HealthBeat News

Category: Health Questions

  • Help – My Neurotransmitters Are Shot!

    Help – My Neurotransmitters Are Shot!

     

    What to do when your symptoms are telling you “something is wrong!”

     

    By Nurse Mark

     

    Regular readers know that we get plenty of questions here – and many of them are heart-wrenching because we can hear the pain of these people when we read their notes. Being unwell is no picnic and feeling mentally unwell is horrible!

    Here is a recent note from one such sufferer.

    Debbie’s email reads:

    Subject: Neurotransmitter = almost nonfunctional
    Message: What does one do, or where to go to restore transmitters. I
    read your symptoms, I have 20 out of the 35 listed.

     

    YIKES! – Poor Debbie – she must be feeling just miserable!

    I emailed her back with the following suggestions:

    Hi Debbie,

    You should start by reading our pages on Neurotransmitter Restoration at http://www.drmyattswellnessclub.com/NeuroRestoreHome.htm

    Please be sure to follow all the links on the left side – they will explain different aspects of neurotransmitter deficiency and imbalance and how to correct them.

    Please also consider having your neurotransmitters tested: http://www.drmyattswellnessclub.com/medicaltests.htm#NEUROFOCUS 

    This is a very comprehensive look at your neurotransmitters and will allow you to focus your restoration efforts instead of using guesswork based on symptoms.

    [Nurse Mark note: “Guesswork” is how most Big Pharma head-meds work – for example, in the case of Zoloft or Prozac or other SSRI drugs they are guessing that serotonin levels are low thus causing symptoms of depression. Unfortunately, serotonin is only one of dozens of neurotransmitter hormones and their intermediaries! “Pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey” is not a good way to practice medicine…]

    Your symptoms are telling you that something is wrong – but symptoms alone cannot tell you what is wrong or out-of-balance.

    The Neurofocus Profile is easily collected at home – you will simply collect and send a urine sample to the testing lab.

    You should also consider a Brief Telephone Consultation with Dr. Myatt: http://www.drmyattswellnessclub.com/BriefConsults.htm

    Dr. Myatt is not accepting “new” patients, but she does still find time to provide brief consultations – and a brief consultation is often enough to answer difficult questions, clear up confusion and get someone headed on the path to good health!

    Hope this helps!
    Cheers,
    Nurse Mark

     

    Postscript:

    I sure hope Debbie is OK – this exchange took place several weeks ago and that was the last we heard from Debbie.

    But that is not a surprise, really, for often when people discover that it is going to require them to make an effort beyond just asking for help, or that help will require them to pay out-of-pocket since our services are not covered by “insurance” we never hear from them again. Oh, well… I sure hope Debbie is getting some help from someone…

  • About Those Health "News" Articles I Read…

    About Those Health “News” Articles…

     

    Sometimes popular media news articles are more confusing than helpful!

     

    By Dr. Myatt

     

    When it comes to “News” articles found in the popular press, all is not always as it seems – many of these articles are written by well-meaning but otherwise ill-informed reporters who often have minimal knowledge of medicine, biochemistry, or even how to critically read a medical paper. This causes people no end of worry, as this exchange with “Jenny” demonstrates.

    Jenny wrote to ask:

    I am trying to stay away from large doses of E because I am afraid that E feeds blood vessels that might feed cancer tumors.  My friend’s oncologist told her to stop taking E for this reason.  A little E is ok for me, but is there any way that I can order CoQ10 without E on your website??

    I wrote back to Jenny:

    Hi Jenny:

    You can order Vitaline CoQ10 with or without E. Here is a link to the Vitaline page.

    I teach doctors in the field of holistic oncology and have never seen any credible evidence that vitamin E causes a problem or increases the spread of cancer. If you have any medical journal citation or other credible evidence besides “an oncologist said…,” I’d be most appreciative if you could forward it to me.

    A ketogenic diet is the single most powerful tool for controlling cancer. I have stage IV cancer patients alive and well WAY beyond what is usually expected, including several doctor patients, because of this diet.

    In Health,
    Dr. Myatt

    Jenny wrote back to take me up on my request for credible evidence against the use of vitamin E and to provide some further background information regarding her concerns:

    Hello:

    Congratulations on extending the life of very sick people.   I know that these patients and their families very much appreciate your talents beyond what they could ever express.

    The oncologist was associated with the Swedish Medical Center Cancer Institute here in Seattle.  My friend had nasal esphophgeal cancer.

