Newsletter 8-7-09

1. Insights on Multiple Sclerosis - There is an increasing number of safe, effective and exciting treatments for this previously "hopeless" disease.
2. Health Myths - Are synthetic Vitamins good for you?
3. Health Myths #1 & 2 - Your Diet - by Dr. Cindy Clayton, D.C. & Nutritionist
4. Diabetic Ulcers - An effective natural solution
5. Neuropathy, why the pain, the tingling and the numbness?
6. Are there additional health problems you need help with?

There are many myths and misconceptions that have been floating around for years and years. People unknowingly spread this false information because they’ve heard others saying the same thing. They have heard it in commercials and in other advertisements. It really get confusing because sometimes the so-called authorities are the ones spreading these untruths. McVitamins is issuing a health issue “Health Myths and Legends” to help you understand.

In an effort to protect themselves and their families from frightening and serious health problems, people are changing their diets and are taking herbs and supplements. Why do they need vitamin supplements? Due to the depletion and demineralization of topsoil, the contaminations of produce from pesticides, herbicides and fungicides, the over processing, enriching and preservation – foods just don’t have the same nutritional value they once had. To get the same amount of iron that was available to Popeye in one can of spinach, today he would have to consume 65 cans. An orange that once contained 50 mg of natural Vitamin C complex in 1950, now contains 5 mg.

We’ve all have gotten used to reading literature proclaiming the benefits of vitamins, deciding what is wrong with us and heading to the health food store to buy what we’ve decided we need We often end up buying all kinds of supplements - but are we any healthier? People are still fatigued, still overweight, still fighting the cholesterol battle, etc. etc. etc.

The body runs on vitamins, minerals, nutrients and oxygen just like your car runs on gas, water and oxygen. But what happens if you put the wrong gas, or worse some other liquid, into your car? Not only will it not work, it may damage the engine. The same thing can happen when you put the wrong vitamins in your body.

We can get healthier if we understand what most vitamins today really are – they’re synthetic. Let’s talk about synthetic vitamins

Natural: These are vitamins not tapered with and are the way they are in nature, not tapered with in any way that might change their molecular structure or biochemical actions. This can also be called whole food supplements.

Crystalline – these are vitamins originally from food but treated with heat, caustic, high-powered solvents (such a s benzene or toluene) chemicals, and distillations to reduce them to a specific vitamin.

Synthetic – These are vitamins made in a laboratory that are chemically reconstructed versions of the crystalline vitamins from other known sources. Thiamine mononitrate (a synthetic vitamin labeled as B1), is made from coal. It’s not “organic” just because it has carbon in its molecular structure.

One of the most perilous deceptions is the passing off of these phony, synthetic vitamins and saying that the body does not know the difference. In the long run, we will compound our health problems by taking them.

Keep in mind that synthetic vitamins are not the vitamin available in foods, but synthesized (made in a laboratory) fractions (parts) of a vitamin complex, The analogy here is essentially the same as an automobile salesman handing you a wheel from a car and telling you the wheel is an automobile.

In an example we look at vitamin C. You can buy “vitamin C” that is called
”Ascorbic Acid”. Ascorbic acid is only one small part of the vitamin C complex. Vitamin C has enzymes, co-enzymes, antioxidants, trace elements, activators, and other unknown factors that enable the vitamin to go into the biochemical operation.

In turn, the human physiology cannot properly utilize these synthetic fractions in the way that natural complexes work in the body and are essential to tissue repair and the sustenance of life.

When a person starts taking a fraction of a vitamin – and has sufficient reserves in his body of all the other components of the vitamin to recombine and process, the person may experience some improvement for a time. However when those reserves are drained, the vitamin will no longer benefit the person. Thus, a person may feel an increase in energy for a short period of time, but if taken for an extended period of time, the effects will reverse.

When vitamins were first discovered, they were discovered in foods. When foods were studied a lot was learned. Studies that show that vitamins work use a food source nutrient. In studies showing that vitamins don’t work, a synthetic was always used.

