June Newsletter 2014
Back in the days of black and white TV, I remember seeing a program about a doctor who couldn’t figure out what was wrong with an elderly woman. The doctor stated that he knew exactly what to do, and handed the woman a bottle with great reassurance that taking these pills three times a day until the bottle was empty would surely cure her. And it did! The doctor called them ‘sugar pills’ and that was my introduction to the concept of placebo effect.
Recently, a different kind of placebo effect was studied. A student at Colorado College noticed many students blaming their test results on whether or not they’d slept well the night before, and so she decided to study this. She brought the subjects into an exam room displaying complicated charts and drawings all around, and told them that with cutting edge technology, using biological markers, it could now be distinguished whether or not someone had experienced a restful sleep. The subjects were connected to an EEG machine that responded to their movements and then let them sleep. The researcher did not even consider whether the subjects actually slept well or not.
Participants were then told how much good sleep they had completed. After that, they were given cognitive tests to measure cognitive functioning. Results showed that the ones who were told that they didn’t get much quality sleep scored lower, while the people who were told that they had slept very well achieved higher than average marks. It occurred to me that perhaps this also is a test on the gullibility of a college student. J
The existence of the placebo effect has been recognized for a long time. Some of it has to do with perceived authority that convinces a person they ARE getting better. Any treatment that is ‘feigned’ but works is given the placebo label. Studies have shown that placebo can be effective from sixty and up to ninety percent of the time, giving even more credibility to the idea of the power of the mind to heal or prevent healing.
Another research study looked at the success of having a certain type of brain surgery. The entire group consisted of people suffering from a specific brain problem, who were then divided into two surgery-specific groups, and a control group. One received a new and advanced procedure. The other group received a simple procedure where only enough was cut to leave a scar at the base of the skull, so the patient would think they had actually had surgery. The control group received no treatment at all. In this case, the placebo/sham surgery actually had better results than the real surgery. However, it was discovered that the subjects of the sham surgery could not be told that information without it affecting their outcome. While previously reporting they were getting better, after being told they had only received the sham surgery, the subjects began to report that their symptoms came back.
When people have an unexplained reversal of their cancer it is called a spontaneous remission. Sometimes the cancer survivor tells an incredible story of how they achieved this. If the story is too unlikely, the doctor will tend not to believe it. Laetrile was such a healing nutrient. It is being called vitamin B-17, and is now becoming accepted for certain cancers. It is very discouraging when conventional medicine remains close-minded and refuses to continue to question and explore all the possibilities with an open and inquiring mind. Marijuana is now also being tested in the US as a treatment for brain tumors and other types of cancer. Recently I was told about a small baby with a brain tumor that was treated by putting a couple drops of marijuana oil on the pacifier that the baby sucked on. Brain scans showed the shrinking of the tumor over a period of a few months and they disappeared. This cannot be a placebo situation because you can’t convince a baby that they are getting well; they either are or are not. It’s just one example of medical research exploring new possibilities and/or discarding old ideas that really were not correct.
