the-psoriasis-treatment

George Hamilton admits that he has been addicted to sunbathing for much of his life. The photo below (from: phoenix.fanster.com), shows him at the age of about 70. In spite of possibly too much sun exposure, he looks young for his age, in remarkably good health, and free from skin cancer. How come? Maybe his secret is vitamin D. Vitamin D is a fat-soluble pro-hormone; not actually a vitamin, technically speaking. That is, it is a substance that is a precursor to hormones, which are known as calcipherol hormones (calcidiol and calcitriols). The hormones synthesized by the human body from vitamin D have a number of functions. One of these functions is the regulation of calcium in the bloodstream via the parathyroid glands. The biological design of humans suggests that we are meant to obtain most of our vitamin D from sunlight exposure. Vitamin D is produced from cholesterol as the skin is exposed to sunlight. This is one of the many reasons (see here  for more) why cholesterol is very im

Some types of cancer have traditionally been higher among the Inuit than in other populations, at least according to data from the 1950s, when a certain degree of westernization had already occurred. The incidence of the following types of cancer among the Inuit has been particularly high: nasopharynx, salivary gland, and oesophageal. The high incidence of these “traditional” types of cancer among the Inuit is hypothesized to have a strong genetic basis. Nevertheless some also believe these cancers to be associated with practices that were arguably not common among the ancestral Inuit, such as preservation of fish and meat with salt. Genetic markers in the present Inuit population show a shared Asian heritage, which is consistent with the higher incidence of similar types of cancer among Asians, particularly those consuming large amounts of salt-preserved foods. (The Inuit are believed to originate from East Asia, having crossed the Bering Strait about 5,000 years ago.) The incidence o

The coconut is often presented as a healthy food choice, which it is, as long as you are not allergic to it. Coconut meat has a lot of saturated fat, which is very good for the vast majority of us. (I posted about this issue elsewhere on this blog: my own experience and research suggest that saturated fat is very healthy for most people as long as it is NOT consumed together with refined carbs and sugars from industrialized food products.) Coconut water is a good source of essential minerals, particularly magnesium and potassium. So is coconut meat, which is rich in iron, copper, manganese, and selenium. Coconut meat is also an good source of folate and an excellent source of dietary fiber. If you are buying coconuts at a supermarket, I suggest choosing coconuts that have a lot of water in them. They seem to be the ones that taste the best. Just pick a coconut up and shake it. If it feels heavy and full of water, that’s the one. First you need to make some holes on the coconut shell to

Mercury Mercury’s recent presence in the body can be assessed with blood and urine samples because the initial half-life of blood mercury elimination is 3 days. The half-life of elimination for whole body mercury is between 60 and 90 days. Generally, the levels of mercury are below 10 mcg per liter in urine and below 40 mcg per liter in blood. Hair analysis can be useful as an estimate of long-term exposure to mercury. To diagnose acute mercury toxicity, symptoms of respiratory distress are evaluated along with lab evaluation with a complete blood count and differential, serum electrolytes, glucose, liver and renal function tests, and urinalysis. Chest readiography and serial ABG measurements should be used for patients with severe inhalation exposure. Reference: http://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/MHMI/mmg46.html Lead Blood lead levels can assess recent exposure to lead. It’s the primary screening method for lead exposure. It can also be measured with erythrocyte protoporphoryn, but this test is

It has been argued that the diets of our Paleolithic ancestors had on average a much higher potassium-to-sodium ratio than modern diets (see, e.g., Cordain, 2002). This much lower modern ratio is believed by some to be the cause of a number of health problems, including: high blood pressure, stroke, heart disease, memory decline, osteoporosis, asthma, ulcers, stomach cancer, kidney stones, and cataracts. But, is this really the case? The potassium-to-sodium ratio in ancient and modern times According to some estimates, our Paleolithic ancestors’ daily consumption was on average about 11,000 mg of potassium and about 700 mg of sodium (salt). That yields a potassium-to-sodium ratio of about 16. Today’s ratio in industrialized countries is estimated to be around 0.6. Just for the sake of illustration, let us compare a healthy Paleolithic diet food, walnuts, with a modern industrialized food that many believe to be quite healthy, whole-wheat bread. The table below (click on it to enlarge)

