Inflammation is like a fire in your body you cannot see or feel. “It’s a smoldering process that injures your tissues, joints, and blood vessels, and you often do not notice it until significant damage is done,” says Dr. Andrew Luster, of the Center for Immunology and Inflammatory Diseases at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital. The damage might show up as arthritis, heart disease, stroke, and even Alzheimer’s disease.
This is a staple in our house. To date, nobody in my family has a clue it’s made out of avocados, so don’t tell them!
We’ll bet that, like a lot of guys, you count yourself among the Fred Flintstones of the world: a carnivorous caveman who’d rather gnaw on a T-bone than spear lettuce leaves. Vegetarianism is foreign to you—unappealing and nonsensical for your muscle-building aspirations.
But guess what? You can build just as much lean muscle on plants. And you won’t starve either: Vegetarian staples like beans and peas are more filling than meat.
Most of the health problems plaguing our modern world have one thing in common: inflammation. Heart disease, autoimmune conditions, arthritis, diabetes, cancer, digestive problems, anxiety, depression, brain fog, and hormonal problems can all be traced back to the inflammatory response—in one way or another. And as a functional medicine doctor, I see the impact inflammation has on the health of people around the world every single day.
In the past, I’ve shared my favourite foods, elixirs, mind tricks, and science-based tools to balance out inflammation, and now I want to share with you another powerful tool to drive inflammation levels down. I personally use this tool on a weekly basis and have seen it work for countless patients. That tool is intermittent fasting (IF), and it has the health blogosphere all abuzz. Here’s what you need to know.
For every pound of excess weight, four pounds of extra pressure are put on the knees. Needless to say, overweight and obese people are at much higher risk of developing arthritis. In fact, an obese person has a 60 percent greater risk of getting arthritis than people who maintain a healthy body weight.
Obesity is a “rising pandemic” afflicting one in 10 people around the world, causing health problems and premature deaths, according to a new study.
Obesity rates have risen over the last three decades in the 195 countries examined by the sweeping study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine on Monday. In more than 70 countries, including the United States, obesity rates at least doubled from 1980 to 2015. The world’s population of 7.5 billion now includes more than 2 billion people who are overweight or obese, according to the study.
Although acupuncture is an ancient practice, its effectiveness has long been a subject of debate in the medical community. Questions about the benefits of acupuncture are now being put to rest, thanks to mounting evidence supporting its use.
A 2012 review of 29 clinical trials that included about 18,000 patients showed that acupuncture is indeed an effective treatment for at least several ailments: chronic back and neck pain, osteoarthritis, shoulder pain, and headaches, specifically.
Acupuncture has also been well-studied as a complementary cancer treatment – and the term complementary versus alternative is key here. “Right now, there’s really no alternative to mainstream cancer care,” explains medical oncologist and acupuncturist Ting Bao, MD, Director of Integrative Breast Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. “So, we try to do evidence-based complementary integrative medicine that goes together with mainstream cancer care.”