    I have read other articles regarding breast cancer and lung cancer and vitamin E.  A very, very recent study was conducted at the University of Washington and concluded in Feb 2010.  Below are some of the articles I have seen….since estrogen receptor positive breast cancer runs on both sides of my family, I am nervous about encouraging any type of cancer, particularly that form.  I did read an article about how vitamin E PREVENTS estrogen receptor positive cancer…but then I see other articles about a correlation between high doses of vitamin E and cancer….so I am one confused woman…I don’t know whether to stop eating soy too for this very reason.  I much prefer it to killing animals just so I can eat.

    BTW, thank you so much for making the CoQ10 available and affordable.  After I started taking it, I noticed my cognitive abilities improving significantly.  I have significant visual snow and visual disturbances that never go away, and what my docs call “persistent migraine aura without headache”.  Brain fog and tinnitus are associated with the condition.  the CoQ10 got rid of the brain fog (but none of the other symptoms), and I want to take higher doses to see if it will help with my other symptoms, hence my request for CoQ10 without Vitamin E.

    Jenny included links to several articles which damned the use of vitamin E. Here is what I had to say about that:

    Hi Jenny:

    Thanks for your info. “Credible” being the keyword to watch for. Many lay publications (most, in fact), do a miserable job of reporting what the actual medical studies say. I don’t think journalists even do research these days!

    For example, the “VITAL” study quoted in the “vitamin E and lung cancer” article did not examine vitamin E AT ALL. The only mention of vitamin E in this study was to quote a previous study, the CARET study. The VITAL study looked only at beta carotene, lutein, lycopene and retinol. Unless my medical password is needed, here is the original article: http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/709053

    SO, the VITAL article reported in the “The Daily” is 100% phonus balonus (that’s Latin for phoney baloney ), but it’s a classic example of how the actual studies get twisted when they are reported in the lay news.

    The second study cited does not say that vitamin E increases risk of cancer; it says the study found “no effect” (no benefit), but also no hazard.

    The third citation isn’t a study, it’s comment on the first study (VITAL) which did NOT even look at vitamin E!

    This is a good example of how, if one wrong thing gets commented on the internet, the same wrong thing can then be repeated a thousand times. A falsehood is still a falsehood no matter how many times it is repeated. But when one doesn’t realize that the original report was false, the many additional comments can lend a false legitimacy.

    Numerous studies have found benefit in taking all antioxidants including vitamin E. Several studies that found a possible inverse effect used dl-tocopherol, an unnatural form of vitamin E that interferes with the body’s use of the 8 other forms of naturally-occurring vitamin E.

    It is difficult if not impossible for a layman to make sense of medical studies, especially when they are twisted all out of shape as reported in the media. No wonder my cancer patients, including a number of physicians, reply on my team and I to read the actual medical studies and make comment for them!

    Now, this is such a good example of how confused people can be over bad journalism that I should probably use our back-and-forth in an upcoming edition of HealthBeat News. It may very well save some other unsuspecting patient from making themselves crazy over trying to make sense of conflicting information!

    There is nothing in any of the articles you sent which should make you afraid of vitamin E. I’m not trying to convince you to take it, just hoping to help you understand how better to read and interpret medical studies.

    For best information, always try and read the actual original medical study, not the media’s reporting of it. Again, they usually do a shameful job when it comes to translating what the studies really found.

    For additional information about substances that have been well-proven to aid in cancer control, please visit our cancer page.

    I teach doctors in the field of oncology. If my work wasn’t well-researched and supported by the medical literature, rest assured they would eat me alive during a presentation!

    Once more with feeling: please remember that supplements are just that – supplemental in the treatment of cancer. A ketogenic diet should be the primary method of treatment and prevention, supplements are the adjunct. And if you don’t have cancer and are simply interested in prevention, that should be a slam-dunk. A diet low in carbs, or even ketogenic if you have weight to lose, is your best (and breast!) friend. I mention weight because fat cells manufacture estradiol, a known risk factor for many cancers, not just breast cancer. Maintain a normal weight if breast cancer prevention is your aim.

    In Health,
    Dr. Myatt

    P.S. Just got an email this evening from my patient with metastasized liver cancer. Her lab values (liver function tests, hs-CRP, ferritin) all continue to improve and are handily within the normal range, down from sky-high in Sept. Her Yale University doctors are pleased but still wondering what in the heck happened! One of our major treatment strategies for her is the use of metabolic ketosis to starve her cancer.

  • Neurotransmitters: Not So Simple…

    Neurotransmitters: Not So Simple…

    There’s a reason doctors go to school for so long!