Different parts of a fish have different types of nutrients that are important for our health; this includes bones and organs. Therefore it makes sense to consume the fish whole, not just filets made from it. This is easier to do with small than big fish. Small fish have the added advantage that they have very low concentrations of metals, compared to large fish. The reason for this is that small fish are usually low in the food chain, typically feeding mostly on plankton, especially algae. Large carnivorous fish tend to accumulate metals in their body, and their consumption over time may lead to the accumulation of toxic levels of metals in our bodies. One of my favorite types of small fish is the sardine. The photo below is of a dish of sardines and vegetables that I prepared recently. Another small fish favorite is the smelt (see this post ). I buy wild-caught sardines regularly at the supermarket. Sardines are very affordable, and typically available throughout the year. In fact, s

Hair used for nutritional status of a mineral can be flawed because of exogenous contamination--from water, dust, cosmetics, shampoos, etc--and because of endogenous, nonnutritional factors such as hair growth rate, color, sex, pregnancy and age. However, I do find it quite interesting that hair analysis could indicate a history of nutrition. Historical measurements would be otherwise difficult to get, but hair grows lsowly and so hair can reflect levels of zinc and other elements over time. Plus, it's an easy test since hair is easy to get. Better non-invasive indicators of zinc deficiency are Bryce-Smith taste and sweat analysis. Loss of taste is one of the first symptoms of a deficiency because zinc is needed for an enzyme, gustin, present in saliva that modulates sense of taste. And sweat analysis may be even more sensitive as an index than blood biomarkers.

Grandma My grandma, 79, scored a 6 on the NSI Determine Checklist, which puts her at “high nutritional risk.” Her eating habits are affected by GERD and she tries to avoid any processed foods high in sodium because of hypertension. She also eats alone most of the time and eats fewer than two meals per day. Although she dislikes eating fruits and vegetables, she does manage to obtain some of them in her diet. She drinks plenty of milk and uses dairy products liberally. She doesn’t drink alcohol, has enough money for food she needs (although she said she could use more), and only takes one prescription medication. She has not gained or lost 10 pounds without wanting to in the last six months. She shops and cooks for herself and reports that she also picks at food throughout the day. Me I, 31, scored a 0 on the NSI Determine Checklist. I have no conditions that affect my diet, I eat balanced meals along with vegetables, fruits and milk products, and don’t drink more than one glass of wine

Charles Darwin, perhaps one of the greatest scholars of all time, thought about his theory of mutation, inheritance, and selection of biological traits for more than 20 years, and finally published it as a book in 1859.  At that time, many animal breeders must have said something like this: “So what? We knew this already.” In fact George Washington, who died in 1799 (many years before Darwin ’s famous book came out), had tried his hand at what today would be called “genetic engineering.” He produced at least a few notable breeds of domestic animals through selective breeding. Those include a breed of giant mules – the “Mammoth Jackstock” breed. Those mules are so big and strong that they were used to pull large boats filled with coal along artificial canals in Pennsylvania . Washington learned the basic principles of animal breeding from others, who learned it from others, and so on. Animal breeding has a long tradition. So, not only did animal breeders, like George Washington, had kn

Acknowledgement: In addition to the references provided at the end of several posts, I would like to acknowledge that I also regularly consult with the most interesting man in the world, especially in connection with complex scientific matters. (YouTube link below, if you must know the identity of this incredibly modest and low-key person.) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVwG1t-NVAA No need to refer to him as The Most Interesting Man in the World (i.e., capitalized), because, as he notes: "There is only one most interesting man in the world."

