Nutrition

January - 2007

Lipitor� for my mother?

No, I�m not whining or complaining. I�m using this as an example of how uninformed (I�ll refrain from saying stupid) medical doctors give people useless and dangerous advice. I�m speaking to my mother the other day. She says she avoids all drugs except one � her MD put her on Lipitor� to keep her cholesterol low. �I�m sure you wouldn�t approve,� she adds. No, I don�t approve. First of all Lipitor� and all those other cholesterol-lowering drugs do not save lives. Let me repeat it, they do not save lives. They do in fact interfere with CoQ10 metabolism and can cause sudden heart failure.

But it gets worse. High cholesterol is protective in older people. That�s right, studies have shown that those 65 and over with high cholesterol actually live longer. (Brescianini S, Maggi S, Farchi G et al. for the ILSA Group. Low total cholesterol and increased risk of dying: Are low levels clinical warning signs in the elderly? Results from the Italian Longitudinal Study on Aging. J Am Geriatr Soc. 2003;51:991-996.) A recent paper put it this way: �Low cholesterol level is a robust predictor of mortality in the nondemented elderly and may be a surrogate of frailty or subclinical disease.� (Schupf N. et al. Relationship between plasma lipids and all-cause mortality in nondemented elderly. J Am Geriatr Soc. 2005;53(2):219-226.)

My mother is 81; what scientific research shows it�s safe and beneficial to give Lipitor� to her? None, zip, zippo. Low cholesterol is the last thing she needs. The research that was done was probably performed on lower life forms such as 3rd year medical students and doesn�t relate to the needs of regular people. In fact, almost no drug research does.

For example, if Lipitor� was studied on 50-year-old white men, how does that relate to my mother? How does it relate to a 50-year-old black man or woman or an Asian or a Hispanic? What if it were done on 81-year-old black men? Does that give us information on what it will do to others? Answer � no, it won�t.

Most drugs are poorly researched on test groups that have no relation to the individual sitting across from the doctor�s desk. That�s because controlled clinical trials do not work � they don�t relate to you or me or our mothers or fathers.

Did my mother listen to me? What do you think? Family - don�t get me started.

Written by a son, who is also a physician.

Killed by fairies

For most of human history roads, towns and villages became different worlds after sundown. In that dark world strange, dangerous creatures arose. As professor Roger Ekirch writes in Smithsonian magazine:

For our ancestors, night meant fear of demons, witches and nighthags. An incubus or succubus might waft into your bed... 'in one English parish, Lamplugh, out of 52 premature deaths from 1650 to 1663, four people were "frighted to death by fairies," seven were "bewitched," and one was "led into a horse pond by a will of the wisp."' (1)

�What nonsense,� we say. And yet, don�t those creatures have their counterparts today? How many are dragged off by that dreaded beast, the osteosarcoma? Killed by its insatiable relative, the astrocytoma? Or ruined by the cruel schizophrenia? Today�s monsters may have scientific sounding names yet they are as mysterious as a "will of the wisp" or a �nighthag.�

That fear continues as people walk into their well-lit doctor�s office with the same dread the dark streets and forests forebode in the past. �Will he find a mysterious creature growing inside of me?� �Is something terrible slowly descending upon me?�

These creatures often strike us unawares just as the night hag of yesteryear. By the time cancer, stroke or a sudden heart attack strikes us down the �victim� has been deteriorating for many years under regular medical care. The time to deal with these dangers is before they become serious. That�s why chiropractors, nutritionists, homeopaths, naturopaths, acupuncturists and other natural healers are becoming so popular. The scary things arising from within us can often be prevented by correcting the imbalances in our physiology in the early stages � rather than waiting for The Big One to drag us away in the night. [Wolkomir R and Wolkomir J. When bandogs howle & spirits walk. Smithsonian. 2001;3(10):39-44.]

And it�s even worse, if they do have a good medical explanation�

�An estimated 12% of primary care patients report persistent physical symptoms for which no good medical explanation can be found.� [Lamberg L. New mind/body tactics target medically unexplained physical symptoms and fears. JAMA. 2005;294(17):2152.]

The $1.6 Trillion Question

The $1.6 Trillion Question: If We're Spending So Much on Healthcare, Why So Little Improvement in Quality? Carolyn Clancy, MD Medscape General Medicine. 2006;8(2):58.

Even though the US spends more on healthcare than any other country, we have shorter longevity, worse public health statistics, and worse healthcare inflation than most developed nations. Hope or Hype by Richard A. Deyo MD, MPH and Donald L. Patrick, PhD, MSPH

The answer: We�re not spending $1.6 trillion on healthcare � we�re spending it on disease care. The allopathic medical approach is an almost total failure in making people well and preventing illness, and is the most dangerous form of healthcare that has ever existed. It�s getting worse, with more people being hospitalized and dying from medical care than ever before. But perhaps just as bad is the medical/pharmaceutical practice of turning people into lifetime consumers of their products. They are told to keep taking drugs the rest of their lives � they never get better, and in fact suffer from years of drug-taking.

Chiropractic, homeopathy, naturopathy, nutrition, Chinese medicine, Ayurvedic medicine and other Empirical, wholistic approaches are far more effective and much, much safer than the allopathic approach (and more scientific too!).

I hope this newsletter has been helpful to you and your love ones. Please, feel free to forward this newsletter on to anyone you feel possibly may benefit from learning about health issues. As always, more health information is always available at "My Patients Web Site" www.drtindall.org

Humor

The pharmacist said, "Why in the world do you need cyanide?"

The lady then explained she needed it to poison her husband.

The pharmacist's eyes got big and he said, "Lord, have mercy -- I can't give you cyanide to kill your husband! That's against the law! I'll lose my license, they'll throw both of us in jail and all kinds of bad things will happen!

Absolutely not, you can NOT have any cyanide!"

The lady reached into her purse and pulled out a picture of her husband in bed with the pharmacist's wife.

The pharmacist looked at the picture and replied, "Well, now. You didn't tell me you had a prescription."

Have a great day and I will see you next month.

Doc T

Music by Eric Nicklas - Casseopia