The AFib Cure – by Dr. John Day & Dr. Jared Bunch

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The authors—cardiologists and AFib specialists—make the case that if you have atrial fibrillation, you do in fact have more options than “take these pills and suffer”.

To be clear: they’re not anti-medication per se and they also acknowledge that for some people the meds may still have their place (safety first, and all), but they do fall on the side of “it would be nice to not have to, if possible, so let’s see what we can do”.

Rather, they recommend lifestyle adjustments (no surprises there), and certain biomarker optimizations (this is where it gets more in-depth), which have a good record of reducing symptoms to the point of remission and freedom from medications.

The book is first a primer on the topic of AFib, and then a how-to manual of fixing the problems that you now understand, by biomarker monitoring, lifestyle optimization, and if those things don’t work, ablative therapy which they argue is safer, easier, and more successful than you might think.

The style is clear and easy to understand, with frequent scholarly citations throughout. On the downside, the tone can sometimes be a little on the pushy side for this reviewer’s tastes, but if one overlooks that, it doesn’t detract from the useful content.

Bottom line: if you or a loved one have AFib and would like more treatment/management options than have hitherto been presented, this book will give you that.

Click here to check out The AFib Cure, and look after your heart!

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  • Nobody’s Sleeping – by Dr. Bijoy John
  • Thriving Beyond Fifty – by Will Harlow
    Get expert advice on mobility, strength, and endurance from this comprehensive book. It’s casual yet informative, with remedies for weak spots. Thrive at any age!

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  • How stigma perpetuates substance use

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    In 2022, 54.6 million people 12 and older in the United States needed substance use disorder (SUD) treatment. Of those, only 24 percent received treatment, according to the most recent National Survey on Drug Use and Health.

    SUD is a treatable, chronic medical condition that causes people to have difficulty controlling their use of legal or illegal substances, such as alcohol, tobacco, prescription opioids, heroin, methamphetamine, or cocaine. Using these substances may impact people’s health and ability to function in their daily life.

    While help is available for people with SUD, the stigma they face—negative attitudes, stereotypes, and discrimination—often leads to shame, worsens their condition, and keeps them from seeking help. 

    Read on to find out more about how stigma perpetuates substance use. 

    Stigma can keep people from seeking treatment

    Suzan M. Walters, assistant professor at New York University’s Grossman School of Medicine, has seen this firsthand in her research on stigma and health disparities. 

    She explains that people with SUD may be treated differently at a hospital or another health care setting because of their drug use, appearance (including track marks on their arms), or housing situation, which may discourage them from seeking care.

    “And this is not just one case; this is a trend that I’m seeing with people who use drugs,” Walters tells PGN. “Someone said, ‘If I overdose, I’m not even going to the [emergency room] to get help because of this, because of the way I’m treated. Because I know I’m going to be treated differently.’” 

    People experience stigma not only because of their addiction, but also because of other aspects of their identities, Walters says, including “immigration or race and ethnicity. Hispanic folks, brown folks, Black folks [are] being treated differently and experiencing different outcomes.” 

    And despite the effective harm reduction tools and treatment options available for SUD, research has shown that stigma creates barriers to access. 

    Syringe services programs, for example, provide infectious disease testing, Narcan, and fentanyl test strips. These programs have been proven to save lives and reduce the spread of HIV and hepatitis C. SSPs don’t increase crime, but they’re often mistakenly “viewed by communities as potential settings of drug-related crime;” this myth persists despite decades of research proving that SSPs make communities safer. 

    To improve this bias, Walters says it’s helpful for people to take a step back and recognize how we use substances, like alcohol, in our own lives, while also humanizing those with addiction. She says, “There’s a lack of understanding that these are human beings and people … [who] are living lives, and many times very functional lives.”

    Misconceptions lead to stigma

    SUD results from changes in the brain that make it difficult for a person to stop using a substance. But research has shown that a big misconception that leads to stigma is that addiction is a choice and reflects a person’s willpower.

    Michelle Maloney, executive clinical director of mental health and addiction recovery services for Rogers Behavioral Health, tells PGN that statements such as “you should be able to stop” can keep a patient from seeking treatment. This belief goes back to the 1980s and the War on Drugs, she adds. 