     

    By Nurse Mark

     

    There’s a very good reason why people like Dr. Myatt have studied for years and continue to study every day – the human body is an incredibly complex and subtle organism.

    No one lay book, no matter how popular or compellingly written, and no amount of internet searching when done by someone without a very solid knowledge of biochemistry, organic chemistry, physics, normal anatomy and physiology, neurology, endocrinology, psychophysiology and pathophysiology is going to provide much more than confusion for most lay-people.

    Without such knowledge a “Ph.D from the University of google” is more of a hindrance than a help – for remember; just because it is written does not mean it is accurate or true, and just because some author uses seventy-five-cent words and pseudo-scientific terms liberally in his or her writing doesn’t mean that he or she really understands what they mean or is actually qualified to use them!

    Neurotransmitters are an excellent example of this complexity: Your gut and your brain are more intimately intertwined than you might imagine. 80% of a normal person’s serotonin is found in the gut, and any pathology that affects the gut can easily upset the delicate balances of serotonin in the gut, in the platelets of the blood (where it plays an important role in hemostasis and blood clotting), and in the serotonergic neurons of the nervous system.

    So, as you can see, even the most apparently simple question about neurotransmitters quickly becomes complicated – this one ties together three complex systems!

    Lori has been doing her very best to learn all she can about the neuroendocrine system as well as the digestive system – each no small feat by itself – and then to apply her new knowledge to herself and her maladies. She wrote recently to ask:

    When I take the 5-htp, I get very sleepy.  Great right before bed, but I bought it to raise my serotonin levels, and I cannot take it during the day. I am only taking less than 50 mg of the 5-htp. Should I take tryptophan instead? I need to raise my serotonin levels PLEASE HELP!!

    Dr. Myatt replied:

    Hi Lori,

    Congratulations! If L-5-HTP is making you sleepy, then this means it is working for you.

    HTP is the direct precursor to serotonin, endorphin, melatonin, nor-epinephrine and dopamine production.

    Click here to learn more about it’s effects: http://www.drmyattswellnessclub.com/l5htp.htm

    Tryptophan converts to L-5-HTP which converts to the above-listed hormones. This means that tryptophan would also make you sleepy.

    Continue to use your L-5-HTP but take it in the evening. That way, your “sleepy” effect will just help you
    get a better night’s sleep while you continue to enjoy the other neurotransmitter benefits!

    In Health,
    Dr. Myatt

  • Natural Cancer killer — 10,000 times stronger than Chemo

    A New Cure For Cancer?

     

    By Nurse Mark

     

    Hard on the heels of our most recent HealthBeat News article Dr. Myatt, Have You Heard About… a reader wrote to us about an email he had received that talked about a “Natural Cancer killer — 10,000 times stronger than Chemo” and went on to accuse: “Billion-dollar drug company hides astounding discovery of a natural cancer killer.”

    Our reader was rightly skeptical and wanted to know what the real story was in all this hoop-la.

    Graviola, also known as paw-paw – is the latest marketing poster-child for some very big internet marketers and these hyperbole-filled advertisements have been making the rounds – offering everything from the substance itself to “free reports” that just happen to tell you how to buy graviola. (Hint: you can buy it from the same outfit offering the “free report” of course…)

    Doesn’t this sound like a wonderful, even miraculous substance? After all, other websites (and advertising emails) claim that it not only “cures all cancers” but that it kills intestinal parasites, calms nerves, reduces blood pressure and helps arthritis, heart and liver and boosts the immune system. Wow – what great stuff!

    So what’s the truth?

    The truth, sorry to say, is that while graviola, or more correctly some very specific isolated compounds found in graviola may show some promise that could be realized with further research and work, it is not the cure-all that the marketers are so breathlessly touting it to be.

    I’ve said it before and I’m saying it again – THERE IS NO ONE-PILL MAGIC BULLET, natural or otherwise, that will allow you to ignore the basic principles of good health and still avoid or beat disease. Without a proper diet and good basic nutrition including a full compliment of vitamins, minerals and trace minerals, without proper rest, exercise, fresh air and clean water, you can take all the magical, miraculous herbs you like – you will be deluding yourself if you think that any one herb will make up for the lack of a solid health foundation.

    Why is it that the very people who are so rightly distrustful of Big Pharma’s one-pill drug solutions to disease are so quick to believe the advertising hype of a one-pill herbal solution to disease?

