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Tuesday, May 21, 2002
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"Someone once asked me if, as a thinker, I was rational or creative. Left brained or right-brained. I considered it, and asked in reply, do I have to choose? Is it possible to be both? I didn’t think I could afford to discriminate. I wanted to be good at designing things, and I needed all the brainpower I had available.
Someone once asked me if, as a thinker, I was rational or creative. Left brained or right-brained. I considered it, and asked in reply, do I have to choose? Is it possible to be both? I didn’t think I could afford to discriminate. I wanted to be good at designing things, and I needed all the brainpower I had available. " [Scott Berkum]
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10:49:22 PM 
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Itching for Conventional Relief
A Devotee of Alternative Medicine Has Her Worldview Shattered by . . . A Nasty Case of the Hives
People who are evangelical (over anything) and take an oppositional position to "some other side" end up with blind spots that do not serve their long term health and balance. In my worldview, it is just "one medicine" and alternative therapies are a choice of "this AND that" rather than "this OR that" and definitely not "this BUT NEVER that."
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2:32:37 PM
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GENEVA, May 16 — Increasingly popular alternative medicines, from Chinese herbal remedies to spiritual therapies, are often misused and may harm patients, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Thursday.
"The herb Ma Huang (ephedra), used in China to treat short-term respiratory congestion, was marketed in the United States as a dietary aid. But its long-term use “led to at least a dozen deaths, heart attacks and strokes,” the WHO said."
Right. And the drugs sold by prescription in the U.S. cause tens of thousands of deaths each year. Traditional medicines in China and elsewhere have a long history of helping to maintain and restore a healthy balance. Western medicines are, by contrast, dramatic and invasive for the most part, the medical equivalent of the sledge hammer or shotgun. There are certainly times when such medicines are vital. And there are certainly hucksters in "alternative medicine" especially around too-good-to-be-true diet remedies. I just object to the fear-based approach to control, which says that "your old ways are no good, unscientific, and unless we can prove them using scientific studies, it is better to replace them with something 'proven' to be marginally more effective than your superstitious ways."
I mean, let's prescribe prozac for Native American suffering from out of control grief rather than a healing ceremony where the person becomes the center of the entire tribe's focused intent on their healing. After all, as the article says, such spiritual remedies can prove harmful or be misused. Well, show me the studies, please. If you are going to claim scientific superiority, show me the studies that show that YOUR solution is better.
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10:40:06 AM
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Manual therapy works best for neck pain in study
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - For some nagging neck pain, so-called manual therapy may be more effective than exercise, painkillers and other standard treatments, new study findings suggest.
This "hands-on" technique, in which the neck is manipulated to improve mobility, worked better than exercise therapy or routine care from a doctor for patients with neck pain due to muscle or joint strain.
Researchers led by Dr. Jan Lucas Hoving of Monash University in Victoria, Australia, report the findings in the May 21st issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Manual therapy is commonly used by chiropractors, physical therapists, massage therapists and doctors known as osteopaths. Unlike exercise therapy, in which patients perform a given activity, manual therapy demands that the patient be "passive" as the therapist moves the neck.
In this study, the researchers used specific "mobilization" techniques--which refers to moving the joint within a patient's range of motion, using slowly applied pressure.
They assigned 183 patients to have either manual therapy, exercise therapy or to continue routine care from their doctors--including advice on home exercises and prescriptions for pain medication--over 6 weeks. All patients were allowed to continue on any pain medication they had been taking.
At the end of the study, about 68% of manual-therapy patients said they were "completely recovered" or "much improved," according to the report. That compared with 51% of those on exercise therapy and 36% of patients continuing their usual care.
"Manual therapy seems to be a favourable treatment option for patients with neck pain," Hoving's team concludes.
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8:56:33 AM
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Mental Health: Flushing Out a Hidden Ailment. Thousands of people could be steered toward treatment for depression if their regular doctors took a few moments to ask them two simple questions. By Eric Nagourney. [New York Times: Health]
"Often, depression is the hidden problem behind a patient's symptoms."
A depressed person has a depressed immune system and depressed energy field. Of course they are going to be symptomatic in a variety of ways that initially cannot be diagnosed as a specific health condition. So we start with depression and end up with heart disease, colitis, and worse. In previous articles, they noted the benefits of the placebo effect on depression and theorized that it might have been the high level of "touch" (interest) shown by the researchers to the depressed person that mattered.
My suggestion if you are mild to moderately depressed: yes, follow your doctor's prescription. But also find a massage therapist that you enjoy talking to, chat for a half hour and get an hour massage, twice a week, for two weeks, and see how you feel then. Doesn't life look a lot brighter?
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8:46:56 AM
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Doctors can be frustrating. You wait a month-and-a-half for an appointment, and he says, "I wish you'd come to me sooner."
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8:28:43 AM
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In the 60's people took acid to make the world weird. Now the world is weird and people take Prozac to make it normal.
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8:28:12 AM
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A friend asked a gentleman why he never married? Replied the gentleman, "Well, I guess I just never met the right woman... I guess I've been looking for the perfect girl."
"Oh, come on now," said the friend, "Surely you have met at least one girl that you wanted to marry."
"Yes, there was a girl... once. I guess she was the one perfect girl; the only perfect girl I really ever met. She was just the right everything... I really mean that she was the perfect girl for me."
"Well, why didn't you marry her," asked the friend.
"She was looking for the perfect man."
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8:27:42 AM
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© Copyright
2002
Rick@Leaders.net.
Last update:
11/18/2002; 10:47:55 PM.
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