    “We think about public service announcements that occurred during that time: ‘Just say no to drugs,’” Maloney says. “People who have struggled, whether that be with nicotine, alcohol, or opioids, [know] it’s not as easy as just saying no.” 

    Stigma can worsen addiction

    Stigma can also lead people with SUD to feel guilt and shame and blame themselves for their medical condition. These feelings, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, may “reinforce drug-seeking behavior.” 

    In a 2020 article, Dr. Nora D. Volkow, the director of NIDA, said that “when internalized, stigma and the painful isolation it produces encourage further drug taking, directly exacerbating the disease.”

    Overall, research agrees that stigma harms people experiencing addiction and can make the condition worse. Experts also agree that debunking myths about the condition and using non-stigmatizing language (like saying someone is a person with a substance use disorder, not an addict) can go a long way toward reducing stigma.

    Resources to mitigate stigma:

    This article first appeared on Public Good News and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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  • The Knowledge That Harvard Medical School’s Clinical Instructor Dr. Monique Tello Thinks Everyone SHOULD Have About Heart Health

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    Anyone (who has not had a double mastectomy, anyway) can get breast cancer.

    Breast cancer, if diagnosed early (before it spreads), has a 98% survival rate.

    That survival rate drops to 31% if diagnosed after it has spread through the body.

    (The US CDC’s breast cancer “stat bite” page has more stats and interactive graphs, so click here to see those charts and get the more detailed low-down on mortality/survival rates with various different situations)

    We think that the difference between 98% and 31% survival rates is more than enough reason to give ourselves a monthly self-check at the very least! You’ve probably seen how-to diagrams before, but here are instructions for your convenience:

    This graphic created by the Jordan Breast Cancer Program (check them out, as they have lots of resources)

    If you don’t have the opportunity to take matters into your own hands right now, rather than just promise yourself “I’ll do that later”, take this free 4-minute Breast Health Assessment from Aurora Healthcare. Again, we think the difference early diagnosis can make to your survival chances make these tests well worth it.

    Lest we forget, men can also get breast cancer (the CDC has a page for men too), especially if over 50. But how do you check for breast cancer, when you don’t have breasts in the commonly-understood sense of the word?

    So take a moment to do this (yes, really actually do it!), and set a reminder in your calendar to repeat it monthly—there really is no reason not to! Take care of yourself; you’re important.

    Pssst! Did you scroll past the diagrams, looking for the online 4-minute test promised by the subtitle? If so, scroll back up; the link is in the middle!

    Harvard Medical School’s Clinical Instructor’s Five-Point Plan for Heart Health

    Dr. Monique Tello, M.D., M.P.H., is a practicing physician at Massachusetts General Hospital, director of research and academic affairs for the MGH DGM Healthy Lifestyle Program, clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School, and author of the evidence-based lifestyle change guide Healthy Habits for Your Heart.

    Here are what she says are the five most important factors to help keep your ticker ticking:

    5. Have (at most) a moderate alcohol intake! While there are polyphenols such as resveratrol in red wine that could boost heart health, there’s so little per glass that you may need 100–1000 glasses to get the dosage that provides benefits in mouse studies. If you’re not a mouse, it may not be as beneficial, and Dr. Tello recommends drinking no more than one glass per day of any alcohol. What constitutes a glass? It varies from one kind of drink to another, so here’s a handy guide.

    4. Don’t smoke. Best of all to never start. But if you did, quit. Simple as that. There is no healthy amount of smoking. While paradoxically, quitting smoking may of course be stressful to you, the long term gains are considered more than worth it. As with all advice, do consult your own physician for guidance, as individual circumstances may vary, and that may change the best approach for you.

    3. Maintain a healthy body weight. While BMI (Body Mass Index) is not a perfect system, it’s a system in popular use, and Dr. Tello recommends keeping a BMI between 18.5 and 24.9.

    What’s your BMI? It takes into account your height and weight; here’s a Quick BMI Calculator for your convenience.

    2. Keep a healthy level of physical activity—which ideally means at least 30 minutes per day vigorous activity, but obviously if you’re not used to this, take it slowly and build up over time. Even just small lifestyle changes (walking where possible, taking the stairs instead of the elevator where possible, etc) can add up to a big difference.