    For more information on the graviola story you may want to read a very interesting article written back in in 2003 by the highly respected medical writer Ralph W. Moss, PhD – it can be found here: A Friendly Skeptic Looks at Graviola

    Graviola may prove to be a useful part of a carefully considered natural supplementation plan – but it is NOT a one-herb cure-all.

    For more information about herbal treatments for cancer please see Dr. Myatt’s Medical White Paper Nutritional and Botanical Considerations in the Systemic Treatment of Cancer – it’s fully referenced, and free.

  • Dr. Myatt, Have You Heard About…

    Dr. Myatt, Have You Heard About… This Wonderful New Miracle Product…

     

    By Nurse Mark

     

    Not a day goes by here at The Wellness Club that we don’t receive one or more emails from well-meaning customers, readers, and even patients, asking us if we know about this or that or another “New, Miraculous, Advanced Formula” product that is making the rounds in the advertising world.

    Folks, I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – you will have to get up awfully early in the morning to find an herb, supplement, vitamin, drug, or other health product that Dr. Myatt is not familiar with – if it is out there, we know about it: maybe not by the particular brand name that has found it’s way into your inbox, but we certainly know of it in it’s basic form.

    You see, there is not much that is truly new under the sun – the laws of physics and of biochemistry are well-known and pretty much unchanging.

    Have we heard about:

    Coral Calcium? Sure we know about it – and whether it is from Okinawa, Brazil, or Timbuktu, if it is real “coral calcium” it comes from the destruction of beautiful, irreplaceable, slow-growing coral reefs and often results in the death of live coral. We have a better idea: Cal Mag Amino – and Dr. Myatt has been recommending it with great success for years.

    Miracle Mineral Supplement? Oh, you mean chlorine dioxide? Concentrated industrial bleach? The stuff that the inventor touts as a cure-all and has actually come up with a “religion” and “church” to protect? We’ve not only heard of it, we’ve researched it and written about it before in Another “Miracle” Product – Is It Real? A Scam? Both? and we’ve taken plenty of flak from the religious devotees of this stuff. I’m sure this mention will generate yet another barrage of angry emails from the true believers. MMS seems to do a pretty good job of killing malaria, but the scientific evidence to support the claims that it “cures 95% of all diseases” is sadly lacking. If you have malaria give it a try – since little else works. Otherwise, be very careful with this stuff, it could be harmful if misused.

    OPC-3, the latest miracle allergy cure? Uh,that would be oligomeric proanthocyanidins – a type of flavonoid – that is extracted from grape seed extract, red wine extract, and pine bark extract bioflavonoids. No need to get the stuff from your local Multi-Level Marketing salesperson; Dr. Myatt has several formulations that she has been using with good satisfaction for some time. Check out Maxi Flavone.

    HCG injections for weight loss? Yeah, we’ve heard all about them and the success stories that go along with the HCG weight loss program. Here’s the “skinny” on this one: any diet that restricts intake to 600 calories per day is going to result in some pretty dramatic weight loss – no matter what else you do. Believers say that the HCG injections help to curb appetite – and that may well be: I know that getting poked regularly and paying the rather exorbitant cost for the injections would tend to ruin my appetite – after all, for that much money, failure is not an option…

    Resveratrol? Yup, we’re familiar with it – Dr. Myatt has been recommending Grape Seed Extract (surprise!) for years. Will it help you lose “up to 20 pounds in a month”? Nope- unless you are following one of those 600 calorie-a-day diets…

    Human Growth Hormone? Yes, it looks like HGH does a whole bunch of wonderful things. It is also very, very tightly controlled by the DEA – your doctor had better not be prescribing it for anything other than a very limited number of fairly rare diseases or he could find himself enjoying an extended stay at Club Fed. The nasal spray version and all the other O.T.C. and buy-it-online versions? Save your money – if they actually do contain HGH they are ineffective. HGH is not absorbed at all orally, and there is no evidence that it is absorbed any other way except parenterally – that is, by injection. If someone visits your gym offering to inject you with HGH run as fast as you can in the opposite direction! Not only is it illegal (and you might be being “set up”) there is a very good chance that it’s NOT HGH! Do you really want to find out what it is? I thought not!

    Acai berry: Now here’s a good one – use this berry and lose weight, restore health, cure cancer, lower your choleserol (or blood pressure, or both) and achieve spiritual enlightenment! Uh, folks, the stuff might be tasty, and it contains some antioxidants (though nowhere near as much as Dr. Myatt’s Maxi Flavone), but in most cases it is little more than a sugar-filled juice drink – certainly no miracle cure for anything!

