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June 2002 Vol. 7 No. 6

 “It is better to wear out than to rust out”
Richard Cumberland-Philosopher

“The only way to live is to accept each minute as an unrepeatable miracle, which is exactly what it is-a miracle and unrepeatable.”
Margaret Storm Jameson Writer

Table of Contents for June:Book Reviews
High Fat Diet May Contribute To Breast Cancer Risk
Cancer Deaths Increasing
High U.S. Costs for Treating Attention Disorder
Alternatives to Antidepressant Use for Children
Major Study Shows Fish Oil Fat in Infants Increases Adult Intelligence
Vegan Diet Improves Rheumatoid Arthritis and Fibromyalgia
An Orange a Day …
New College Course On Vegetarian Nutrition Begins On Web 21 August
Doctors Release Tips For Healthy, Hearty Summer Barbecue

Book Reviews: 

The Ab Revolution: Dr. Jolie Bookspan. “How to use your abs all the time for real life”  No more crunches, no more back pain. Pub: Neck and Back Pain for Sports Medicine, 2002 e-mail: scientist@erols.com ISBN: 0-9721214-0-4
This book will provoke you to re-think the way nearly everyone has been told how we should train our abdominal muscles and core.  A must read for the fitness professional, athlete, and the general suffering public.
The False Fat Diet: Elson M. Haas, MD “Identify the foods that make you retain water and look falsely fat. Eliminate allergy-like “food reactions’ that cause real weight gain”. Ballantine Pub. Group 2001 www.randomhouse.com/BB  ISBN 0-345-44315-2

A must read for anyone dealing with clients regarding weight problems, and a mired of health care problems.  Could be one of the defining moment books that you read in your lifetime.  

High Fat Diet May Contribute To Breast Cancer Risk  

The results of a new study indicate that a high fat diet probably plays a supporting role in the development of breast cancer.  The study findings are the latest round in a scientific debate about the link between breast cancer and dietary fat.
UK researcher Dr. Richard A. Wiseman, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, examined “all relevant epidemiological and biological evidence” pertaining to the development of breast cancer, in an effort to pinpoint a single cause responsible for the majority of cases.
Although estrogen is a promoter of breast cancer, according to the data, it is not the main cause of the disease, and it appears that the diet plays an even greater role then previously thought.
Dietary factors and especially saturated fat consumption are associated with breast cancer, and dietary fat intake may cause depletion of an essential agent that is normally protective against breast cancer.
A deficiency of this yet-to-be discovered agent, either by inadequate intake or depletion via a high-fat diet, combined with age and estrogen, permits breast cancer to develop at significantly greater rates compared with women in countries that have a diet low in saturated fat. [Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health 2000; 54:851-858.] http://www.afpafitness.com/search/search.html

Type in Cancer Battle Plan, Cancer and Foods

www.afpafitness.com/newsletters/MayNews99.htm
www.afpafitness.com/newsletters/MarNews99.htm

Cancer Deaths Increasing  

The One Simple Thing You Can Do to Dramatically Lower Your Risk
http://www.mercola.com/2002/may/29/cancer.htm

High U.S. Costs for Treating Attention Disorder 

The costs of treating attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in US children is similar to the price tag for fighting childhood asthma — and far higher than national average healthcare costs for kid.
The findings indicate that ADHD and asthma “deserve similar emphasis” as public health concerns. Researchers used data from a 1996 national survey to estimate the annual healthcare costs of children and teens with ADHD, those with asthma and those in the general population with neither condition.
They found that on average, the cost of healthcare for a child with ADHD was $479 higher than for kids in the general population. The findings were similar for children with asthma, whose healthcare costs were $437 higher than average.
The bulk of the cost for treating ADHD was in doctor visits, prescription drugs and out-of-pocket expenses. The potential economic burden of ADHD is enormous.
Based on the survey’s estimate of the prevalence of childhood ADHD (3.5%), the researchers put the yearly healthcare cost of the disorder at $1 billion.

Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine May 2002;156:504-511

http://www.mercola.com/2002/may/29/adhd.htm

Alternatives to Antidepressant Use for Children 

Antidepressants like Prozac have increased over 20 fold since the 1980s. What are practical and inexpensive options.  Prescriptions for antidepressant medications for children and teenagers rose substantially during the 1990s.
Even though more and more children and teens are being treated with antidepressants, the evidence supporting the use of the newest class of antidepressants in children younger than 15 is “meager. More research is needed to examine the safety and effectiveness of these medications in children.
The researchers grouped antidepressants into three classes: selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), which include Prozac; an older class of drugs called tricyclic antidepressants; and “other antidepressants.”
From 1988, the year Prozac was introduced, to 1994, prescriptions for antidepressants increased three- to five-fold. Prescriptions for all three types of medications rose, but the rise was greatest for SSRIs, which increased 19-fold.

