Forums > Social Chat > Partnering Up: A Year for Change

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
S2...more than white it is actually anything bleached, and that is mainly because the process strips it of it's nutrients. Vitamins are really not good for most people to take. If you do take them they should be the drops for tinctures. Vitamins are REALLY hard on the digestive tract. A body processes natural sugars differently (and better) than processed sugars, and so eating fruit is still better for you than taking supplements, but, like with anything, in moderation.
And as for fatty foods, actually, you can trip the fat off of the meats, so we were always taught to not include them in the don't eat list, but more put them on the more moderately than others lists.

I also have to disagree with the diabetes not being genetic. Yes, there is alot to diet in it, but some of the forms of diabetes are genetic, and can not be explained away. Especially that of young, healthy children (like my friends niece who nearly died from shock because the doctors didn't catch that it was diabetic issues).

Thanks for all the info....there is so much to sort through!

Did you also know that if you do anything for 13 days it becomes habit..supposedly? So if you want to stick to something...essentially tough it out for 13 days and the body adjusts in that time. I know if you repeat something to yourself 13 times you tend not to forget it. My grandmother taught me that when I was young and it still holds true to this day. Maybe it's something with 13? I just thought that with diet and workout, it might help to make the change in lifestyle more...habitual? Worth a try, right? Hmmmm....we shall see!

[ 18. January 2003, 08:32: Message edited by: Pele ]

Pele
Higher, higher burning fire...making music like a choir
"Oooh look! A pub!" -exclaimed after recovering from a stupid fall
"And for the decadence of art, nothing beats a roaring fire." -TMK

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
Actually, when I said diabeties isn't genetic, I was refering to the late onset type (not the type little children get). And even late onset has genetic factors, it is just that you can overcome the genetic factors of late onset, because late onset diabeties is mostly caused by poor lifestyle/eating habits (obesity). Some people can eat horribly their whole lives and not get diabeties (of either type) or get fat.


I am very saddened to hear that you cryed about that, Pele. You know we all love you here, right? And personaly I care more about your mind than what you look like. But if you have the desire to change you body, and you belive you can do it, then you will succeed. You are a strong person, and I can't imagine anything would get in your way.

we eat and we drink and we smoke and we try!

Posted: 17th Jan 2003

quote:

---

Originally posted by santanatwo:

MD's like to treat the symptoms, and not the disease, because that is the way they are trained, it is also the way to keep you coming back for more medicine. (more money for them)

---

I take serious exception to that. It makes us out to be incompetent, evil, money-grubbing monsters.

First, the fundamental tenet of medicine is that you always treat the underlying cause. Symptomatic therapy is only appropriate as a way to bridge to such therapy or if the underlying cause is not amenable to treatment.

I've been accused of "treating symptoms" for using antibiotics in a patient with cellulitis. I've been accused of "treating symptoms" for using insulin in a patient with Type I diabetes.

Second, This accusation royally pisses me off, actually. Yes, medicine requires the most intense training of any profession. Only military Special Forces have a more intense training, and theirs doesn't last four years. And so, yes, it tends to attract a lot of Type-A personalities. And yes, I've run into some horrible doctors who are clearly more out for their own pocket books than their patients' well-being and wouldn't know good patient care if it got into bed with them.

Having said that, I have seen my fair share of alternative med practicioners who make outrageous claims, charge huge amounts of money, and actively injure patients through incompetence, by giving them herbs with dangerous interactions, urging them not to seek medical care for life-threatening conditions (just saw a woman who is on the waiting list for a kidney transplant because some chiropractor told her that he could treat her lupus and not to seek medical therapy), and in general, don't care about their patients' well-being but just about stuffing their pockets.

Be that as it may, the majority of alternative medicine practicioners I know (and I know many), be they accupuncturists, chiropractors, naturopaths, Feldenkrais specialsts, etc. are good people with honest intentions who are well aware of their limitations and who genuinely care about their patients. They aren't out to grab money from unsuspecting, desperate, sick people. They are out there to help. And because of them, I refuse to make blanket statements about any of the complimentary and alternative health fields.

