Dr Beecher’s February 24 Weekly Chiropractic Newsletter

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WEEKLY HEALTH NEWS UPDATE

Week of Monday, February 24th, 2014

Mental Attitude: Meditation Benefits. According to an analysis of 47 clinical trials involving over 3,500 patients, meditation offers benefits to people with depression, anxiety, and pain similar to antidepressant medications. The researchers behind the study also note that meditation does not have the potential negative side-effects of antidepressant drugs. JAMA Internal Medicine, January 2014

 

Health Alert: Hygiene and Diabetes? Researchers at the University of Helsinki Children’s Hospital believe the rise in auto-immune diseases, like type 1 diabetes and allergies, may be linked to a corresponding rise in hygiene standards. The so-called “hygiene hypothesis” suggests that less bacterial exposure during childhood may hinder the development of a child’s immune system. The researchers point out that Finland has the highest incidence of type 1 diabetes in the world but neighboring countries with lower hygiene stands have much lower reports of the auto-immune disease.

University of Helsinki Children’s Hospital, January 2014

 

Diet: Avocado Please. According to a new study, participants who ate half of a fresh avocado with lunch were 40% less hungry three hours later and 28% less hungry five hours later. Most of the fat content in avocados is monounsaturated fat and studies have shown that regularly consuming this type of fat can reduce levels of bad cholesterol in the blood, as well as reduce the risk of stroke and heart disease. Nutrition Journal, January 2014

 

Exercise: A Quick Walk? Walking at a moderate  pace for 180 minutes over the course of a week (30 minutes a day for five days or 60 minutes a day for three days) has been demonstrated to significantly improve mild to moderate depression. Harvard Medical School, November 2005

 

Chiropractic: Dare to Compare. Patients with chronic (>13 weeks) spinal pain were placed into one of three types of care: acupuncture, medication, or spinal manipulation. After 30 days of treatment, only the manipulation group showed significant reduction in pain intensity and improvements across all outcome measurements.

Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics, July 1999

 

Wellness/Prevention: Watch What You Eat! A study involving 224 adolescent females found that the increased consumption of dietary fat was significantly linked to an increase in abdominal fat, regardless of total calorie intake or physical fitness. The accumulation of abdominal fat is harmful as it increases the risk of suffering from cardiovascular problems, diabetes mellitus, arterial high blood pressure, high cholesterol level, etc. According to lead researcher Dr. Idoia Labayen, “Until now it was thought that even with an unbalanced diet, you somehow compensated for it if you got plenty of physical exercise. In this study we have shown that this is not the case.” Clinical Nutrition, January 2014

 

Quote: “Before you can think outside the box, you have to be smart enough to know that there is a box.”

~ A. Farthingsworth

 

This Weekly Health News Update is compliments of Dr. Ward Beecher and Beecher Chiropractic Clinic. If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at 281-286-1300 or BeecherChiropractic.com .

 

Dr Beecher’s February 17 Weekly Chiropractic Newsletter

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WEEKLY HEALTH NEWS UPDATE

Week of Monday, February 17th, 2014

Mental Attitude: Green Spaces? Researchers have discovered that moving to greener areas can improve a person’s mental health over the long-term. During a 5-year study, people who moved into greener areas experienced an immediate improvement in mental health that persisted for at least three years. Those who moved to a more built-up area with less green space experienced a decline in their mental health. The authors of the study suggest creating more green spaces in towns and cities (parks and gardens) could bring lasting benefits to public health.

Environmental Science & Technology, January 2014

 

Health Alert: Excessive Alcohol Consumption. Nearly forty million American adults drink too much alcohol, although most are not considered alcoholics. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, high weekly use is considered 15 or more drinks for men and eight or more drinks on average for women. Excessive alcohol consumption causes premature death (79,000 deaths annually in the United States alone) and costs the economy $224 billion a year. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, January 2014

 

Diet: High-Protein Diet Linked to Kidney Problems! A Spanish study found that rats fed a long-term, high-protein diet (57% of total calories from protein) had a higher risk for developing kidney stones and other renal diseases than rats fed a lower protein diet (13% of total calories from protein). The authors of the study stress that even though these results are derived from rat subjects, their findings should translate to humans and anyone on a high-protein diet should be closely monitored for kidney-related issues. Nutricion Hospitalaria, January-February 2013

 