Often in discussions about Paleolithic nutrition, and books on the subject, we see speculations about how long it would take for a population to adapt to a particular type of food. Many speculations are way off mark; some think that even 10,000 years are not enough for evolution to take place. This post addresses the question: How long does it take for a food-related trait to evolve? We need a bit a Genetics 101 first, discussed below. For more details see, e.g., Hartl & Clark, 2007; and one of my favorites: Maynard Smith, 1998. Full references are provided at the end of this post. New gene-induced traits, including traits that affect nutrition, appear in populations through a deceptively simple process. A new genetic mutation appears in the population, usually in one single individual, and one of two things happens: (a) the genetic mutation disappears from the population; or (b) the genetic mutation spreads in the population. Evolution is a term that is generally used to refer to

As I blog about health issues, and talk with people about them, I often notice that there is a growing contempt for the medical profession. This comes in part from the fact that many MDs are still providing advice based on the mainstream assumption that saturated fat is the enemy. Much recent (and even some old) research suggests that among the main real enemies of good health are: chronic stress, refined carbs, refined sugars, industrial trans-fats, and an omega-6/omega-3 imbalance caused by consumption of industrial vegetable oils rich in omega-6 fats. Because of this disconnect, some people stop seeing their doctors regularly; others avoid doctors completely. Many rely exclusively on Internet advice, from health-related blogs (like this) and other sources. In my opinion, this is a BIG mistake. A good MD has something that no blogger who is not an MD (like me) can have. He or she has direct access to a much larger group of people, and to confidential information that can clarify thin

The fundamental principle of the paleo diet movement is that we should model our diet on the diet of our ancestors. In other words, for optimal health, our diet should be as close to the diet of our ancestors as possible. Following this principle generally makes sense, but there are a number of problems with trying to follow it too strictly. Some of those problems will have to wait for other posts. Examples are: our limited knowledge about what our ancestors really ate (some say: lean meat; others say: fatty meat); the fact that evolution can happen fast under certain circumstances (a few thousand years, not millions of years, thus recent and divergent adaptations are a possibility); the fact that among our ancestors some, like Homo erectus , were big meat eaters, but others, like Australopithecus afarensis , were vegetarians … Just to name a few problems. The focus of this post is on traits that evolved in spite of being survival handicaps. These counterintuitive traits are often call

The traditional Inuit diet is very high in animal protein and fat. It also includes plant matter. Typically it is made up primarily of the following: fish, walrus, seal, whale, berries, and fireweed (of which syrups and jellies can be made). Kjærgaard and colleagues (see under References, at the end of this post) examined data from an Inuit population in Greenland from 1962 to 1964, prior to the heavy westernization of their diet that is seen today. They investigated 96.9% of the whole population in three areas, including Ammassalik in East Greenland (n = 1,851). Of those, only 181 adults, or 9.7 percent, had anything that looked like an abnormality that could suggest ischemia. This included ventricular hypertrophy (an enlargement of the heart chambers), leading to an overestimation because benign ventricular hypertrophy is induced by continuous physical exertion. These 181 adults were then selected for further screening. Benign ventricular hypertrophy is also known as athlete's he

Environmental toxins, or xenobiotics, are foreign chemicals that enter our bodies and can potentially cause harm to our organs, tissues and cells. There are more than 60,000 known everyday chemicals that we are exposed to of which at least 200 are found in newborns at moment of birth. The most prevalent pollutants nowadays are phthalates and plasticizers, of which have been determined to be endocrine disruptors, and have been linked to thyroid diseases and various health conditions such as insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, obesity, osteoporosis and arteriosclerosis. Other toxins are implicated in depleting folic acid leading to digestive disorders such as colitis or are known carcinogens. Organic acids, of which are compounds used in metabolism, can be measured to assess how the body responds to toxins in the body or to evaluate nutrients related to processes of detoxification. For example, methylation is a vital step in the facilitation of converting homocysteine to methionine a

The original inhabitants of the Ryūkyū Islands, of which the island of Okinawa is the largest, are believed to have the highest life expectancy in the world. One of the staples of their diet is sweet potatoes. The carbohydrate percentage of a sweet potato is about 20; that is, each 100 g of sweet potato mass has about 20 g of carbohydrates. Sweet potatoes have a medium-high glycemic index, and are often avoided by those with impaired insulin sensitivity, and certainly by diabetics. The other main staple of their diet is pork, as you may have inferred from the title of this post. The quote below is from the first of the three links provided below the quote. Pork appears so frequently in the Okinawan diet that to say "meat" is really to say "pork." [...] It is no exaggeration to say that the present-day Okinawan diet begins and ends with pork.          http://www.wonder-okinawa.jp/026/e/pork.html          http://www.okinawaindex.com/index/?tid=2&cid=250&id=2

