Posted on March 5, 2008
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Your Personality and Your Disease Resistance
Researchers have recently been looking into why some people succumb to different chronic illnesses while others retain their good health. There has been a lot of discussion about the possibilities of a type of personality that is, in a very real way, “disease resistant”.
So how is this possible? Researchers have found that the way a person deals with stress greatly affects their ability to deal with illness and, as a result, they can successfully ward off severe chronic illness. It is thought that just by changing the outlook on everyday stressors – such as having a sense of humor about backing the car out of the garage with the door open – can improve a person’s overall wellbeing. This also applies to people who already have chronic illnesses: there is a better survival rate among patients with positive attitudes than in patients with depression.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Meditating On Meditation
Meditation is the practice of concentrating one’s thoughts and awareness on a specific thought. This concentration may not seem like something that could in any way affect a person’s health, but in fact studies and thorough research has shown that in fact meditation can help improve a person’s health.
The most interesting physical benefit of meditation is improved cardiovascular health. There are many theories about why meditation helps the cardiovascular system, but one of the dominant theories is that the calming effect of meditation not only relaxes the mind, but it also relaxes the entire body. Over time, regular meditation can help a person’s heart to be healthier. Since heart disease is prevalent in both men and women, meditation is helpful for everyone. Of course, meditation also helps a myriad of other ailments by the same relaxation method.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Meditating On Science Fiction
For science fiction fans, mediation is nothing new. While the actual, real-life practice of meditation varies greatly from practitioner to practitioner, it is not at all like the forms of meditation portrayed in the movies and on TV. Generally, movies and TV programs show meditation as a way for the practitioner to accomplish something other than personal wellbeing.
In many science fiction movies characters will use mediation as a way to focus their energies against their foes. Some science fiction films show protagonists recharging their mental or physical abilities with meditation, while others use these meditative practices for things like telepathy. Still there are instances of semi-real meditation practices. For example, in the television show Stargate SG1, some species use meditation to obtain access to a higher level of existence, much like real life practicing Buddhists do.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Meditating On Alternative Therapy
The list of alternative therapies that are not readily or legitimately recognized by the medical community is long. Most members of traditional medical organizations like the American Medical Association would never recommend treatments like herbal therapy, homeopathy, or acupuncture to their patients. But what is surprising is that in recent years more and more traditional medical practitioners have pushed their patients to practice meditation.
Meditation is recommended to a very wide variety of patients suffering from any number of symptoms and illnesses. For example, patients with chronic pain from severe illnesses like cancer or arthritis often will practice meditation to alter the brain’s perception of pain. Patients with emotional disorders, like Generalized Anxiety Disorder, are often prescribed meditation as a way to calm the mind during severe anxiety attacks. Other benefits of meditation are heightened self-awareness and observation as well as relaxation and concentration.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Let the Sunshine in
The number of diagnosed and treated cases of depression and seasonal affective disorder has grown over the last few years. This has, of course, brought about the development of new treatments for all types of depression. One of the newer alternative depression treatments is light therapy. The use of “light boxes”, which provide 10,000 lux of artificial light, not only has been proven to help persons with Seasonal Affective Disorder, but recently they have been shown to help all types of depression.
Though these light boxes do not cause any skin damage the way other types of light therapies – like ultraviolet light therapies – do, there has still been research into other types of light therapy for depression. The use of blue light to treat depression is just as effective as the use of light boxes for younger patients; however, it is not effective in older patients.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Light Therapy as an Acne Treatment
For those with severe acne problems, there are limited treatments. Some dermatologists prescribe certain acne drugs or acne facial soaps or other external treatments. But many dermatologists have taken to using blue light or red light therapies to treat acne.
Besides these two types of light, sunlight is the best acne treatment; but the UVA and UVB rays in sunlight are extremely damaging to the skin, especially during prolonged exposure. Since artificial UV didn’t work as well as real sunlight, blue and red visible rays were found to be effective and safer. These two lights actually have the ability to destroy the bacteria that cause acne in the skin. The prescribed therapy is generally 3 days of exposure; this can get rid of almost all (99.9%) of the bacteria in the skin. The only real precaution dermatologists need to take with this treatment is appropriate eye protection.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Theories on Light Therapy Safety
Light therapy uses ultraviolet and other types of light to treat a wide range of illnesses and medical and emotional problems. Almost anything from skin problems to emotional distress and depression can be at least helped by light therapy. But as with most medical and alternative therapies, there are some disadvantages to light therapy.
It is widely known and acknowledged by the medical community that ultraviolet light is damaging to the skin. It breaks down vitamins A and C in the skin, and can damage the skin’s collagen. Some genetic damage has also been seen with extended exposure to UV. Blue light is also used in some light therapy; unfortunately, blue light can cause breaks in cellular DNA. While the cells can usually repair themselves, research has shown that cancer can easily develop in damaged cells like those injured by blue light exposure.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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An Alternative to Traditional Health Care
In the last few years, there has been an abundant interest in alternative medical therapies and treatments for all sorts of physical and emotional ailments. The burgeoning interest can probably be attributed to the rising costs of traditional medical care and pharmaceuticals normally used to treat these illnesses.
Many people also have another, related problem: they don’t have health insurance. The lack of health insurance can affect a person’s ability to get proper medical treatment for chronic problems. Using alternative medical treatments can not only be cheaper than traditional treatments, but many people feel that these alternative treatments are just as effective, if not more so. For those who do not have medical insurance, alternative treatments may be the only option they have for symptom relief or for a cure for their problems. Also, since mental health isn’t generally covered by insurance, alternative therapies are sometimes the only viable option.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Should We Be Skeptical of Iridology?
It is believed that the human iris cannot change during the course of a person’s life. The iris forms when the person is still in the uterus, and though there can be some color changes within the iris during the first year of a person’s life, this is generally the only natural change that occurs. Some glaucoma patients get iris variations after treatment, but there are no other changes to the iris, despite illness. This, of course, brings about the question what is the iridologist looking at if a person’s eye never changes?
Iridologists and proponents of iridology generally feel that the problems a person has, particularly illnesses, can be determines by whatever variations are visible in the iris. They do not necessarily look for changes in the iris. However, it can also be argued that if the iridologist is not looking for changes, he is not able to diagnose any illnesses at all.
Posted on March 5, 2008
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Why Has Iridology Not Been Approved In the US?
Many proponents of alternative therapy wonder at why some of the available therapies, treatments, and diagnostic practices have not been approved by the United States government for established medical use. While the reasons for the lack of approval vary according to the alternative therapy method in question, in the case of Iridology it is simply a matter of a complete lack of scientific evidence of the efficacy of the method.
There have been several scientific studies of Iridology performed by researchers and the results of each of these studies have been almost identical. The general conclusion is that the effectiveness of iridology as a diagnostic tool is no better than chance. In other words, it is statistically just as likely for a person to guess at a patient’s illness as it is for a trained Iridologist to assess the illness correctly. Because there is no conclusive evidence to prove that Iridology works, the United States government has not approved it as a legitimate diagnostic tool.
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