Additionally, the body actually has to recognize what you are putting into your body as food. Like the finicky cat, that looks at some new food offered it and says “what is that?” You’re body does the same thing. It doesn’t recognize the synthetic vitamins and often just sends it right back out of the body.

A synthetic vitamin fraction can only be utilized for a drug or pharmacological effect. The effect of a drug is palliative - meaning a making or covering over of symptoms - it isn't curative. The disease process remains unchanged or progressively gets worse for lack of proper attention.

What is needed is vitamins that come from whole food, which comes along with all the co-factors present when you eat a food.

Tissue and cell repair, or replacement, require the following to restore the approximately 24 billion cells that break down each day in the human body.

· A discontinuance of organic or inorganic poisons either inhaled or ingested in bad air, bad food and/or bad water.

What is a natural vitamin or supplement? It is a whole food supplement, made from food, not made in the laboratory.

Myth # 1

Diets High in Fat Cause You to Get Fat

Advertisers have promoted low fat everywhere and so many people are obsessed with cutting fat from their diets. But did you know that eating healthy fat actually helps you lose weight? When you eat low fat foods your metabolism drastically shuts down. When your metabolism shuts down, so does your fat burning furnace. If you want to speed up your metabolism and lose weight – consume more healthy fat. Fat also tells your brain that you’re full. It will greatly cut your appetite. Have you ever eaten at a Chinese restaurant and been hungry an hour later? That was because of the high carbohydrates. It is the carbohydrates that cause you to get fat and make you hungry, especially sugar and refined grains. We’re not talking about the artificial margarine, oleos or the heated, trans fats. We’re talking about eating more raw nuts, olive oil, flax oil, coconut oil, cod liver oil, real butter, cheese, eggs and meats as good sources of healthy fat (organic and hormone free).

The problem with a high carbohydrate, low calorie diet is that bread, pasta, cereal, and other carbs break down into sugar very rapidly. This triggers an increase in insulin. Insulin takes high sugar that’s in the blood and puts it into storage as fat. This data can be found in almost every medical textbook on the subject of insulin and carbohydrate metabolism. When insulin is released it also inhibits the action of enzymes that break fat down.

Your organs need calories to keep functioning, including the heart, liver, kidneys and brain. Low calorie diets actually starve these organs. They will eventually start to malfunction. A low calorie diet will also cause your metabolism to slow way down which will cause your body to expand it’s fat cells and make it very hard to lose weight.

Protein on the other hand increases a hormone which has a function that is the opposite of insulin. It will cause your body to dissolve fat rather than store it. In the process of dissolving the fat, it gives you energy. By taking grain carbohydrates and sugar out of your diet and increasing vegetables, proteins and healthy fats, you will lose weight with less hunger and will have more.

Dr. Cindy Clayton, D.C. is a Doctor of Chiropractic practicing in the Portland, Oregon area

Cindy Clayton-Sudalnik, D. C.
Life Wellness Group,
9921 NW Engleman St,
Portland, OR 97229,
(323) 394-0194

About 10 percent of diabetics have open sores that are very hard to heal, often lasting for years in that unhealed state, causing great discomfort and high risk of infection. Now a very simple and completely natural remedy can rapidly heal these wounds.

Studies conducted in 1991 by a medical research team compared a conventional method of burn treatment commonly used to treat burns, pressure ulcers and leg ulcers, with a topical application of honey* applied to the surface of the wound. Burn patients were divided into two groups.

The burns of patients in one group were cleaned with saline solution and pure, undiluted, unprocessed honey was applied daily. Burns of the other group were cleaned and covered with gauze that was soaked in a medicated dressing (5% silver sulfadiazine) that was changed daily.

Results showed that within seven days 91 percent of the infected wounds treated with honey were free of infection, compared to less than 7 percent of the burns treated with the medicated dressing. Within 15 days, 87 percent of the honey treated wounds were healed; whereas only 10 percent of the other group wounds were healed. Patients treated with honey experienced less irritation, more relief of pain, and no allergic reactions or side effects.

