Medication Side Effects and Nutritional Deficiencies

Ever listen to a drug commercial and their disclaimer at the end where they tell you all the possible side effects.   Or did you ever check on the potential side effects of a drug you are taking on one of the sites www.rxlist.com or www.drugs.com ? You might wonder what can create so many problems.

Well, it is true that a drug is a chemical that is unnatural to the body and is actually a toxin to the body, but due to those very properties they force the body to make some corrections, or at the very least cover up the symptoms of whatever it is that is a problem.

Read the Article  Medication Side Effects and Nutritional Deficiencies

 

The Safety of Vitamin B6

by Bob Held

The Linus Pauling Institute found that adverse effects have only been documented from Vitamin B6 supplements and never from food sources.

Therefore, safety concerning only the supplemental form of vitamin B6 (pyridoxine, also called pyridoxine hydrochloride) is discussed here.

Although vitamin B6 is a water-soluble vitamin and is excreted in the urine, long-term supplementation with very high doses of pyridoxine (Vitamin B6) may result in painful neurological symptoms known as sensory neuropathy.

Symptoms include pain and numbness of the extremities and in severe cases, difficulty walking. Sensory neuropathy typically develops at doses of pyridoxine (Vitamin B6) in excess of 1,000 mg a day.

However, there have been a few case reports of individuals who developed sensory neuropathies at doses of less than 500 mg of Vitamin B6 daily over a period of months.

None of the studies in which a neurological examination was performed reported evidence of sensory nerve damage at intakes below 200 mg of pyridoxine (Vitamin B6) daily.

To prevent sensory neuropathy in virtually all individuals, the Food and Nutrition Board of the Institute of Medicine set the tolerable upper intake level for pyridoxine (Vitamin B6) at 100 mg/day for adults.

To your health.

McVitamins

Nutritional Deficiencies Can Cause All Sorts of Problems

Recently, I came upon an article in the NY Times about B12 deficiency and the types of symptoms it can create.    An interesting part of this article  is the many different diagnosis that were possible.   Fortunately, the deficiency was found and the patient recovered.

Today, I was shown an information about Depression and D3.   I’ve talked about Omega 3 Fatty Acids and Depression, and this is a different deficiency.    It is good to realize that they both can create this type of symptom.

Here is the Article about B12 –  The Presenting Problem – Was the patient’s strange gait the key to his illness?  Read about it here. The Man with the Wobbly Walk

And the video about Nutrition and Depression   – Vast numbers of people have suffered through depression at some point in their lives. Depression takes a huge toll on individuals, and has significant social and economic costs.  What if foods could be a key to helping people lift out of depression and reduce anxiety?   Watch Dr. Saul’s Video about Nutritional Deficiencies

Never underestimate what vitamins deficiencies can do.

Healthy Eating

I’m always on the go and often go to Whole Foods to buy some prepared hot foods that I don’t mind eating.  That’s not all the economical and is restricted to what they offer on that day.

In an earlier blog post about the Fast Food Lifestyle and Health I was doing research on how to eat healthier while trying to save time.   Well, I haven’t gone through all the recipes out there to see how many of them I would trust, but I did find a good healthy cook book.   It is just out, is available on Kindle and has a lot of really good recipes that uses food that actually helps to burn fat…. in case you are interested.   The doctor feels that you don’t lose weight to be healthy, but get healthy to lose weight.   Healthy bodies don’t store fat.

I got the recipe book and haven’t gotten through all the recipes yet where I can evaluate them, but thought I’d pass it on as something you might be interested in.

The Book is called “Healthy Fat Burning Recipes” by Dr. Eric Berg and can be found on Amazon.   You can also find his other books there. 

Check it out.

Nutrition & Health – What is Good Nutrition?