This is an issue that often comes up in online health discussions, and was the topic of a conversation I had the other day with a friend about some of the benefits of intermittent fasting . Can the benefits of intermittent fasting be achieved without muscle loss? The answer is “yes”, to the best of my knowledge. Even if you are not interested in bulking up or becoming a bodybuilder, you probably want to keep the muscle tissue you have. As a norm, muscle takes a long time, and effort, to build. It is generally easier to lose muscle than it is to gain it. Fat, on the other hand, can be gained very easily. Body fat percentage is positively correlated with measures of inflammation markers and the occurrence of various health problems. Since muscle tissue makes up lean body mass, which excludes fat, it is by definition negatively correlated with inflammation markers and health problems. As muscle mass increases, so does health; as long as the increase in muscle mass is “natural” – i.e., not

Since different parts of a fish have different types of nutrients that are important for our health, it makes sense to consume the fish whole. This is easier to do with small than big fish. One of my favorite types of small fish is the smelt; the photo below shows a batch of smelts that I prepared using the recipe below. Another small fish favorite is the sardine. Small fish are usually low in the food chain, and thus have very low concentrations of metals that can be toxic to humans. Many people dislike the taste of smelts, but will eat them if they are well seasoned and their texture is somewhat hard. Here is a recipe that will get you that. - Steam cook the smelts for 30 minutes to 1 hour (less time = harder texture). - Spread the steam cooked smelts on a sheet pan covered with aluminum foil; use light olive oil to prevent the fish from sticking to the foil. - Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. - Season the steam cooked smelts to taste; I suggest using salt, chili powder, garli

Despite whether or not megaloblastic anemia is caused by a deficiency of folate or vitamin B12 (cobalamin), large doses of folate will correct the anemia (1). Because this is the case, the extra folate can potentially "mask" symptoms of vitamin B12 deficiency such as from pernicious anemia. Unfortunately, an undiagnosed chronic vitamin B12 deficiency can lead to irreversible neuropathy. The cobalamin in methyl derivative form is necessary to methylate homocysteine to methionine (2). It's also necessary to convert methylmalonyl CoA to succinyl coA. In the absence of B12, then, leads to accumulation of both methylmalonic acid and homocysteine levels (2). As they accumulate, they lead to possible neuropathy via irreversible demyelination of nerves (3). The mechanism by which this occurs is thought to be related to methylmalonyl CoA acting as an inhibitor of malonyl CoA's role in biosynthesis of fatty acids, which leads to myelin sheath degeneration (3). However, because

I would like to comment on a recent article co-authored by Dr. Loren Cordain, and published in the journal Current Treatment Options in Cardiovascular Medicine, in 2009. Dr. Cordain is probably the leading expert today on the diet of our Stone Age ancestors. The importance of this article comes from the fact that in the past Dr. Cordain has argued that our Stone Age ancestors have not consumed large amounts of saturated fat, because of the relatively low percentage of fat in the flesh of wild animals. This led, according to Dr. Cordain, to an evolved body design that is not well adapted to the consumption of significant amounts of saturated fat. Yet, many other researchers have argued that saturated fats are beneficial to our health, with ample empirical evidence to back up their statements. The researchers at the Weston A. Price Foundation have been particularly prominent voices in favor of saturate fats. Now, this acknowledgement that saturated fats (or saturated fatty acids) are n

A recent post  on the Primal Wisdom blog led me to do go back to some of the research on an approach to dieting that I tried myself, with some positive results. The approach is known as intermittent fasting (IF). I also found an excellent blog post by Dr. Michael Eades on IF (see  here ). Typically IF involves fasting every other day. On the non-fasting days, food and water consumption is not restricted in any way. On fasting days, only water is consumed. Variations of this approach usually involve replacing water with juice, and having an eating window of only a few hours within longer periods – e.g., fasting 19 hours and then eating during a window of 5 hours, for each period of 24 hours. IF is different from calorie restriction (CR), in that in the latter total daily calorie intake is restricted to a somewhat fixed amount, below one’s basal metabolic rate (the number of calories needed to maintain one’s current weight). In CR the calorie restriction is not normally achieved through