So it royally pisses me off when someone turns around and accuses all physicians of intentionally making patients sick, of not treating underlying causes (a central tenet of medicine, BTW, and I challenge you to point to a case where we don't treat the underlying cause when the underlying cause is at all accessible), and of just being in it to get rich. Because most physicians are good people who are honestly out to help. And just because some diseases are difficult to treat, and just because we can't always work miracles and give a pill and it goes away forever, doesn't make it our fault.

I graduated from a very prestigious university. Believe me, I have classmates who are shamefully rich by now. If money was all I wanted, believe me, I'd have piles of it by now. Instead, I am slaving away, throwing away some of the best years of my life, spending $30K a year on tuition because I'm out to help people.

I suggest that from now on, you carefully think about what you say before you make gross generalizations like the one you just did.

[ 18. January 2003, 11:57: Message edited by: MikeGinny (Lightning) ]

-Mike

Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella



A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
Hey Mike....just don't work as a country doctor in a backwater town and send sick people home..okay? Or tell people they have Menier's disease when it was an infection....etc. Some do, some don't but on the whole....people need to be more proactive in their own health care. If that lady had've done her research into her own condition, she would've known not to rely on the chiropractor. It's what amazes me the most of society today. People have this amazing resource at their fingertips, and a tonne of people who know how to use it, and yet are more apt to rely on what others say more now than ever.
I dunno. It's why I am asking and really relishing all the info coming in on here and really trying to research things. I don't want to be skinny. I want to be healthy.
Thanks again, everyone.
And Mike, you are so very appreciated, all the work and sacrifices you are making, really, it is tremendous and I, for one, totally admire what you are doing!

Pele
Higher, higher burning fire...making music like a choir
"Oooh look! A pub!" -exclaimed after recovering from a stupid fall
"And for the decadence of art, nothing beats a roaring fire." -TMK

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
Mike, I certainly didn't mean to generalize ALL doctors. I know MANY who are very respectible, honest people, who care (obviously) about other people more than themselves, otherwise they would be doing something a lot safer, right?. However, I do have evidence to suport my point of view.

Back Pain.

For many years MD's have perscribed "the pill" for back pain. Wether that pill be anti-inflamatories, muscle relaxers, or just pain pills. The root of back pain is not always so easily cured however. I know several people who have been given PAIN PILLS by their doctors, but not sent to a chiropracter, or DO (doctor of ostiopathy). Back problems are one of the most common types of injuries that people get (up their with rotator cuffs and knees and broken bones) And yet the majority of MD's have very little knowledge of ostiopathic manipulation techniques. That is why, in rescent years, many MD's have begun to study with DO's and learn their techniques. Yet to the best of my knowledge, these techniques are not being taught in MD schools very often. The Classic MD aproach to back pain is "here is a pill" and it does work sometimes, but usually the condition persists and is recurent. Have you seen the studies showing how much faster people get back on the job after back injuries if they go to a chiropracter rather than an MD? Every form of doctoring has it's place, but it is important to know the best forms of cures.

I realize I generalized a little to much and was not specific enough in my previouse post and I have revised it slightly to be more specific, For the generalization I appologize. However, I do stand by my statement.

I certainly did not mean it as a personal attack on yourself, I was mainly pointing out a problem. I do think we are a lot better off with doctors than without them, and there is usually more than one way to treat a disease. Wether it be by prevention via healthy lifestyle, or if one must resort to herbal medicine, homeopathic, surgury, massage, manipulation, nutient, pills, or even poison (chemotherapy)

[on a side note, most drugs are derived from plants, and many drugs are more effective in their natural form, because of the chiral nature of most drugs. asprin for instance work four times fast if it is in the pure chiral form (D or L?)(not a mixture of the two). ]

Still, if I think about it long enough I am sure I could come up with another example of treating the symptom and not the root.

[ 18. January 2003, 14:49: Message edited by: santanatwo ]

we eat and we drink and we smoke and we try!

