Foods You Can Eat to Reduce Inflammation

14 Jul

A new study conducted by researchers from the University of Florida may give another reason why older people complain about pain more than those who are younger.  The small, preliminary study has suggested for the first time that inflammation may occur quicker and at a higher magnitude—and stays around longer—when seniors experience pain.  This might mean that older adults are more susceptible to developing chronic pain.  It also gives yet another reason to attempt to decrease inflammation as soon as possible.  Getting treatment as quickly as possible after an injury or the onset of pain may be critical in decreasing the chances of the pain getting worse and becoming chronic.

While reducing inflammation following an injury is important, inflammation isn’t just associated with pain. Higher than normal levels of inflammation can trigger many disease processes including cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease.

One of the best things a person can do to help keep inflammation in check is eat foods with anti-inflammatory properties. According to ScienceDaily, a study by scientists from the University of Liverpool’s Institute of Aging and Chronic Disease, “has identified food stuffs that can help prevent chronic inflammation that contributes to many leading causes of death.”  Their work shows that diets rich in fruits and vegetables, which contain polyphenols, protect against age-related inflammation and chronic diseases.  According to researcher Sian Richardson, “The results of our study suggest that (poly)phenols derived from onions, turmeric, red grapes, green tea, and açai berries may help reduce the release of pro-inflammatory mediators in people at risk of chronic inflammation.  Older people are more susceptible to chronic inflammation and as such they may benefit from supplementing their diets with isorhamnetin, resveratrol, curcumin, and vanillic acid or with food sources that yield these bioactive molecules.”

Remember, we’re always here to help your body heal and maintain the pain free body you deserve.

This information should not be substituted for medical or chiropractic advice. Any and all health care concerns, decisions, and actions must be done through the advice and counsel of a health care professional who is familiar with your updated medical history.

Man Sentenced to Death Is Recognized as a Hero 40 Years Later…

12 Jul

You’ve probably heard the old adage that truth is often stranger than fiction.  This is actually only part of the actual quote that is rarely used in its full length and seldom attributed to its originator. It goes…

“Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.”

 Who originally said that?  None other than Mark Twain.  If you like interesting and insightful quotes, Twain in a person you should look up.  He was very insightful and not afraid to speak his mind.

Now back to the story… but you may want to keep that quote in mind as you read on…

It was some time in the early 1940s.  The place was Poland.

Hitler and the Nazis had a plan to exterminate certain races of people and conquer the world.  But not everyone knew it… yet.

Many countries were ignorant to Hitler’s plans or they simply chose to turn a blind eye.  “But he is doing it over there – not here,” was a common excuse to ignore Germany’s actions.  That attitude proved costly to many…

Witold Pilecki joined the Polish resistance soon after the Nazis invaded Poland.  When mysterious camps started popping up all over the country, he suspected the they had a nefarious purpose and he set out on a mission to discover what was really going on.

So he did something completely unimaginable… He deliberately got himself arrested by the Nazis so that he could infiltrate one of the camps: Auschwitz.

He spent 2.5 long years suffering at Auschwitz in order to send information to the world that the Nazis were actually running death camps, and this intelligence was used to try to convince Germany’s enemies to send help.

How did he send this information back to compatriots?  He built a radio in the death camp using various  parts that had been smuggled in.

When help didn’t arrive, Pilecki escaped and set out to contact the London-based Polish government-in-exile in an effort to try to get help for all the suffering people in Auschwitz and the other concentration camps. But the Allies did not believe his dispatches could be true.  They thought his claims were exaggerated or false because they could not believe that so many had been killed in the death camps during the preceding years.

When Poland later fell under the control of Communists, he was sentenced to death on charges of espionage and the illegal crossing of the borders under a false name. After the fall of communism towards the end of the 20th century, Pilecki’s true contributions to the war effort were finally recognized by his countrymen, all charges against him were posthumously dropped, and he was decorated with the highest honors the Polish military could offer.

So there you have it.  A man who sacrificed his own life by willingly entering a Nazi death camp to try to save Poland (and the world) wasn’t recognized as the hero he was until over 40 years after his death.

The truth certainly can be stranger than fiction, but it is because “fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn’t.”

We love helping our patients and their friends and relatives through their tough times and getting them feeling better! We are here to help you stay feeling better and looking younger! Don’t be a stranger. You really can afford Chiropractic care! Don’t wait until you can no longer move!

While Your Pain May Not Be All in Your Head, What’s in Your Head May Play a Role in How Much Pain You Feel. Here’s Why…

11 Jul

For most people, pain is an infrequent nuisance. For others, it’s a burden that influences every aspect of their lives. It’s one of the most common and difficult problems people face. And if you suffer with pain, you are not alone.

Check out these mind-boggling statistics..

Here are the number of Americans affected by each of the following conditions:

            Cancer – 1.4 million (According to the American Cancer Society)

             Coronary Heart Disease (Including Heart Attack and Chest Pain) and Stroke – 18.7 million people (According to the American Heart Association)

            Diabetes – 20.8 million people (diagnosed and estimated undiagnosed, according to the American Diabetes Association.)