Studies done by an earlier medical research team in 1988 showed that various types of wounds and skin ulcers which had not previously responded to conventional methods of treatment such as antibiotics and medicated dressings responded favorably to a topical honey treatment.

Wounds and ulcer types treated with honey included: gangrene of the skin, burn wounds, topical ulcers, bedsores, and diabetic ulcers. After the wounds were cleaned with saline, honey and clean bandages were applied daily. Infected wounds that had not responded to conventional treatments were free of infection within 7 days of the first honey application.

Following treatment with honey, dead tissue was quickly replaced with healthy tissue. In some cases, diabetic ulcers were successfully treated with honey and skin grafts, thus preventing amputation. Apparently, the antibacterial properties of honey allow it to work on wounds and skin ulcers in the same manner it works on burns.

* The honey used must be raw unprocessed honey and it must state somewhere on the label that it is "unheated".

What causes this debilitating pain, burning, painful touch, lack of coordination and balance, and cramps?

Neuropathy has many symptoms. It may start with a tingling feeling and end up with numbness. It can be a pricking, or burning sensation, loss of reflexes and muscle shrinkage, abnormal sensations, or sensitivity to touch. Its worse symptom is pain, sometimes so excruciating that a person would amputate rather then continue the pain.

It is called many names such as paresthesia, neuritis, neuralgia, dysesthensia, hypoesthesia, hypesthesia, hypalgesia, hypealgesia and hyperesthesia due to its many different kinds of symptoms.

They are created by a specific type of nerve damage. This nerve damage can come from too much sugar in the blood (the reason it is a side effect of diabetes). It can be caused by exposure to chemicals such as cancer treatments, poisons, alcoholism, or a side effect of some medications. It can be the result of kidney or liver failure, infectious disease or nutritional deficiencies especially B vitamins. The reasons are many; the damage they produce is the same.

What creates the problem is damage done to the outer lining of the nerve cell. Cells have coverings much like an electrical wire has an insulation of plastic. Have you ever seen a wire whose insulation is damaged – the electrical current doesn’t flow correctly. It can send electricity out from the area where it is damaged, it can stop the flow of electricity or it can damage what its supposed to be supplying electricity to.

A damaged nerve covering does the same thing. It can send out “sparks” that cause tingling, it can stop the flow resulting in numbness. It can create feelings of hot or cold or a sensitivity due to crossed signals. It can definitely cause pain especially as the damage gets worse.

The idea is to fix this outer covering. This is called the myelin sheath. What is needed is specific B vitamins. The only question is how to get these B vitamins in sufficient amounts so that the body can actually repair the damage. Isolated B vitamins that are sold at the health food stores or local drug stores get washed out of the system too quickly to fix the damage. It would be hard to take enough of this type of nutrients to make a difference. You can’t get it from vitamins made in a laboratory.

What is needed is a whole food supplement with methylcobalamine and benfotiamine and other B vitamins that the body can use to repair the cells. That is one of the functions of the body, to repair cells. But it does need specific nutrients to do its job.

Nutrients are what a body runs on. A car runs on gas. If you drive the car down the road, it uses up a steady amount of that gas. If you take that same car and speed down the freeway, you will use up a lot of gas. When you take a body “out on the freeway”, or put it under physical stress, it uses up a lot more nutrients. Thus, getting the right supplements in the right amount is important.

Just as a car won’t drive without giving it gas. A body can’t repair itself (or function correctly) without the proper nutrients it needs to “drive”. In the case of neuropathy, it needs these B vitamins.

Neuropathy can be a side effect of many things. Although most often it is caused by too much sugar in the blood - Diabetes - there are many factors.

Chemoitherapy and some drugs have neuropathy as a side effect and it can be caused by surgery damaging the nerves - there are others.

MCVitamins News

Myth # 1

Diets High in Fat Cause You to Get Fat