As more information is gathered and more discoveries are made, medical advice can change. For about twenty-five years now, MDs have been prescribing statin drugs increasing the dose until their patient’s blood tests show a lowering of LDL to a target level of 100 mg/dL or less, as this number was set as ‘the best standard’. It was insisted that by lowering LDL, the chances of plaque build-up in and hardening of the arteries would decrease, resulting in a lowered risk of heart attack. Higher cholesterol numbers were heavily frowned upon by MDs, resulting in the prescribing of increased dosages of statin drugs to achieve target levels. Chiropractors and alternative medicine practitioners have been trying to call this out as the health advice ‘fraud of the century’. As more research becomes available, the M.D. advice is now slowly changing. The American College of Cardiology (ACC), the American Heart Association (AHA), and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute have new recommendations that advise cardiologist to stop lowering LDL to target numbers of 100 mg/dL or less. Why? It is now agreed that there is simply no evidence to support LDL treatment to a specific target. No evidence. Currently, no recommendation at all is being made for specific LDL lowering. I see it as the beginning of the ’cholesterol scam’ breaking up. Previously, I wrote about three good studies that revealed that lowering the LDL had no effect on mortality from a heart attack. One study noticed some improvement in mortality rates for people taking statins after they had already had one heart attack. Researchers noted that the prescribed statin contained a bit of anti-inflammatory as an ingredient, and that this could explain the slightly lower mortality rates in this specific population group. A Tufts university study inferred that taking statin drugs increase a person’s risk to get diabetes by eighty percent. This same study linked LDL levels equal or below 70 mg/dL to an increased risk for blood cancers. LDL levels fluctuate easily when something else is wrong with the body in a way similar to fever signaling an infection. LDL cholesterol also fights infections like staphylococcus aureus. LDL is needed to build and maintain muscles. Artificially lowering these levels has many hazards. I look forward to the end of the cholesterol phobia and fraud. You can read more about these studies on our website activelifechiro.info. Go to newsletter archives and reference the June 2013 newsletter for odd cholesterol facts, and July 2013 to get more facts and more details on this research.
Increasingly, good nutrition is proving to be the smartest medicine. The heart needs CoQ10, an enzyme which chemically is a B vitamin. Statin drugs actually use up CoQ10, thus making the need even greater. Heart function is also aided by whole vitamin B-complex and fish oil. Standard Process makes a whole food product called Cardio-Plus for the heart, a circulation improvement product called Vasculin, and a micro circulation product called Cyruta-Plus. I had two patients who had been told they had heart murmurs and these products helped them.
With all this talk about placebos and new standards, it is easy to get overwhelmed about listening to any advice at all. One idea to take in is this: if the advice is about reducing symptoms, it will likely change, and if the advice is about getting to the root of the problem, and treating the cause before symptoms develop, then the advice is less likely to change.
Our next fundraiser will be held at the Woodland Park Farmer’s Market on Friday June 13th. We will be raising money for our Relay for Life team to benefit the American Cancer Society. If you are interested in joining our Relay team, please contact Kristin Valenti, team captain, at the office. Please note our summer dates and calendar changes. We will not be closing the clinic for vacation for “a whole week” off this summer. Instead, we’ll be taking two long weekend type vacations.
Recently, a different kind of placebo effect was studied. A student at Colorado College noticed many students blaming their test results on whether or not they’d slept well the night before, and so she decided to study this. She brought the subjects into an exam room displaying complicated charts and drawings all around, and told them that with cutting edge technology, using biological markers, it could now be distinguished whether or not someone had experienced a restful sleep. The subjects were connected to an EEG machine that responded to their movements and then let them sleep. The researcher did not even consider whether the subjects actually slept well or not.
Participants were then told how much good sleep they had completed. After that, they were given cognitive tests to measure cognitive functioning. Results showed that the ones who were told that they didn’t get much quality sleep scored lower, while the people who were told that they had slept very well achieved higher than average marks. It occurred to me that perhaps this also is a test on the gullibility of a college student. J
The existence of the placebo effect has been recognized for a long time. Some of it has to do with perceived authority that convinces a person they ARE getting better. Any treatment that is ‘feigned’ but works is given the placebo label. Studies have shown that placebo can be effective from sixty and up to ninety percent of the time, giving even more credibility to the idea of the power of the mind to heal or prevent healing.
Another research study looked at the success of having a certain type of brain surgery. The entire group consisted of people suffering from a specific brain problem, who were then divided into two surgery-specific groups, and a control group. One received a new and advanced procedure. The other group received a simple procedure where only enough was cut to leave a scar at the base of the skull, so the patient would think they had actually had surgery. The control group received no treatment at all. In this case, the placebo/sham surgery actually had better results than the real surgery. However, it was discovered that the subjects of the sham surgery could not be told that information without it affecting their outcome. While previously reporting they were getting better, after being told they had only received the sham surgery, the subjects began to report that their symptoms came back.