Exercise: Decreased Risk for Heart Attack Later in Life. A Swedish study involving over 740,000 males found that lack of aerobic fitness at age 18 corresponds to a greater risk for a heart attack later in life. According to lead researcher Dr. Peter Nordström, “As far as we know, this is the first study to investigate the links between an objective measure of physical fitness in teenagers and risk of heart attack in the general population. Further studies are needed to investigate the clinical relevance of these findings, but given the strong association that we have found, the low cost and easy

accessibility of cardiovascular training, and the role of heart disease as a major cause of illness and death worldwide, these results are important with respect to public health.” European Heart Journal, January 2014

 

Chiropractic: Car Wrecks and Disk Injuries. A disk injury can cause chronic neck pain following a car accident. If the outer wall of the disk (the annulus) is torn and does not properly heal, stress on the nerve endings in the annulus may cause neck pain during normal activities. North American Spine Society, January 2014

 

Wellness/Prevention: Un-Happy Employees are More Likely to Smoke. According to the Gallup research, employees who are emotionally disconnected from their jobs are 20% more likely to smoke than employees who are either neutral or excited about their work. Previous research has shown that disengaged employees are more likely to suffer from stress, obesity, and chronic health problems. Gallup, August 2013

 

Quote: “We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us.”

~ Joseph Campbell

 

This Weekly Health News Update is compliments of Dr. Ward Beecher and Beecher Chiropractic Clinic. If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at 281-286-1300 or BeecherChiropractic.com .

 

Dr Beecher’s February 10 Weekly Chiropractic Newsletter

To download Dr. Beecher’s Weekly Newsletter, please click here!

WEEKLY HEALTH NEWS UPDATE

Week of Monday, February 10th, 2014

Mental Attitude: Depression’s Influence on Severe Rheumatoid Arthritis Sufferers! Based on data provided by 322 patients with severe rheumatoid arthritis, researchers have identified that a patient’s psychological state can affect self- reported measurements about how their body responds to different treatments and therapies. The researchers recommend rheumatologists be aware of their patient’s mental state when assessing the efficacy of their treatment plan.

Arthritis Care & Research, December 2013

 

Health Alert: Smoking is a $289 Million Dollar a Year Burden! During the last half-century, 20 million Americans have died as a consequence of smoking and 16 million more continue to suffer from smoking-related conditions. The combined healthcare expenses and lost economic productivity that results from smoking-related illnesses costs the United States (US) about $289,000,000 each year. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one in every thirteen children alive in the US right now will die prematurely from smoking-related diseases unless current smoking rates drop! Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, January 2014

 

Diet: Diet Soda Not Helpful for Dieters! A new study conducted by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health finds that drinking diet soda may not help dieters lose weight. Using data from the long-term National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, researchers discovered that, even though people who drink diet sodas are drinking fewer calories, they tend to consume just as many or more total calories than people who drink sugary beverages. According to lead author Dr. Sarah Bleich, “The results of our study suggest that overweight and obese adults looking to lose or maintain their weight–who have already made the switch from sugary to diet beverages–may need to look carefully at other components of their solid-food diet, particularly sweet snacks, to potentially identify areas for modification.” American Journal of Public Health, January 2014

 

Exercise: How to Keep that New Year’s Resolution. Recording goals in a fitness diary, reflecting on successes and failures, and being held accountable by others are key strategies that have been found to maximize the achievement of all goals, including New Year’s resolutions. Loughborough University, January 2014

 

Chiropractic: The Cause of Post Car Accident Neck Pain. After a car accident, the cause of neck pain may be unknown. Muscles and ligaments can become strained and even inflamed, but they usually heal within six to ten weeks. Pain that lasts longer is usually due to injury to the disk, facet joint, or both. Facet joint pain is the most common cause of chronic neck pain after an accident. Facet joint pain may occur alone or along with disk pain and may sometimes be mistaken for muscle pain. North American Spine Society, January 2014

 

Wellness/Prevention: Breastfeeding and Rheumatoid Arthritis? A study of 7,000 older Chinese women showed that those who breast fed their children had a 50% reduced risk for rheumatoid arthritis later in life.

Rheumatology, January 2014

 

Quote: “The desire to reach for the stars is ambitious. The desire to reach hearts is wise.” ~ Maya Angelou

 

This Weekly Health News Update is compliments of Dr. Ward Beecher and Beecher Chiropractic Clinic. If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at 281-286-1300 or BeecherChiropractic.com .

 

Dr Beecher’s February 3 Weekly Chiropractic Newsletter

To download Dr. Beecher’s Weekly Newsletter, please click here!