    1. Enjoy a healthy diet. This is the single most important thing, and the best modern scientific consensus holds that the best diet contains plenty of vegetables, fruits and nuts, whole grains, and omega-3 fatty acids, while it avoids processed meats, sugar-sweetened beverages, trans fats (what are trans fats?), and too much sodium.

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  • Ultra-Processed People – by Dr. Chris van Tulleken

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    It probably won’t come as a great surprise to any of our readers that ultra-processed food is—to make a sweeping generalization—not fabulous for the health. So, what does this book offer beyond that?

    Perhaps this book’s greatest strength is in showing not just what ultra-processed foods are, but why they are. In principle, food being highly processed should be neither good nor bad by default. Much like GMOs, if a food is modified to be more nutritious, that should be good, right?

    Only, that’s mostly not what happens. What happens instead is that food is modified (be it genetically or by ultra-processing) to be cheaper to produce, and thus maximise the profit margin.

    The addition of a compound that increases shelf-life but harms the health, increases sales and is a net positive for the manufacturer, for instance. Dr. van Tulleken offers us many, many, examples and explanations of such cost-cutting strategies at our expense.

    In terms of qualifications, the author has an MD from Oxford, and also a PhD, but the latter is in molecular virology; not so relevant here. Yet, we are not expected to take an “argument from authority”, and instead, Dr. van Tulleken takes great pains to go through a lot of studies with us—the good, the bad, and the misleading.

    If the book has a downside, then this reviewer would say it’s in the format; it’s less a reference book, and more a 384-page polemic. But, that’s a subjective criticism, and for those who like that sort of thing, that is the sort of thing that they like.

    Click here to check out Ultra-Processed People, and understand better what you are putting in your body!

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Related Posts

  • Nobody’s Sleeping – by Dr. Bijoy John
  • How we treat catchment water to make it safe to drink

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    Most of us are fortunate that, when we turn on the tap, clean, safe and high-quality water comes out.

    But a senate inquiry into the presence of PFAS or “forever chemicals” is putting the safety of our drinking water back in the spotlight.

    Lidia Thorpe, the independent senator leading the inquiry, says Elders in the Aboriginal community of Wreck Bay in New South Wales are “buying bottled water out of their aged care packages” due to concerns about the health impacts of PFAS in their drinking water.

    So, how is water deemed safe to drink in Australia? And why does water quality differ in some areas?

    Here’s what happens between a water catchment and your tap.

    Andriana Syvanych/Shutterstock

    Human intervention in the water cycle

    There is no “new” water on Earth. The water we drink can be up to 4.5 billion years old and is continuously recycled through the hydrological cycle. This transfers water from the ground to the atmosphere through evaporation and back again (for example, through rain).

    Humans interfere with this natural cycle by trapping and redirecting water from various sources to use. A lot happens before it reaches your home.

    The quality of the water when you turn on the tap depends on a range of factors, including the local geology, what kind of activities happen in catchment areas, and the different treatments used to process it.

    Aerial view of a dam next to a forest.
    Maroondah dam in Healesville, Victoria. doublelee/Shutterstock

    How do we decide what’s safe?

    The Australian Drinking Water Guidelines define what is considered safe, good-quality drinking water.

    The guidelines set acceptable water quality values for more than 250 physical, chemical and bacterial contaminants. They take into account any potential health impact of drinking the contaminant over a lifetime as well as aesthetics – the taste and colour of the water.

    The guidelines are not mandatory but provide the basis for determining if the quality of water to be supplied to consumers in all parts of Australia is safe to drink. The guidelines undergo rolling revision to ensure they represent the latest scientific evidence.

    From water catchment to tap

    Australians’ drinking water mainly comes from natural catchments. Sources include surface water, groundwater and seawater (via desalination).

    Public access to these areas is typically limited to preserve optimal water quality.

    Filtration and purification of water occurs naturally in catchments as it passes through soil, sediments, rocks and vegetation.

    But catchment water is subject to further treatment via standard processes that typically focus on:

    • removing particulates (for example, soil and sediment)
    • filtration (to remove particles and their contaminants)
    • disinfection (for example, using chlorine and chloramine to kill bacteria and viruses)
    • adding fluoride to prevent tooth decay
    • adjusting pH to balance the chemistry of the water and to aid filtration.

