glycemic Index foods and think that you cannot live on those foods alone. Fair enough. The next best place to choose your foods from is the low glycemic index foods, the best of these include:

  • Nuts: peanuts, cashews, almonds, walnuts…
  • Fruits: apples, kiwi, cherries, berries (strawberries, blueberries, blackberries…)
  • Beans: pinto, chickpea, butter beans, lima bean, black beans, lentils…
  • Grains: while I’m not a big fan of grains, if you want to include them in your diet try to prepare them as most people make rice: boil and eat them. The whole grain with the lowest glycemic index is barley. You should also choose the whole-grain versions and not the “white” versions. If you simply must have your grains ground and processed, choose pasta as it generally is very low on the glycemic index.

  Below or Low

  As you can see, the best way to eat is to choose foods low or below the glycemic index. While it can be difficult at times, these foods are what your body need to thrive.

Hydrotherapy: The Water Cure

History

After the use of Herbal Medicines, the use of water to stimulate healing may be the next-oldest form of medical treatment. We know that hydrotherapy is among the treatements used in ancient Egypt and India, and is mentioned in the oldest writings known to still exist, the Vedas.

The modern system of Naturopathic Hydrotherapy has its roots primarily in the European Alps. Vincent Priessnitz (1799-1852), an unschooled farm boy who learned how to treat animals with cold water, later healed himself from broken ribs and eventually treated patients for a wide range of conditions. Despite his lack of formal medical training he was formally acknowledged by the Austrian government.

Father Sebastian Kneipp, a German priest (1821-1897), cured himself of tuber-culosis and went on to be considered the Father of Modern Hydrotherapy. A great many of the early Naturopathic physicians trained under him.

Hydrotherapy was hugely popular during the 1800's, both in Europe and the United States, and Spas and Sanatoriums flourished. Eventually, with the onset of modern medicine and a greater reliance on drug therapy, the use of hydrotherapy to stimulate our own internal healing mechanisms has waned. Here in the 21st century, it is the practitioners of Naturopathic and Ayurvedic medicine that are keeping this valuable treatment method alive.

Therapeutic Effects of Water 

Specific Physiological Effects of Hydrotherapy Enhanced Circulation of Blood & Lymph Increased Oxygen to Tissues Better Digestion of Food Increased Nutrients to Cells General Boost to the Immune System Balances the Nervous System: - Calms the Sympathetic - Nourishes the Parasympathetic Assist the Body's Detoxification Efforts

Hydrotherapy usually consists of using hot or cold water, and sometimes alternating between the two. Water can be applied to the body in packs, in sprays, or through soaking in tubs or lakes. The water may simply be pure water, or in some instances natural mineral springs were used which were observed to have healing effects. Even in modern times, there are more research citations in Pub Med, a large government medical database, on the use of water than there are for the use of aspirin.

Hot water is known to expand tissues and increase circulation. Cold water contracts tissues and decreases circulation. When these two are alternated, a pumping effect on tissues is achieved, which accelerates the flow of blood, oxygen and nutrients into, and accelerates the removal of wastes and toxins from the affected area. When these alterations are carefully choreographed, the body's parasympathetic nervous system, responsible for healing, can be stimulated.

When using mineral baths, minerals are absorbed through the skin into the blood, having direct physiological effects. Minerals and bath salts can be used in home tubs if you are not able to travel to natural mineral hot springs. Another type of home baths is peat moss baths. Peat is rich in a cocktail of plant derived minerals, and soaking in peat baths is much like soaking in a peat moss tea. Peat baths are also excellent for detoxification

Constitutional Hydrotherapy 

is a traditional Naturopathic treatment developed in the early 20th Century by Dr. O.G. Carroll, and later passed on to Dr. Harold Dick. It consists of alternating hot and cold applications to the chest, abdomen and back, in conjunction with sine wave electrotherapy to the liver and adrenal glands.

Constitutional Hydrotherapy

The primary treatment goal is to enhance the function of your body's parasympathetic nervous system, that portion of your autonomic functions which regulate digestion and absorption of nutrients, immune function, and is the body's natural antidote to stress.

By stimulating the parasympathetic nervous system, the body's overall healing ability is enhanced. Stress is a vital part of our makeup that protects us from danger. Too often, however, the "effects of modern living" leave us in a stressful "fight or flight" mode for too long, which prevents the body from absorbing nutrients, healing, or recovering from injuries. Constitutional Hydrotherapy is a way of jump-starting the parasympathetic nervous system and defusing the effects of stress.

Conditions Treated by Hydrotherapy 

Based on its therapeutic effects, Hydrotherapy can be used for a wide variety of illnesses The following list of conditions are some for which the Constitutional Hydrotherapy treatments in particular, have been effective for many patients.

Conditions Successfully Treated by Hydrotherapy Crohn's Disease Colitis IBS GERD Hemorrhoids Chronic Asthma Bronchitis Allergies Colds Flu Pleurisy Systemic Infections AIDS Chronic Fatigue PMS Dysmenorrhea Infertility Reynaud's hypertension Arthritis Diabetes Hypothyroidism Obesity Cancer varicose veins Psoriasis Depression