Although SSRI prescriptions, which were usually prescribed to treat depression, rose dramatically during the early 1990s, in 1994, more than half of all antidepressant prescriptions were for tricyclic antidepressants. And this class of drugs was most often prescribed for attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), not depression.
Although tricyclic antidepressants are recommended as a secondary treatment for ADHD, clinical studies do not support the use of these drugs in youths with depression.
Another potential problem is that previous research has shown that many children on SSRIs also receive stimulant medications, which are often used to treat ADHD. The effectiveness and safety of this combination in children is unknown.

The expanded utilization of antidepressants for the management of behavioral and emotional disorders of youth in the 1990s was prominent. More research is needed to strengthen the evidence that the medications are appropriate for children and teens.
Given that a large proportion of children and youths are having their emotional and behavioral problems treated by primary care physicians rather than psychiatrists, future research to evaluate the antidepressant prescriptions among the young must consider the effects of both types of care.
Pediatrics May 2002;109:721-727
http://www.mercola.com/2002/may/25/child_antidepressants.htm

Major Study Shows Fish Oil Fat in Infants Increases Adult Intelligence 

Breast fed infants have higher levels of fat that appear to radically improve the intelligence level in those who receive them.  Infants who are breast-fed for up to 9 months may out-smart their peers as adults.

The findings support a growing body of research linking breast-feeding with intellectual development in early and middle childhood, but are the first to show an association between breast-feeding and adult intelligence.
It is not clear why breast-fed infants may log higher IQs as adults, but the researchers speculate that breast milk contains beneficial nutrients not found in formula or cow’s milk. Breast milk contains docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and arachidonic acid (AA) — long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids that appear to support brain development, according to previous studies. These nutrients were recently added to some infant formulas sold in the United States.
The physical and psychological bond between a mother and child that develops during breast-feeding might also play a role by stimulating brain development, or unidentified environmental factors may be at work. For instance, the researchers suggest, the amount of time a woman spends breast-feeding her childmay serve as a marker of the time and energy she invests in the child’s entire upbringing.
Test scores rose in tandem with the duration of breast-feeding for up to nine months, regardless of the parents’ social status and education, the mother’s weight gain during pregnancy, the individual’s birth weight, and other factors that may affect cognitive development.
Longer duration of breast-feeding was more common among older moms and those with more education and higher social status, and among infants with higher birth weights and lengths, the study found. Single women and those who smoked were the least likely to breast-feed for long periods.
These results indicate that breast-feeding may have long-term positive effects on cognitive and intellectual development. The nutrients in breast-milk, behavioral factors, and factors associated with choice of feeding method may all contribute to the positive association.

JAMA May 8, 2002;287:2365-2371 (Full Text Article)http://www.mercola.com/2002/may/22/fish_oil.htm

Vegan Diet Improves Rheumatoid Arthritis and Fibromyalgia 

A diet change helps rheumatoid arthritis, according to Swedish researchers who enrolled 66 arthritis patients in a one-year study, assigning 38 to a gluten-free, vegan diet and 28 to a non-vegan diet. The special vegan diet was meant to eliminate the proteins from milk and grains that appear to cause an immune reaction. Forty percent of people in the vegan group improved compared to just one person in the control group.
Another study tested a mostly raw vegan diet in 30 patients with fibromyalgia, a syndrome of chronic fatigue, pain, poor sleep, depression, and anxiety. After several months on the diet, 19 participants showed significant improvement in range of motion, flexibility, and other measures.
Hafstrom B, Ringertz A, Spanberg L, et al. A vegan diet free of gluten improves the signs and symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis: the effects on arthritis correlate with a reduction in antibodies to food antigens. Rheumatology 2001;40:1175-9.

Donaldson M, Speight N, Loomis S. Fibromyalgia syndrome improved using a mostly raw vegetarian diet: an observational study. BMC Complement Altern Med 2001;1:7.

An Orange a Day …  

Vitamin C is essential for the formation of collagen-the connective tissue matrix within our bones. Researchers from the University of California surveyed 13,080 adults enrolled in the Third National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey and found that pre-menopausal women with higher vitamin C intakes had higher bone densities than women with lower intakes. Men with vitamin C intakes of approximately 200 milligrams per day-an amount easily consumed on a varied plant-based diet-had the lowest self-reported fracture rates.

Simon JA, Hudes ES. Relation of ascorbic acid to bone mineral density and self-reported fractures among US adults. Am J Epidemiol 2001;154:427-33.

New College Course On Vegetarian Nutrition Begins On Web 21 August http://www.pcrm.org/news/health020529.html
Veggie Recipes for the Grill and Picnic Basket 

http://www.pcrm.org/news/health020530.html

To find a holistic doctor in your area, please contact the American Holistic Medical Association (AHMA) to obtain a copy of their national referral directory. 

American Holistic Medical Association
6728 Old McLean Village Dr.
McLean, VA 22101
Phone: 703-556-9728 and 703-556-9245
http://www.holisticmedicine.org