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
funny the difference you can get by putting a comma instead of a period.

I have also notice you did not refute any of my medical knowledge posted above. Hopefully that is a sign that it is accurate (and it is to the best of my knowledge), as I would be putting myself in the place of those I earlier accused, if I was giving out bunk information.

[ 18. January 2003, 14:33: Message edited by: santanatwo ]

we eat and we drink and we smoke and we try!

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
Santana,

I have no personal beef with you. But one of the things that happens when you're in the medical field and you're interested in alternative medicine is that you start to run across a lot of "knee-jerk" statements. Like "doctors treat the symptom and not the disease."

Yeah, a lot of doctors send patients home with vicodin instead of saying, "look, I can't see any reason why you shouldn't see a chiropractor, so here's the name of a good one I know." But that's not what we're taught to do.

Another problem is that so many patients who come to us just want their magic pill that many doctors get in the mindset of deciding what the patient is looking for, rather than checking on what the patient is looking for. If the patient just needs a pill, we can do that. If the patient is actually willing to put effort into it, some doctors are willing to work with that patient. That's why I've had problems with doctors, because as a medical student, I research my complaint before I come in and I walk in the room with a differential diagnosis already prepared. They aren't ready to discuss that with me because they aren't used to dealing with people who are proactive.

In the summer of 2000, my doctor noted that my blood pressure was high and told me that as body mass goes up, blood pressure goes up. When I told him that I'd tried everything to lose weight, he sat me down and talked to me about getting in touch with my body as I described above. This is why I think he's a model for physicians. Because he didn't just assume that it wasn't worth even trying, he tried. And I respect him all the more because he was totally shocked when I walked back a year later weighing 40 pounds less. He went through that effort fully expecting that I wouldn't even try.

That's the kind of doctor I want to be. And that's the kind of doctor that I wish we'd train more of.

And I agree that the D.O.'s have something on us that we don't. But unfortunately if you want to be an academic in medicine, you need an M.D. And since that's what I want to do, that's where I am.

But not all diseases are caused by lifestyle, and not all of them can be treated with lifestyle change. Sometimes, it's just bad luck.

-Mike

Certified Mad Doctor and HoP High Priest of Nutella



A buckuht n a hooze! -Valura

Posted: 17th Jan 2003
True- i do wish more doctors would not prescribe pills for back pain though. i had to fight to get my physical therapy referral, and i'm not relishing having to do it again.

Keep your dream alive
Dreamin is still how the strong survive

Shalom VeAhavah

New Hampshire has a point....

Posted: 18th Jan 2003
Hey Pele -

tell me more about why chickweed would be dangerous.
I've done lots research on it and eaten it in copious amounts - for the taste and because it makes me feel good - with no ill effects. And, I know and old lady who knows her herbs but didn't know chickweed, but was prescribed it by her doc. I showed her where it grows and how to tincture it.

Also, in the past five years I've treated accidents (on myself and my cats) with herbs only, with super and magical results. Also, I get reactions taking over-the-counter drugs, yet when I use the herbs that I know well and that grow near by, I do well.

Why?

Posted: 19th Jan 2003
About a year ago the company I work for had an MD come in and give us all a 4 hour ergonomics class.I don't remember exactly what his field was,I think he was a physical therapist type.Anyway he basically said that chiropractors are a joke and that most back,knee,and other body pains can be avoided by simply stretching your body out about 2 to 3 times a day.Also he told us how to work on our everyday body mechanics to avoid injury such as bend with your knees when picking anything up (did you know you can put like 750psi on your lower back picking up a pencil if you bend at your waist? ).Also don't twist your back unless absolutely necessary and when you sleep don't lay on your stomach.Do the words accumulated trauma ring a bell Mikey?

The way he described it was that the human body has a natural "pain killer" that is released when you "pop" your bones (like you would do with your fingers or back).Thus giving you that temporary feeling of relief and why chiropractors exist.Correct me if I'm wrong.