WEEKLY HEALTH NEWS UPDATE

Week of Monday, February 3rd, 2014

Mental Attitude: Be Positive! Young people with positive attitudes such as self-belief, aspiration, flexibility, and an appetite to learn were associated with less hyperactivity, fewer emotional problems, fewer problems with fellow pupils, greater inclination to help others, were happier, and slept better. Think Forward, January 2014

 

Health Alert: Alarming Rate of Overweight and Obese in Developing Countries. In the last three decades, the amount of overweight and obese people in developing countries has skyrocketed from 250 million to almost one billion people. In comparison, richer nations have seen a rise from 200 million to 600 million overweight and obese people over the same period of time. Dr. Steve Wiggin explains, “On current trends, globally, we will see a huge increase in the number of people suffering certain types of cancer, diabetes, strokes and heart attacks, putting an enormous burden on public healthcare systems.” Overseas Development Institute, January 2014

 

Diet: Vitamin E. A study involving 140 elderly men and women found that those with higher levels of vitamin E in their bodies were less likely to suffer from cognitive decline. Foods rich in vitamin E include spinach, almonds, sunflower seeds, avocados, shrimp, rainbow trout, olive oil, broccoli, and pumpkin. Experimental Gerontology, January 2014

 

Exercise: As Effective as Medications. Doctors from the Stanford University School of Medicine reviewed the results of

305 studies involving over 300,000 patients and have determined that exercise may be as effective as medication in preventing early death in people who’ve had heart attacks or strokes. Furthermore, regular exercise lowers the risk of early death, helps one stay lean, and reduces the risk of heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes, depression, some cancers, and cognitive decline. Despite this information, only 21% of American adults meet the government’s recommendations for exercise: 150 minutes per week of moderately intense aerobic activity and muscle strengthening activities two days a

week that work all the major muscle groups. British Medical Journal, January 2014

 

Chiropractic: Can Neck Pain Affect Brain Activity? Transcranial magnetic stimulation measurements taken on chronic neck pain patients both before and after spinal manipulation showed that manipulation improved cerebellar motor processing in their brains. The cerebellum is the part of the brain that plays an important role in fine-tuning the body’s movements. Journal of Manipulative and Physiological Therapeutics, October 2013

 

Wellness/Prevention: Decreasing Cancer Risk. Over an 8-year study period, postmenopausal women who closely followed the American Cancer Society’s Nutrition and Physical Activity Cancer Prevention Guidelines had a 17% lower cancer risk, a 20% lower risk of cancer-related death, and a 27% lower risk of death from all causes. According to lead author Dr. Cynthia Thomson, “The message is simple and clear: If you want to reduce your risk for cancer, even later in life, eat a healthy diet, be active daily, avoid or limit alcohol, and don’t smoke.”

US National Institutes of Health, January 2014

 

Quote: “Practice does not make perfect. Perfect practice makes perfect!” ~ Vince Lombardi

 

This Weekly Health News Update is compliments of Dr. Ward Beecher and Beecher Chiropractic Clinic. If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at 281-286-1300 or BeecherChiropractic.com .

 

Dr Beecher’s February 2014 Monthly Chiropractic Newsletter

To download Dr. Beecher’s Monthly Newsletter, please click here!

“When we do the best we can, we never know what miracle is

wrought in our life, or in the life of another.” ~ Helen Keller

 

New Study:

Is Exercise the

Best Medicine?

 

New research shows exercise can be just as effective as many frequently prescribed drugs for treating some major causes of death, including heart disease and diabetes!

 

Also this month:

  • Fight the Common Cold… with Your Stomach! The health benefits of probiotics and how research shows they can reduce your child’s risk for the common cold.
  • Scientists Discover a New Body Part! That’s right… After all these years, scientists have actually discovered a new body part, and knowledge of its existence may help doctors treat some knee injuries.
  • The Tale of Two Homeless Men: Faced with one of the most difficult decisions of his life, this homeless man made the right choice and turned his whole life around…

Houston – It’s pretty sad, but in today’s society, it is common to boast and brag.  It is also common to make things seem much better or worse than they really are.

We see marketers do it every day through the advertising they bombard us with.  Who hasn’t bought something after watching a TV commercial only to find out it wasn’t half as good as claimed?

Well, what you’re about to read is different and without any hype, it could change both your health and your future.

With rising insurance costs in the United States and other countries, this information may also save you a lot of money and time.

Here’s what this is all about:  Healthcare professionals want to give their patients the best possible treatments but how does a doctor know which treatment is best?