The National Centers for Health Statistics reports that pain affects an estimated 76.2 million people, which is more than diabetes, heart disease, and cancer combined.

In fact, pain is cited as the most common reason Americans go to the doctor. It is a leading cause of disability, and it is a major contributor to healthcare costs.

According to the National Center for Health Statistics (2006): “More than one-quarter of Americans (26%) age 20 years and over report that they have had a problem with pain of any sort that persisted for more than 24 hours.

 “Adults age 45-64 years were the most likely to report pain lasting more than 24 hours (30%). Twenty-five percent (25%) of young adults age 20-44 reported pain, and adults age 65 and over were the least likely to report pain (21%).”

What Are Commonly Reported Pain Conditions?

According to the report: “When asked about four common types of pain, respondents of a National Institute of Health Statistics survey indicated that low back pain was the most common (27%), followed by severe headache or migraine pain (15%), neck pain (15%), and facial ache or pain (4%).

“Back pain is the leading cause of disability in Americans under the age of 45. More than 26 million Americans between the ages of 20-64 experience frequent back pain.

 “Adults with low back pain are often in worse physical and mental health than people who do not have low back pain: 28% of adults with low back pain report limited activity due to a chronic condition, as compared to 10% of adults who do not have low back pain. Also, adults reporting low back pain were three times as likely to be in fair or poor health and more than four times as likely to experience serious psychological distress as people without low back pain.”

It’s clear that pain is common and can be life changing, but what if you could affect how much pain you feel…

Simply By the Way You Think?

A team of German researchers say you probably can.  Here is how…

You have probably heard of the placebo effect.  It occurs when people experience positive results from a fake or sham treatment (like a sugar pill) because they expected it to be helpful.

Dr. Katharina Schwarz from the Institute of Psychology at the Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg (JMU) in Bavaria, Germany notes, “The placebo effect often works quite well when treating pain and depression.”

Her research shows that the mere expectation of getting a drug can alleviate symptoms and make patients feel better. She adds, “And those are not just the patient’s subjective sensations, it can actually be measured physiologically.”

Dr. Katharina Schwarz is an expert on how expectations influence perception and behavior, and she did an amazing experiment that showed just how much a person’s expectations of pain actually affected how much pain they felt.

In the experiment, men were given a stimulus and asked to rate how much pain they felt.  Later that day, they were given information that either told them that men feel more pain than women or vice versa.  The researchers backed up the claim with reasons like women have a higher threshold for pain because they endure childbirth or men don’t feel as much pain because of their ancestral role as hunters, etc.

They repeated the experiment the next day.  The participants who thought that men were less sensitive rated the pain as being much less intense than they did on the previous day. However, those who had learned that women have a higher pain tolerance considered themselves more sensitive to pain than before.

According to Dr. Schwarz, “I want to increase the awareness, especially of students, for these mechanisms and in particular for the ones that have a negative impact on people.”

Past studies have demonstrated that patients who feel like they’ll never get better don’t respond to treatments as well as patients who are confident their condition will improve.

Another study recently published in the journal Cell Reports finds that pain actually changes cells—which may explain why some people continue to feel pain in an area long after their injury heals. Investigators from King’s College London observed slight epigenetic changes in the immune cells around damaged nerves. These changes to the epigenome persisted long after the cells were replaced by newer cells weeks or months later, giving the impression such cells had a “memory” of the previous injury. The researchers suspect these modifications to the epigenome alter which genes are expressed in those cells and may make them more sensitive to pain in the future.

So what does all this mean for you?

For starters, even though many people live with pain, it’s not normal, so it’s important to consult with a doctor who can help identify the underlying cause of your pain and treat it. It’s also important that you are confident that such a treatment will benefit your condition. If you suffer from back pain or other musculoskeletal complaints, then there’s a great chance that chiropractic treatment can help you get out of pain and back to living your life.

Don’t forget, if you ever have any questions or concerns about your health, talk to us. Contact us with your questions. We’re here to help and don’t enjoy anything more than participating in providing you natural pain relief.

Does Thinking Positively Really Work?

7 Jul

I’m sure you hear statements like this all the time…

“Just think positive thoughts and good things will happen.”

“If you believe it, you can achieve it!”

Do you need any more examples?

But does that stuff really work?  Does thinking positive thoughts actually change your life one bit, or is all just smoke and mirrors being pedaled by entrepreneurs in the self-help industry trying to make money of you?

First, we need to define what “works” means.  This is where most people go completely off the rails.  They define “works” as something close to magic.  In other words, they think that a few simple days of thinking positively will drop $100 million in their lap and bring them eternal happiness.

That’s not going to happen.

But we do know that the way we think influences our perception of the world and the things we experience.

For example, in this newsletter, we discuss a study that showed that people experience pain differently based on things they were told before they experienced the pain.  When males were told that men experience less pain than women, they reported experiencing less pain than they did just the day before.