    This water is delivered to our taps via a reticulated system – a network of underground reservoirs, pipes, pumps and fittings.

    In areas where there is no reticulated system, drinking water can also be sourced from rainwater tanks. This means the quality of drinking water can vary.

    Sources of contamination can come from roof catchments feeding rainwater tanks as well from the tap due to lead in plumbing fittings and materials.

    So, does all water meet these standards?

    Some rural and remote areas, especially First Nations communities, rely on poor-quality surface water and groundwater for their drinking water.

    Rural and regional water can exceed recommended guidelines for salt, microbial contaminants and trace elements, such as lead, manganese and arsenic.

    The federal government and other agencies are trying to address this.

    There are many impacts of poor regional water quality. These include its implication in elevated rates of tooth decay in First Nations people. This occurs when access to chilled, sugary drinks is cheaper and easier than access to good quality water.

    What about PFAS?

    There is also renewed concern about the presence of PFAS or “forever” chemicals in drinking water.

    Recent research examining the toxicity of PFAS chemicals along with their presence in some drinking water catchments in Australia and overseas has prompted a recent assessment of water source contamination.

    A review by the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) proposed lowering the limits for four PFAS chemicals in drinking water: PFOA, PFOS, PFHxS and PFBS.

    The review used publicly available data and found most drinking water supplies are currently below the proposed new guideline values for PFAS.

    However, “hotspots” of PFAS remain where drinking water catchments or other sources (for example, groundwater) have been impacted by activities where PFAS has been used in industrial applications. And some communities have voiced concerns about an association between elevated PFAS levels in their communities and cancer clusters.

    While some PFAS has been identified as carcinogenic, it’s not certain that PFAS causes cancer. The link is still being debated.

    Importantly, assessment of exposure levels from all sources in the population shows PFAS levels are falling meaning any exposure risk has also reduced over time.

    How about removing PFAS from water?

    Most sources of drinking water are not associated with industrial contaminants like PFAS. So water sources are generally not subject to expensive treatment processes, like reverse osmosis, that can remove most waterborne pollutants, including PFAS. These treatments are energy-intensive and expensive and based on recent water quality assessments by the NHMRC will not be needed.

    While contaminants are everywhere, it is the dose that makes the poison. Ultra-low concentrations of chemicals including PFAS, while not desirable, may not be harmful and total removal is not warranted.

    Mark Patrick Taylor, Chief Environmental Scientist, EPA Victoria; Honorary Professor, School of Natural Sciences, Macquarie University; Antti Mikkonen, Principal Health Risk Advisor – Chemicals, EPA Victoria, and PhD graduate, School of Pharmacy and Medical Sciences, University of South Australia, and Minna Saaristo, Research Affiliate in the School of Biological Sciences, Monash University

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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  • Paris in spring, Bali in winter. How ‘bucket lists’ help cancer patients handle life and death

    10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.

    In the 2007 film The Bucket List Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman play two main characters who respond to their terminal cancer diagnoses by rejecting experimental treatment. Instead, they go on a range of energetic, overseas escapades.

    Since then, the term “bucket list” – a list of experiences or achievements to complete before you “kick the bucket” or die – has become common.

    You can read articles listing the seven cities you must visit before you die or the 100 Australian bucket-list travel experiences. https://www.youtube.com/embed/UvdTpywTmQg?wmode=transparent&start=0

    But there is a more serious side to the idea behind bucket lists. One of the key forms of suffering at the end of life is regret for things left unsaid or undone. So bucket lists can serve as a form of insurance against this potential regret.

    The bucket-list search for adventure, memories and meaning takes on a life of its own with a diagnosis of life-limiting illness.

    In a study published this week, we spoke to 54 people living with cancer, and 28 of their friends and family. For many, a key bucket list item was travel.

    Why is travel so important?

    There are lots of reasons why travel plays such a central role in our ideas about a “life well-lived”. Travel is often linked to important life transitions: the youthful gap year, the journey to self-discovery in the 2010 film Eat Pray Love, or the popular figure of the “grey nomad”.

