Healthy Eating

Mar 18, 2007

Heartburn Traded For Hip Factures?

Acid reflux can be very damaging and uncomfortable, but your doctor has a prescription for just about everything. You trust him and he ought to know how to fix it - he’s your doctor and he met with the man with the black satchel. So it’s going to be the "purple pill" Nexium, Prevacid or Prilosec. My sources indicate that these prescriptions can cause esophageal or pancreatic cancer. As of this last December, the Journal of American Medical Association reported a study of users of these proton-pump inhibitors or acid blockers, showed they had a 44 percent higher risk of hip fractures than nonusers. The longer the usage and the higher the doses, the greater the risk. Tagamet and Pepcid, known as H2 blockers, had similar but smaller risk of hip fractures.
Over-the-counter buffering antacids like Maalox, Tums and Rolaids did not have the same effect. Instead, their repeated use reduces stomach acid, leaving calcium and other bone minerals less well absorbed. Certain minerals like calcium, iron and zinc are "acid dependent," and require a lower pH for absorption. Some stomach acid is required to kill microbes/bacteria. A lack of this acid allows unwanted microbes to thrive, causing infection with diarrhea or constipation, gas, bloating and headaches.
To naturally eliminate heartburn, a combination of alkaline minerals such as calcium, magnesium and potassium has been found useful.
Many people find that reducing their stress reduces the production of acid. Also helpful is eating more fruits and vegetables high in alkaline buffering minerals, smaller frequent meals; and taking digestive enzymes. Eliminating alcohol, coffee, smoking and spicy, fatty fried foods reduces chronic stomach irritation. If it causes you acid - listen to your body talk. High carbohydrate baked goods can be the source of acid production.
It is time for you to realize that your body is the best source for messages regarding good and bad foods. There is no magic bullet. Your doctor means well but isn’t always the best source for preventative measures. I still find that a tablespoonful of apple cider vinegar does the trick for me. However, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure or a bottle of pills. Most attempts to correct problems may just cause more serious problems as you have heard in TV ads that mention a slight problem and then go on to explain all the dangerous consequences of that prescription.
A for-profit health care system, like the one we have experienced all these years, is motivated by big bucks when they should be targeting the real problem and giving you a prescription for prevention and not a prescription for multiple side-effects.
Doctors must take heed that the damage they do is not without serious consequences, such as higher insurance costs and serious damage to the health of their patients. That M.D. doesn’t give any doctor the license to "DO HARM." Their oath was to "do no harm" and drug manufacturers, food processors and restaurants are now in the cross-hairs of those concerned for the health of our children and our parents. With knowledge comes power, but a little knowledge is dangerous and a license may even amplify that danger. Like any field of knowledge, the field is cluttered with qualified, very qualified and those that watch the bottom line more than the latest research they can use to help others.
This report made by the Journal of American Medical Association needs to be read by your doctor. The insurance companies are now beginning to rate doctors on their ability to fix problems rather than simply carrying a prescription form and requiring unnecessary tests without a positive result toward healing.
You are responsible for eating healthy foods and for staying away from behavior that destroys your health and opens the door to more medicine and a pyramid of pills with side effects more dangerous than the problem.
As we look around we see more and more obesity and hear everyone talking about type II diabetes, cancer, MS, Parkinsons and Alzheimers, but what are we doing to address these problems?