Positive Health Online

We now publish Positive Health PH Online Issue 244 in February 2018. That we have been publishing PH Online for some 24 years is mind-boggling to me, considering that we started from our kitchen back in 1994, following setting up the Bristol Cancer Help Centre - BCHC [now Penny Brohn Centre] Nutrition and Cancer Database after BCHC was almost shut down over the tabloid and media scandal caused by erroneous research published.

Perhaps other Editors and Writers will understand this, but I struggle with what to write and include in each Editorial even after 24 years. Others who don’t write and don’t experience the weight on the shoulders feeling of what to fill the blank page may think me slow-witted. No matter.

The content of PH Online is enormous and all-encompassing, including virtually the entirety of health conditions and natural treatment approaches. Health, medical care, the NHS and how to accommodate the ever-burgeoning, sicker population demands are perhaps the No. 1 political and financial topic on the agenda in the UK. One of my key motivations which led to the creation of Positive Health magazine PH Online was to change the healthcare model into an Integrated Health Care System. Then and now, all access to NHS treatment is via the GP whereby mainly conventional treatments are prescribed, although GPs can refer patients to complementary practitioners provided they are on the (CNHC) Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council voluntary register of complementary therapists. Alas, the term Integrated Health Care has recently been taken over and morphed to mean integrating NHS with Social Care provision. True integrated health care only happens in innovative medical practices and is not available to the vast majority of NHS patients is of immense disappointment.

There have been recent research breakthroughs announced regarding cancer detection and treatment techniques. These included CancerSeek a blood test that can detect eight types of cancer, including liver and pancreatic cancers which may, with improved accuracy, may help to improve cancer detection, treatment and patient survival. Another area of cancer discovery included chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T-cell therapy which shows potential in heavily pre-treated patients with multiple myeloma.

“In a study the BCMA [B-cell maturation antigen] -directed CAR T-cell therapy bb2121 induced complete remissions for 56% of patients with relapsed/refractory multiple myeloma. Additionally, there was a 94% objective response rate, which consisted of a very good partial response or better for 89% of patients. After 40 weeks of follow-up, the median progression-free survival (PFS) had not yet been reached, and the 9-month PFS rate was 71%. Regarding safety, the treatment was generally well tolerated.”

PH Online Issue 244 editorial features continue to address and argue against conventional treatment approaches. This includes the outstanding analytical examination of chronic fatigue syndrome ME/CFS, NLP and the Lightning Process™ in the Looking Glass by Nancy Blake.

“The purpose of this article is to provide an explanation of the theoretical model and practical processes underlying both appropriate and inappropriate use of NLP in the treatment of patients with ME/CFS.
"The timing of this article has been influenced by recent publicity about a research paper by Crawley et al[1] which purports to support the use of the Lightning Process™, in addition to Specialist Medical Care, to treat ME/CFS in children between the ages of 12 and 18.  The Lightning Process™ is described by its developer as based on Osteopathy, NLP and Life Coaching. 
"There has been a recent decision to review the NICE Guidelines for treatment/management of ME/CFS, and it is not unreasonable to speculate that evidence for the effectiveness of this trade-marked treatment might be used to support recommending its use, paid for by the  NHS, in a revised Guideline. The use of psychological therapies in ME/CFS, which the recent Report by a Committee of the US IOM[2] describes as a serious, complex multisystem disease, not psychogenic, is naturally a cause for controversy.  
"ME/CFS is generally recognized as an illness in which exercise “exacerbates symptoms”, and it has always seemed illogical to prescribe exercise as a treatment.[3]”

The review by Nancy Blake of Straight-Jacketed by Empty Air by Greg Crowhurst is an informed and appropriate accompaniment to the suffering and neglect of patients with ME.

Perhaps one of the most promising progress in nutritional treatment approaches to serious conditions including Epilepsy, Multiple Sclerosis, ALS [motor neurone or Lou Gehrig disease] and cancer, particularly brain cancer is the low carbohydrate Ketogenic diet as published in the feature What Happens When the Body Goes Into Ketosis (Ketogenic Diet).

“From a young age, we’re taught that eating three meals a day, plus snacks, is healthy and necessary for the human body to function normally, and this rhetoric still dominates North American food guides today. Mark Mattson, the Current Chief of the Laboratory of Neuroscience at the National Institute on Aging, once asked:
“ 'Why is it that the normal diet is three meals a day plus snacks? . . . There are a lot of pressures to have that eating pattern, there’s a lot of money involved. The food industry – are they going to make money from skipping breakfast like I did today? No, they’re going to lose money. If people fast, the food industry loses money. What about the pharmaceutical industries? What if people do some intermittent fasting, exercise periodically and are very healthy? Is the pharmaceutical industry going to make any money on healthy people?'
"The quote above comes from a TED talk Mattson gave on the benefits of fasting, a practice which forces the body to switch its fuel source from glucose to ketones. Scientists are observing a wide variety of health benefits from this transition, from starving cancer to improving cognition, and a ketosis diet is now being implemented for people with cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, and more. It has tremendous benefits for the brain, as explained by Mattson in his talk, but also for the body.”

Within this article are several video links including the riveting 3-hour Podcast: Discussion between Joe Rogan and Dr Dom D’Agostino PhD which ranges far and wide regarding the basics of the ketogenic diet and displays the far-reaching acumen in medicine, metabolic science, weight and body building, even veterinary medicine and hunting prowess of Dr Dominic D’Agostino PhD Assistant Professor in the Department of Molecular Pharmacology and Physiology at the University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine, and a senior research scientist at the Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC). He was also recently a crew member of the NASA NEEMO 22 project. Further information is available at his website KetoNutrition.

Statin Nation - The Ill-Founded War on Cholesterol, What Really Causes Heart Disease, and the Truth About the Most Overprescribed Drugs in the World by Justin Smith is reviewed and illustrates yet another area of healthcare in which the conventional paradigm badly needs updating.

“The author documents and exposes myths - the Diet Heart Hypothesis, Good and Bad Cholesterol Fallacy and imponderables we still don’t understand, including all the factors involved in the processes of heart disease. Justin Smith does a credible job of explaining cholesterol’s importance, including documenting the research findings of dietary studies exploring the Diet-Heart Hypothesis, which generally concluded that saturated fat is not related to LDL levels and that the greater saturated fat intake was associated with lower progression of heart disease, whereas polyunsaturated fat and carbohydrate intakes were associated with heart disease progression.”

All in all, PH Online Issue 244 is a splendid issue, provocative and not an easy read.