When people have an unexplained reversal of their cancer it is called a spontaneous remission. Sometimes the cancer survivor tells an incredible story of how they achieved this. If the story is too unlikely, the doctor will tend not to believe it. Laetrile was such a healing nutrient. It is being called vitamin B-17, and is now becoming accepted for certain cancers. It is very discouraging when conventional medicine remains close-minded and refuses to continue to question and explore all the possibilities with an open and inquiring mind. Marijuana is now also being tested in the US as a treatment for brain tumors and other types of cancer. Recently I was told about a small baby with a brain tumor that was treated by putting a couple drops of marijuana oil on the pacifier that the baby sucked on. Brain scans showed the shrinking of the tumor over a period of a few months and they disappeared. This cannot be a placebo situation because you can’t convince a baby that they are getting well; they either are or are not. It’s just one example of medical research exploring new possibilities and/or discarding old ideas that really were not correct.
As more information is gathered and more discoveries are made, medical advice can change. For about twenty-five years now, MDs have been prescribing statin drugs increasing the dose until their patient’s blood tests show a lowering of LDL to a target level of 100 mg/dL or less, as this number was set as ‘the best standard’. It was insisted that by lowering LDL, the chances of plaque build-up in and hardening of the arteries would decrease, resulting in a lowered risk of heart attack. Higher cholesterol numbers were heavily frowned upon by MDs, resulting in the prescribing of increased dosages of statin drugs to achieve target levels. Chiropractors and alternative medicine practitioners have been trying to call this out as the health advice ‘fraud of the century’. As more research becomes available, the M.D. advice is now slowly changing. The American College of Cardiology (ACC), the American Heart Association (AHA), and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute have new recommendations that advise cardiologist to stop lowering LDL to target numbers of 100 mg/dL or less. Why? It is now agreed that there is simply no evidence to support LDL treatment to a specific target. No evidence. Currently, no recommendation at all is being made for specific LDL lowering. I see it as the beginning of the ’cholesterol scam’ breaking up. Previously, I wrote about three good studies that revealed that lowering the LDL had no effect on mortality from a heart attack. One study noticed some improvement in mortality rates for people taking statins after they had already had one heart attack. Researchers noted that the prescribed statin contained a bit of anti-inflammatory as an ingredient, and that this could explain the slightly lower mortality rates in this specific population group. A Tufts university study inferred that taking statin drugs increase a person’s risk to get diabetes by eighty percent. This same study linked LDL levels equal or below 70 mg/dL to an increased risk for blood cancers. LDL levels fluctuate easily when something else is wrong with the body in a way similar to fever signaling an infection. LDL cholesterol also fights infections like staphylococcus aureus. LDL is needed to build and maintain muscles. Artificially lowering these levels has many hazards. I look forward to the end of the cholesterol phobia and fraud. You can read more about these studies on our website activelifechiro.info. Go to newsletter archives and reference the June 2013 newsletter for odd cholesterol facts, and July 2013 to get more facts and more details on this research.
Increasingly, good nutrition is proving to be the smartest medicine. The heart needs CoQ10, an enzyme which chemically is a B vitamin. Statin drugs actually use up CoQ10, thus making the need even greater. Heart function is also aided by whole vitamin B-complex and fish oil. Standard Process makes a whole food product called Cardio-Plus for the heart, a circulation improvement product called Vasculin, and a micro circulation product called Cyruta-Plus. I had two patients who had been told they had heart murmurs and these products helped them.
With all this talk about placebos and new standards, it is easy to get overwhelmed about listening to any advice at all. One idea to take in is this: if the advice is about reducing symptoms, it will likely change, and if the advice is about getting to the root of the problem, and treating the cause before symptoms develop, then the advice is less likely to change.
Our next fundraiser will be held at the Woodland Park Farmer’s Market on Friday June 13th. We will be raising money for our Relay for Life team to benefit the American Cancer Society. If you are interested in joining our Relay team, please contact Kristin Valenti, team captain, at the office. Please note our summer dates and calendar changes. We will not be closing the clinic for vacation for “a whole week” off this summer. Instead, we’ll be taking two long weekend type vacations.