Scientific research is used to determine which treatments work, which treatments do not work, and which treatments do more harm than good.

Countless medications have been scientifically tested over the years, and new drugs are often compared with older pharmaceuticals to prove their efficacy.  However, very few studies actually directly compare drugs with exercise to treat common health conditions and diseases.

Until Now…

Huseyin Naci, a graduate student at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and Dr. John Ioannidis, the Director of the Stanford Prevention Research Center at the Stanford University School of Medicine, studied the effectiveness of both drugs and exercise in lessening mortality among people who had been diagnosed with either heart disease, chronic heart failure, stroke, or diabetes.

The two researchers gathered all of the recent randomized controlled trials, reviews, and meta-analyses of older experiments relating to mortality among patients with those illnesses, and whether the study participants had been treated with drugs or exercise.

In total, they studied information from 305 studies, which included a total of 340,000 participants.  Most of these past studies focused on pharmaceuticals.  Only 14,716 of the subjects were prescribed exercise to treat their disease.

The results of their study were published in the October 2013 issue of the British Medical Journal.             Their conclusion:  “No statistically detectable differences were evident between exercise and drug interventions in the secondary prevention of coronary heart disease and pre-diabetes.  Physical activity interventions were more effective than drug treatment among patients with stroke.  Diuretics were more effective than exercise in heart failure…

            “Although limited in quantity, existing randomized trial evidence on exercise interventions suggests that exercise and many drug interventions are often potentially similar in terms of their mortality benefits in the secondary prevention of coronary heart disease, rehabilitation after stroke, treatment of heart failure, and prevention of diabetes.”

WOW!

According to this study, both drugs and exercise are more or less just as effective as treatments for those common and life-threatening diseases.

But here is what the study did NOT mention…  Exercise is cheaper and does not come with dangerous side-effects!

What Does This Mean for You?

Clearly, health care is changing.  With the restructuring of insurance in many countries and an aging population, it must change.  Expensive treatments will be cut if cheaper and just as (or more) effective therapies are found.  (Or, at least they should be.)

Clearly, insurance coverage is not what it used to be.  Many times, patients have to pay huge sums of money out-of-pocket, even if they are insured by private or government insurance plans.  Who wants to pay all that money if it can be avoided?

But even more important is doing what’s best for YOU.  If exercise can help keep you healthy so you do not end up with heart disease, diabetes, etc., then it makes sense to add it to your lifestyle. Imagine what combining exercise, eating right, stress reduction, and chiropractic care can do for your long-term health.

Science Discovers New Body Part!

You read that correctly.  In fact, science has discovered a new ligament in the knee, and its discovery is a pretty fascinating story.

One hundred and thirty-four years ago, French surgeon Paul Segond couldn’t explain the painful resistance in his knee after an injury.  This led him to theorize about the existence of an undiscovered ligament.

Now, Belgian doctors have actually found it.  The ligament is called the anterolateral ligament (ALL) and was found in all but one of the 41 cadavers they dissected to prove its existence.

According to The Star: “The discovery was shocking: all but one of the dissected bodies had the ‘well-defined ligamentous structure’ between the femur and the anterolateral tibia, or shin that was described by the French scientist.  The finding led the doctors to conclude that most humans, about 97 percent, have the little lost ligament.”

Here is something very important: “The doctors also announced patients with ACL tears were likely suffering knee collapses because of ALL injuries.”

This may explain why many people (including athletes) have the diagnosis of a torn ACL but do not have instability or collapse of the knee.  There are reports of athletes playing professional sports for years with a torn ACL.

This opens the door for new treatments and ways to approach knee injuries, especially for people with a torn ACL and knee instability.

What is amazing is how long it took scientists to discover a ligament they estimate is in 97% of people.

Can you imagine what will be discovered next?

 

            Don’t forget, if you ever have any questions or concerns about your health, talk to us. Contact us with your questions. We’re here to help and don’t enjoy anything more than participating in providing you natural pain relief.

Inspirational Story Of The Month

(Names And Details May Have Been Changed To Protect Privacy)

 

 

The Tale Of

Two Homeless Men

Faced with one of the most difficult decisions of his life, this homeless man

made the right choice and turned his whole life around…

 

Imagine there are two homeless men begging for change on a street corner.  A young man stops and makes them an incredible offer.

The young man offers them each two choices:  You can have $100 in cash right now or no money and two months of coding lessons.  (Coding is a term computer programmers use in regards to writing software programs.)