Nutrition is an important subject, although often ignored by most medical doctors as secondary, somehow relegated to something that comes about by just normal day to day eating.   I’ve never been certain how they think that you can get enough nutrition from fast food restaurants or the supermarket processed foods that most people consume.   Some doctors are catching on and recommending supplements but sometimes their understanding is limited in scope.   I keep asking when the subject will be reintroduced into medical schools so that we can have truly educated health care physicians in the medical field. (Did you know that homeopathy & herbal medicine was taught in medical schools before 1920?).

An example of ignoring nutrition was when  a friend had gallstones and her doctor wanted to remove her gallbladder. . II thought that the doctor would at least give her a diet which restricted some of the poor food choices she made, but no, he said she didn’t have to change her diet despite not having a gallbladder.   I was never sure why he didn’t think that diet had anything to do with gallstones.

Here is an article on nutrition that was published in “EzineArticles.com  which gives you a overview about nutrition and supplements.   Nutrition & Health

Vitamin B May Protect Against Alzheimer’s and More

The reference by Dr. Mercola (link is below) talks about homocysteine being lowered in the body in the presence of vitamin B.  I was interested in forwarding this as homecysteine has also always been associated with heart disease and more and now with Alzheimers.

Why?  The body needs cysteine.  It is vital to making Glutathione. Go to the link if you want to know more about Glutathione, the body’s master anti-oxidant).

Homeocysteine is part of a reaction in the body and is supposed to convert to cysteine.  But it needs B vitamins to convert.   Thus the need for the B vitamins.

Here is what the article is about:

B vitamins may slow brain shrinkage by as much as seven-fold in brain regions specifically known to be most impacted by Alzheimer’s disease

High levels of the amino acid homocysteine are linked to brain shrinkage and an increased risk of Alzheimer’s; B vitamins are known to suppress homocysteine

Among participants taking high doses of folic acid and vitamins B6 and B12, blood levels of homocysteine were lowered as was the associated brain shrinkage – by up to 90 percent

Here is the full article:

B Vitamins and Alzheimer’s

Gluten Free Foods – a “Healthy Choice”

You have probably noticed a growing number of processed food products boasting with a label that says “Gluten-Free”.  It is the healthy choice?

It is interesting that a lot of people have gluten-free diets – they eat fruit, vegetables, meat – not processed foods.    But now you can actually buy ‘gluten-free’ pizza among many other gluten-free foods – cookies, cereals, breads, etc.

What does this all mean?   I decided to find out and here is an article on this

Gluten Free Foods – Are they healthy?

Grains – Are they good for you?

A lot of us know we can’t eat wheat. There are those who have “celiac’s disease” and then there are those who know that wheat and other grains just don’t agree with their digestive system.

There are many drugs available for the symptoms that are created by the problems many people have with digestion. And one has to ask the question, are these drugs necessary? Or is it something that I ate?

Here is an article on Grains

Do you take herbs for Neuropathy?

I’ve have found at least four different neuropathy products claiming to repair nerves, or handle neuropathy symptoms, that contain herbs.  I’ve written about herbs before as they aren’t nutrients that the body needs to grow and repair itself (ie. protein, vitamins, minerals, etc). They act like drugs in so far as they force the body to do something it normally doesn’t do.  It is also hard to determine the strength of the herb you are taking as they aren’t like the herbs you drink in tea or put on your salad, they are extracts and thus you don’t really know the quality or strength of what you are taking.

Herbs may relieve the symptoms of neuropathy, but relief in the sense that they cover up the symptoms and you have to keep taking the herbs to get that relief.  They don’t go to the cause of the problem.

Herbs also have side effects and can’t be taken with different medications.

First, if you are on medications and want to take any herbal remedy, please go to your pharmacist.  The pharmacies have a database to check whether the drug and the herb will conflict.

Here is an article with a list of the many herbs touted for neuropathy.  It talks about side effects and how long you can safely take them.

There is a link on this page to an article about the problem of taking herbs for neuropathy and that page has a link to a video by a pharmacist telling you how to take herbs safely if you want to. to. She talks about taking one at a time so you can judge what the herb is doing for you.

But rather than tell you what she says you can go directly to the page where you can find it Taking Herbs