    How about hoodia – the stuff that keeps mysterious African tribesmen slim and fit and never hungry? Yeah, right: they are slim and fit because they are active and limit their food intake. Never hungry? Don’t you believe it!

    Or Hyaluronic Acid – traditionally used by cosmetic surgeons for filling defects, smoothing wrinkles, and plumping lips (think of the oversized lips often seen on Hollywood starlets!) this substance is now being offered as a supplement and claimed to be the next miracle cure for joint problems of all sorts. Since it is a natural substance (your body makes plenty of it all by itself) it is unlikely to be harmful. Whether it will cure joint problems is another matter – the new “miracle” formulations all seem to contain a cornucopia of additional herbs and supplements, presumably with the hope that if they throw enough “stuff” at the problem, something in the mix will actually provide relief. Most of these formulas contain so many different substances (it is well-known in the supplement industry that people like and will tend to buy the supplements with the “most stuff” on the label) that they end up containing nothing useful – what we call “pixie dust doses.” For joint health, try Glucosamine Sulfate. Just be sure to get the good stuff – the pharmaceutical grade,  patented, fully-reacted molecule by the Canadian firm GlucosaPure®. It has been working for Dr. Myatt’s patients for years.

    Then there is “Liquid Oxygen” – promising everything from better health to an “oxygen high”. A more careful look finds that it is basically sodium chloride – can you say “table salt”? I’ll get my oxygen the old-fashioned way, thanks – take a deep breath…

    Don’t forget the various versions of “alkaline” and “ionized” water that are produced by remarkably expensive appliances, often sold through multi-level marketing schemes. We’ve seen the “amazing” science-fair / trade-show demonstrations, and we’ve actually tested several versions of these machines in our own home. Yes, they do produce varying degrees of either acidic or alkaline water through electrolytic action. Would we want to drink any of it on an ongoing basis? Certainly not! Folks, the normal pH range of human blood is 7.35-7.45. Anything above is alkalosis. Anything below is acidosis. Your body works very hard to maintain this very narrow range of pH since values outside that range are what we in the medical biz call “incompatible with life.” It is not practically possible to alter your body pH by drinking funny water or eating magic foods – your body works too hard to resist those changes, What you can do very effectively with these altered waters is cause digestive problems as your digestive system struggles to maintain it’s preferred pH…

    Eskimo oil, Arctic oil, krill oil, etc.: Can you say “fish oil”? Be sure to get the good stuff – molecularly (cold process) distilled and free of heavy metal contamination… Try Dr. Myatt’s Maxi Marine for a good product at a good value.

    Salba: claimed to be a miracle food of the gods (I wonder which gods?) by it’s marketers – we’ve written about it beforein We Got ‘Spanked’ Over Salba? and essentially, if you don’t mind paying a bunch more for something that gives you the same benefits of flax and but be sprinkled on your salad as a garnish, well, it’s your money… We’ll stick with good ol’ flax seed.

    The list of “miracles” goes on and on – usually presented with breathless hyperbole telling us how the “miracle” is newly discovered / long lost / known only to the ancients / suppressed by (or soon to be suppressed by) Big Pharma or the FDA or Black Helicopters / or so new that there hasn’t been time for more than the one study which was conveniently done either by a scientist/researcher/doctor who has somehow disappeared (probably afraid of the Black Helicopters) or funded by the company marketing the supplement.

    For many companies your health is all about marketing. There is one major vitamin company (which shall remain nameless) that produces a very slick, professional, glossy magazine every month, and in it every month there is always at least one, often several, “cutting edge breakthrough” products – newly discovered, and offered exclusively by the company that produces the magazine. Are we really to believe that there are that many new and novel supplements and formulations each month? It’s all about sales – and for a large segment of the American population, “new” sells well whether it is really new or just wrapped up in a shiny new label and hyped and promoted.

    Marketing is all about having a product to sell that is “new” and that nobody else has for sale – yet.

    Here at The Wellness Club we are not opposed to new – we just insist on seeing proof for all the wild and wonderful claims. If the proof is there, if it shows that a product or formulation will benefit our patients and customers, we will adopt it and tell you about it promptly.

    But without proof? We’ll wait and see – there are plenty of tried and true remedies, supplements, and formulations. There’s no need to be a guinea-pig for something that is more about marketing and making money than about your good health.

    If you want to read about those tried and true remedies and about the proven breakthroughs, there is plenty of scientifically verified information available to you free for the looking – just visit www.DrMyattsWellnessClub.com for the “real goods.”