Now, imagine one homeless man takes the $100 and the other decides to learn to code. What happened to both men?  The hypothetical homeless man with a $100 bill would likely spend it and still be on the streets. As for the other man, the one who took the coding lessons, we don’t have to speculate his future because we actually know it.

You see, a 23-year old computer programmer by the name of Patrick McConlogue made this exact offer to a 37-year old homeless man named Leo Grand. Leo chose the programming lessons.

So, McConlogue started by spending one hour a day with Grand before work.  After their morning session, McConlogue would go to work and Grand would practice what he learned on a Google Chromebook McConlogue gave him.

Grand would practice his daily lesson until the battery in his Chromebook died.  (He found places to charge it overnight while he slept on public benches.)

At the end of the two months, Grand had learned a lot, but both men decided they wanted to do more.  That’s when McConlogue’s boss, John Katzman, stepped in.

Katzman allowed McConlogue to teach Grand full-time at the New York office of his company “Noodle.”  After five more weeks of full-time work, Grand had completed and released his first app.  An App… or application… is a type of software program that allows you to perform specific tasks.  Applications for desktop or laptop computers are sometimes called desktop applications, and those for mobile devices are called mobile apps.

Grand is currently researching for his next app and is looking for a full-time job as a computer programmer.

Even better, McConlogue has started a mentorship program for programmers.  So far, 150 programmers have signed up to teach someone to code for one hour a day for two months.  McConlogue is still figuring out how to run his new mentorship, but the impact he could have on so many lives is incredible.

It’s amazing what a little delayed gratification can do.  Grand decided to pass up on the quick and easy $100 now for the possibility to create a wonderful life in the future.

Not only that, you just never know how far one small act of kindness can reach.  It would have been much easier for McConlogue to just walk right by Grand or to throw him some spare change.  Instead, he took a chance.              He opened his heart and gave Grand the opportunity of a lifetime, an opportunity that meant a lot of dedication and work for both men.

Altruism is rare, but it is clearly not dead.

 

We love helping our patients and their friends and relatives through their tough times and

getting them feeling better!  We are here to help you stay feeling better and looking younger!

Don’t be a stranger.  You really can afford Chiropractic care! Don’t wait until you can no longer move!


Did You Know?…

Good News About Cherries! 

Did you know that eating cherries could lower inflammation in the body drastically enough to alleviate arthritis symptoms? In at least one study, powdered cherry consumption actually led to a change in the functioning of inflammation-regulating genes in mice.

Like all dark-skinned fruits, cherries are high in antioxidants and other phytochemicals that promote human health in ways that science is only just beginning to understand.

While sweet cherries may be more fun to eat, the most potent inflammation-fighting cherries are the tart variety.  In addition to fighting inflammation and arthritis, cherries have also been found to fight gout, reduce body fat, and lower levels of cholesterol.  Think it can’t get any better?  At least some tart cherries contain high enough levels of the hormone melatonin that they can actually help you fall asleep.

 

Tip Of The Month

Fight the Common Cold… with Your Stomach!

No one wants to get sick.  In fact, I bet you never want to get the common cold or the flu ever again in your life.  While that would be nice, it is impossible.  But, new research has shown a way children may get the common cold less often, and shorten the time they have it when they do.  This is extremely important because the common cold is responsible for the largest amount of school and work absenteeism and causes a huge economic burden.

A double-blind randomized controlled trial was performed during the winter season in Thailand.  Children ages 8-13 were given either a two-strain combination probiotic or placebo twice a day for three months.

According to the study,  “Children in the probiotics group had significantly lower risk of fever, cough, rhinorrhea, school absence, and school absence related to common cold compared to children in the placebo group.  There was no impact on diarrhea and vomiting.”

What are Probiotics?

Probiotics are microorganisms that offer some form of health benefit to their host organism and they can be found in various different foods.  Probiotics are believed to play very important roles in regulating proper intestinal function and digestion by balancing intestinal microflora.  Probiotics are normally consumed in fermented foods with active live cultures, such as yogurt, though they are also available in supplement form as capsules, liquid, and chewables.  There are many different strains of probiotics, but the most common strains available today are Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium.

 

Remember, we’re always here to help your body heal

and maintain the pain free body you deserve.

 

This information is solely advisory, and should not be substituted for medical or chiropractic advice.  Any and all health care concerns, decisions, and actions must be done through the advice and counsel of a healthcare professional who is familiar with your updated medical history. We cannot be held responsible for actions you may take without a thorough exam or appropriate referral. If you have any further concerns or questions, please let us know at 281-286-1300.