Same people.  Same pain.  Different belief.  Different experience with the pain.

Does this mean that if you believe you are a positive person and act accordingly better things will happen in your life?

I can’t say that for sure.

But I do know this, it will change your perspective, and that can change your life.

While there are many things you can’t change about life, you can always change the way you think about them and the way you react to them.

The same emotional trigger that can make you feel stress, fear, or anger can also make you laugh, or at least bring about a neutral feeling.

For example, when you’re confronted with a crisis, try to see how it may actually be an opportunity. When you do that, you might observe things changing for the better.

Sincerely,

Dr. Binder

Thai Man Feeds 80 Stray Dogs Every Day!

13 Jun

(Names And Details May Have Been Changed To Protect Privacy)

What is a hero?

To many, a hero is the baseball player who hits a game-winning home run or someone who takes a public stand for a just cause, regardless of the impact it has on their career or livelihood.

But, there are many heroes you’ve probably never heard of because they do not seek notoriety—they simply help others because it’s just the right thing to do.

Michael Baines is one of these heroes.

Here is his story…

Michael owns a restaurant in Thailand, and he got used to seeing the countless abandoned and stray dogs that lived on the streets. For a while, Michael, like most people, just ignored them.

Then about five years ago, everything changed.

That’s when a pregnant stray dog made her way to the back of his restaurant. Michael knew he had to do something, so he began taking care of her. He connected with the animal and from that moment on, decided he was going to make a difference in the lives of the stray and abandoned dogs in his town.

He could no longer just walk by a suffering dog anymore without doing something to help so he started feeding the strays he came across and soon enough, he was feeding 80 per day. Yes, that’s 80 dogs every day.
Michael makes a mixture of dry dog food, white rice, steamed fish, and oil and makes numerous stops around town to feed the dogs he finds. As you can imagine, this is not only time-consuming, but it’s also costly.

It costs about $1,000 USD per month to feed this many dogs. Michael does get some help in the form of donations from some of the locals, but he also pays part of the bill out of his own pocket.

Baines has many supporters, and oddly enough, he also has some who are opposed to what he is doing as if helping the starving dogs in the streets is only exacerbating the problem of stray dogs in the area.
He is quite candid about why this problem exists in the first place. He says it’s not the dog’s fault one bit but it is some of the people in his own community who are 100% responsible.

All these poor dogs are out there suffering because they were once pets that for whatever reason, lost their home. Maybe they got out and their owners never found them (or looked). Or maybe they were abused and ran off. Or maybe they were discarded for no longer being a cute puppy.
Sure, everyone has a great excuse, but in reality, there are no excuses. These are living things that deserve better.

Worse, many of these abandoned dogs were not spayed or neutered. So now they breed in the streets, creating more dogs without a home.
Michael notes, “It is a nice ‘job’ but sometimes very emotional and frustrating, as you see many dogs that is in very bad shape. I do this from my heart and the payment is to meet these lovely dogs and feel their love. That is priceless and worthwhile.”

While some may brush off Michael’s effort as futile given the number of stray dogs roaming the streets in his town alone, he says, “Even if I cannot save them all, I think: for just that single dog I helped—I did [make] a change.”

We love helping our patients and their friends and relatives through their tough times and getting them feeling better! We are here to help you stay feeling better and looking younger! Don’t be a stranger. You really can afford Chiropractic care! Don’t wait until you can no longer move!

Yoga Isn’t Just Good for Your Body, It’s Good for Your Mind Too!

10 Jun

In a time when most people are looking to improve their physical fitness, yoga is an option with a long list of health benefits. Here are just a few that go beyond improved strength, flexibility, and balance:

• Improves reaction times and cognitive tasks. Researchers found an immediate benefit to brain function after a single 20-minute session of yoga. Study lead Dr. Neha Gothe writes, “It appears that following yoga practice, the participants were better able to focus their mental resources, process information quickly, more accurately and also learn, hold, and update pieces of information more effectively than after performing an aerobic exercise bout.”
• Reduces stress by inhibiting inflammation. In a study that involved caregivers who commonly experience a high level of stress, researchers found “a reduced activity of those proteins linked directly to increased inflammation” among study participants who performed twelve minutes of yoga a day for eight weeks.
• Helps manage chronic pain. The National Institutes of Health’s Dr. M. Catherine Bushnell reports that those who practice yoga have better function in several areas of the brain, including those involved in pain modulation.
• Decreases depression symptoms in pregnant women. Pregnant women who participated in a mindful y10oga routine that focused on poses for the pregnant body experienced improved mood and a stronger attachment to their developing babies. With 1 in 5 women suffering from major depression during pregnancy, researchers believe that mindful yoga may be one of a few alternatives to treating mood disorders during gestation.

Remember, we’re always here to help your body heal
and maintain the pain free body you deserve.

This information should not be substituted for medical or chiropractic advice. Any and all health care concerns, decisions, and actions must be done through the advice and counsel of a health care professional who is familiar with your updated medical history.

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