    The significance of travel is not merely in the destination, nor even in the journey. For many people, planning the travel is just as important. A cancer diagnosis affects people’s sense of control over their future, throwing into question their ability to write their own life story or plan their travel dreams.

    Mark, the recently retired husband of a woman with cancer, told us about their stalled travel plans:

    We’re just in that part of our lives where we were going to jump in the caravan and do the big trip and all this sort of thing, and now [our plans are] on blocks in the shed.

    For others, a cancer diagnosis brought an urgent need to “tick things off” their bucket list. Asha, a woman living with breast cancer, told us she’d always been driven to “get things done” but the cancer diagnosis made this worse:

    So, I had to do all the travel, I had to empty my bucket list now, which has kind of driven my partner round the bend.

    People’s travel dreams ranged from whale watching in Queensland to seeing polar bears in the Arctic, and from driving a caravan across the Nullarbor Plain to skiing in Switzerland.

    Humpback whale breaching off the coast
    Whale watching in Queensland was on one person’s bucket list. Uwe Bergwitz/Shutterstock

    Nadia, who was 38 years old when we spoke to her, said travelling with her family had made important memories and given her a sense of vitality, despite her health struggles. She told us how being diagnosed with cancer had given her the chance to live her life at a younger age, rather than waiting for retirement:

    In the last three years, I think I’ve lived more than a lot of 80-year-olds.

    But travel is expensive

    Of course, travel is expensive. It’s not by chance Nicholson’s character in The Bucket List is a billionaire.

    Some people we spoke to had emptied their savings, assuming they would no longer need to provide for aged care or retirement. Others had used insurance payouts or charity to make their bucket-list dreams come true.

    But not everyone can do this. Jim, a 60-year-old whose wife had been diagnosed with cancer, told us:

    We’ve actually bought a new car and [been] talking about getting a new caravan […] But I’ve got to work. It’d be nice if there was a little money tree out the back but never mind.

    Not everyone’s bucket list items were expensive. Some chose to spend more time with loved ones, take up a new hobby or get a pet.

    Our study showed making plans to tick items off a list can give people a sense of self-determination and hope for the future. It was a way of exerting control in the face of an illness that can leave people feeling powerless. Asha said:

    This disease is not going to control me. I am not going to sit still and do nothing. I want to go travel.

    Something we ‘ought’ to do?

    Bucket lists are also a symptom of a broader culture that emphasises conspicuous consumption and productivity, even into the end of life.

    Indeed, people told us travelling could be exhausting, expensive and stressful, especially when they’re also living with the symptoms and side effects of treatment. Nevertheless, they felt travel was something they “ought” to do.

    Travel can be deeply meaningful, as our study found. But a life well-lived need not be extravagant or adventurous. Finding what is meaningful is a deeply personal journey.

    Names of study participants mentioned in this article are pseudonyms.

    Leah Williams Veazey, ARC DECRA Research Fellow, University of Sydney; Alex Broom, Professor of Sociology & Director, Sydney Centre for Healthy Societies, University of Sydney, and Katherine Kenny, ARC DECRA Senior Research Fellow, University of Sydney

    This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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  • Felt Time – by Dr. Marc Wittmann

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    This book goes far beyond the obvious “time flies when you’re having fun / passes slowly when bored”, or “time seems quicker as we get older”. It does address those topics too, but even in doing so, unravels deeper intricacies within.

    The author, a research psychologist, includes plenty of reference to actual hard science here, and even beyond subjective self-reports. For example, you know how time seems to slow down upon immediate apparent threat of violent death (e.g. while crashing, while falling, or other more “violent human” options)? We learn of an experiment conducted in an amusement park, where during a fear-inducing (but actually safe) plummet, subjective time slows down yes, but measures of objective perception and cognition remained the same. So much for adrenal superpowers when it comes to the brain!

    We also learn about what we can change, to change our perception of time—in either direction, which is a neat collection of tricks to know.

    The style is on the dryer end of pop-sci; we suspect that being translated from German didn’t help its levity. That said, it’s not scientifically dense either (i.e. not a lot of jargon), though it does have many references (which we like to see).

    Bottom line: if you’ve ever wished time could go more quickly or more slowly, this book can help with that.

    Click here to check out Felt Time, and make yours count!

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