Health Tips

April 13, 2004

Health Tips Newsletter Archives

We're All Aging - How You Can Age Successfully

Nearly 400 older men and women age 65-95 were followed for 16 years to see if they were successfully aging.

What is successful aging? It was defined as having little or no difficulty with daily physical activities such as bathing, eating, dressing, shopping, cooking, doing housework, walking a flight of steps or half a mile, lifting or carrying 10 pounds, writing or handling small objects.

At the beginning of the study in 1974, nearly 60% of those surveyed scored as successfully aging. By 1990, 16 years later, only 35% still qualified.

What predicts successful aging?

• Income: Those with income above the lowest quarter of the group were nearly twice as likely to age successfully.
• Education: Those with 12 or more years of education also did better.
• Chronic disease: Those without diabetes, chronic lung disease, arthritis, or hearing problems fared better.
• Depression: The absence of depressed feelings made successful aging twice as likely.
• Personal contacts: Those reporting five or more close personal contacts nearly doubled the rates of successful aging.
• Exercise: Seniors reporting that they walked often for exercise were nearly twice as likely to enjoy healthy aging.

Those who were not depressed, had close personal contacts and walked often, tripled their chances of healthy aging. ¹
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Words of Wisdom

In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act. - George Orwell
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Chiropractic Questions and Answers

Do Chiropractors Have Medical (MD) Degrees?

Chiropractors have Doctor of Chiropractic (DC) degrees from chiropractic colleges. The education is similar to that of a medical doctor in some respects and different in others. While MDs study drug prescribing and other medical procedures, chiropractors study spinal analysis and adjusting.
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Chiropractic Demonstrated as More Effective Then Medication, Acupuncture

Chronic spinal pain patients receiving chiropractic care responded much more favorably and with better results than those who used medication or acupuncture. 27.3% of the patients under chiropractic care experienced early pain relief compared to 9.4% of the acupuncture patients and 5% of the medication patients.¹
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Chiropractic and Spinal Research

Remember, all people can benefit from chiropractic care. Feel free to forward these studies to others.

Chiropractic and Infertility, Migraines

A 28-year-old woman visited a chiropractor because of severe migraine headaches she had had since she was a teenager. She also had irregular menstrual cycles and had been to medical clinics for her inability to conceive. Two months after beginning care she reported no headaches during the preceding month. A regular menstrual cycle began 7 weeks into care and within 6 months she became pregnant.²

Restoration of Vision

An elderly man experienced a complete loss of vision following head trauma. It was determined that optometric and opthalmological treatments were not indicated. The patient was referred to a chiropractor and after a series of chiropractic adjustments the patient's vision returned. Possible neurological explanations are addressed in the study.³

Restoration of Sense of Smell

A sixty-year-old man had gone to a chiropractic clinic for lower back muscle pain. During his exam he revealed that he had lost his senses of smell and taste 18 months earlier, while he was suffering from a common cold.

Chiropractic care: an atlas subluxation was adjusted; T3 and a PI ileum were also adjusted. Later that evening the patient reported: "This is the first time I've been able to taste and smell anything for the past year." At a six week re-examination smell and taste were still intact and his lower back muscle pain (gluteal) had resolved.⁴
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Acetaminophen (Tylenol) Can Be Deadly

A January 22, 2004 article by the Associated Press reports that many Americans are accidentally overdosing on the over-the-counter pain reliever acetaminophen, best known as Tylenol. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has released a warning for consumers to avoid dangerous or potentially lethal side effects. More than 600 products that treat pain, colds, flu and coughs contain acetaminophen.

Taking too much acetaminophen can also damage the liver beyond repair. According to the FDA, more than 56,000 emergency room visits and approximately 100 deaths a year are due to acetaminophen overdoses.
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Aspirin Use Linked to Pancreatic Cancer

Those using aspirin for daily aches, pains and headaches should consider alternative care. Regular aspirin use has been revealed to increase one's risk for pancreatic cancer. 31,000 Americans a year are diagnosed with it and almost every victim dies within 3 years (under medical care). A study of 88,000 nurses found that those who took 2 or more aspirins a week for 20 or more years had a 58% higher risk of pancreatic cancer. Taking 14 tablets or more per week had an 86% greater risk than non-users. Taking 6 to 13 tablets increased the risk 41% and taking 1-3 a week increased the risk 11%. (It had earlier been reported that regular aspirin use may cause pancreatitis, an inflammation of the pancreas that may precede pancreatic cancer.)⁵
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Microwaving Vegetables Removes Critical Nutrition

A test measured the levels of flavonoids (antioxidants) that remained in fresh broccoli after it was cooked by steaming, pressure cooking, boiling or microwaving. The results showed large differences: Conventional boiling led to a 66% loss of flavonoids compared to fresh raw broccoli while pressure cooking led to a 53% loss of flavenoids (the majority of it was found in the cooking water). But when broccoli was microwaved the loss of flavonoids was 97%! Steaming had minimal effects, in terms of loss of antioxidants; there was almost no difference in antioxidants between raw and steamed.⁶
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How to Get Copies of this Newsletter for Friends and Relatives

Stop by the office and we'll give you some hard copies or write to us and we'll add them to our mailing list. Please remember that everyone needs to be free from subluxations so bring your friends and loved ones for a spinal checkup.

Thanks for reading. Call me for an appointment today; your body will thank you for it!

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