What he then went into massive detail about is muscle spasms and why they are the real root of the problem.To most people a muscle spasm is like a "charlie horse" when your muscle totally cramps out on you.This is actually a more advanced stage of muscle spasm.An actual muscle spasm is a knot that forms in the fibers of your muscle that does not allow blood to flow through that particular area.A cramp is when the entire area is no longer having blood flowing easily through it.Back pain is also caused by the disks in your back having the weight of your body being irregularly distributed on them.This is caused often times by bending at the waist.

Here's a website for anyone who is interested Ergonomics

Now bear in mind I am not a doctor and am only relaying what was told to me.Maybe Mike can tell me if I was fed a load of BS or if this will actually be helpful to some of you.

Posted: 20th Jan 2003
Actually I think the technical term is tetanus. Lack of blood flow being a bad thing for muscles of course. There are usually other things chiropracters do besides just pop joints. Often they first do some massage and get you to do relaxation techniques and apply pressure to certain muscles along the back. This help to relax these muscles, (which is one of the roots of the pain, right?) Then they do the poping. I have a friend in DO school right now, and she spent a half hour just applying steady pressure up and down my back, (just to the side of the spine). (I forget what the name of the pressure point/muscle group/therapy is...but it is also used for older people and people with brittle bones where poping would be dangerouse) after she was done I felt very relaxed and I shrugged my shoulders and felt half the vertebrae in my back pop! That is how relaxed it made those muscles. So, it isn't just the poping that does the job.

Yes mike, I totaly agree with everything you just said. In fact I have been thinking about it a lot over the weekend.

People expect a "magic pill" and many doctors rely to much on "magic pills". It is also amlost imposible to force somebody to stop doing something that is harming them, they have to do it on their own. If it involved changing a habit, then you mught as well forget it (like "change of lifestyle") It is more acceptable to most people for them to "take a pill twice a day" than to change the way they live. This is not to say pills don't work, because they often do, unfortunatly they don't always work. They do work so often that it breeds unwarented trust in pills as a "end all, cure all". Or as I like to say "where there's a pill there's a way " In fact, the side effects of some drugs can be worse than the thing they are treating. Liver damage for instance is rampant in pharmasuticals, because the liver is heavily involved in the metabolism of these drugs. Often there are alternative treatments for the same disease, (even within the field of MDs). I think it is good to be open to variouse methods and to carefully consider the side effects befor perscribing a pill that could kill somebody as opposed to an alternate cure. Both of my mom's parents died as a result liver failure, due to the drugs they were taking, drugs KNOWN to cause liver failure.

Another problem I have seen is people beliving to much in herbal medicine. While there are many good things it can do, even do better in some cases, it does have limits. Some things are better treated with more agresive treatments (things doctors can do). Herbs can also be just as dangerouse as drugs. (remember, most drugs are either purified from plants, or derived from chemicals found in plants) When used improperly they can kill. One should take extream caution when using herbal remedies. Just because herbs aren't regulated by the FDA doesn't mean they aren't dangerouse.

Treating the symptoms and not the root is not always a bad thing either. There are many things that will heal themselves if given the chance, but you will still feel crappy while your body is healing, so making the patient feel better is not always a bad thing, or the worst thing to do. And, sometimes it is too dangerouse to treat the root directly (if it requires surgury for instance) and it may be preferable to make the patient feel better while their body it given a chance to heal itself. This is common practice, with cold and flu. The symptoms are easily treated, but only the body can truly do the work. The best thing to do is often to give the body the things it needs to heal itself (like nutrients).

Every form of therapy has its place in medicine. One should not close the mind to other methods of treating illnesses.

And personlaly I feel much better when the doctor leaves the room "wait right here, son" so they can go lookup your condition real quick. Doing a little memory refreshing and research before doing a diagnosis is a very good thing.

What I realy long for is the day when all forms of effective treatments are accepted by all medical practitioners (be they MD, DO, herbal, massage therapists, nutritional, etc) and integrated into one comprehensive whole. That day will be a great day for medicine.

we eat and we drink and we smoke and we try!