Natural Health and Herbal Remedies Blog – information on herbal medicine

Acne is a disease, and not just a phase teenagers go through. In fact, it’s on the rise in women over twenty-one.
Acne sufferers usually have a genetic proclivity for the disease, a structural defect in the skin that makes pores function differently. But there are certain factors that do aggravate acne, and you should know them.

Acne Activators
Stress: It can be emotional or physical, negative or positive, even brought on by drinking too much coffee.
Ultraviolet Light: Too much sun can irritate the skin and worsen the condition.
Many birth control pills: Also other medications.
Certain cosmetics: For a list of acne-irritating ingredients contained in commonly sold cosmetics, send a self-addressed envelope and an international reply coupon covering postage to the ACNE Research Institute, 1587 Monrovia, Newport Beach, CA 92663. USA.
Oils or chemicals: Contact can be direct or as indirect as working in a garage or at a greasy grill.
Abrasive scrubs: Or too much rubbing of affected skin. Keep skin clean, but overdoing washing can aggravate acne condition.
Iodine, iodized salt: Eliminate all salted and processed foods, which are usually high in salt that has been iodized and can worsen acne.
• Multiple vitamins with minerals (but low in iodine), 1 daily
• Vitamin E (dry form), 400 IU, 1-2 daily
• Vitamin A, 25,000IU (water soluble), 1-2 daily, 5 days a week (stop for two)
• Zinc, chelated, 50 mg., 3 times daily with meals
• Acidophilus liquid, 1-2 tbsp., 3 times daily, or 3-6 capsules 3 times daily
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When one stands erect, one’s weight is transmitted through the spine on to the hip and ultimately to the lower limbs. Yet most of the weight of the body is in front of the spine (all the internal organs – heart, lungs, liver, intestines, uterus etc are in front of the spine). The various curves in the spine pull the various organs back to bring that weight in line with the body’s axis. Thus these curves help to support the weight of the various organs as well as keep this weight balanced in the vertical position. A flexible plastic rod when pressed down on the floor or ground will develop curves to maintain the weight. These curves act like springs to accommodate the weight of the body. If one puts on a lot of weight and the spinal muscles are weak then these curves may be accentuated, causing problems. The discs are not the only shock absorbers. In fact the curvatures provide an element of shock absorption as well.
Consider yourself carrying a heavy weight in your hands. The natural reaction would be for you to increase or exaggerate the lumbar curvature to be able to evenly balance the weight, through the compensatory change in curve. If the weight is heavy, you will feel constrained in your lower back. Similar things happen in late pregnancy. Due to the increase in weight in the abdomen the lumbar curve increases and women get a continuous low backache. If they do not prepare themselves with exercises, the condition becomes very uncomfortable. People who have put on a lot of weight face similar problems.
In the case of women carrying weight (pitcher, fodder etc) on their heads in certain countries like Africa and India, the weight is distributed along the axis of the spine and weight-bearing muscles create the upward thrust, neutralising the load. This does not result in any increase in the spinal curves. Similarly men with powerful spinal muscles do not have exaggerated lumbar curves when they put on weight as the excess weight is well compensated for.
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Remedies for headache prescribed by doctors have all passed the test of a placebo trial, carried out in the relatively calm atmosphere of university hospital out-patient departments. The trial reported here was done in a much more unusual setting in 1995 by a group of doctors and scientists from the US National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. All of us have had headaches, with which we coped as well as we could. This trial was carried out on 30 patients whose headache disturbed them so much that they had gone to a hospital emergency department. It is important to realize that these patients would have been unusually worried by their headache and would have been full of expectation that powerful medicine would be given. Everyone was given an injection: one-third were given an aspirin-like drug, ketoralac, one-third a narcotic, meperidine, and the other third received a saline injection, all double-blind. All three injections produced an identical reduction of pain. The reason for choosing this example of a placebo effect is to emphasize the effect of the patients’ expectation in exaggerating the placebo effect. The two drugs had normally been tested on relaxed patients and shown to be superior to placebos. In this case, where the patients had deliberately sought emergency treatment and had a high expectation, the placebo was as effective as the drugs. Clearly, we are dealing with a subtle but powerful effect.
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Exercising is very important in retaining your mobility as well as your self-esteem. The exercises that follow are only suggested ones.

You may already have been given exercises by your doctor or physiotherapist. If not, discuss these with them prior to commencing your exercise program. When you do begin your exercise program do them once daily.

Begin slowly. You are not expected to do the entire series of exercises at first. Start out with just one or two if you wish. Do what you can, recognise your limitations and be realistic about exercise.

You may not have used some of your muscles for a long time. You may experience some increased soreness at first. When you commence stretching just do enough to feel it in your muscles. If you are only able to get your leg off the ground one or two inches or centimetres, that is okay.

Just work at improving your range of movement. In time you will be pleasantly surprised at just how much mobility you can obtain.

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In the ‘secret room’ image you can:

‘Imagine that you’re walking along a corridor in your mind. You keep walking until you come to a door. It’s a door you have never seen before. Behind it lies your secret room. Your sanctuary, a place incompatible with pain. You open the door and close it behind you leaving your pain and discomfort behind you. In this place of peace and perfect tranquillity you see yourself not as you have been — but as you would like to be.

Ego enhancement through positive suggestion

The following suggestions are usually given to patients as part of their hypnosis training. It was developed as a result of the experience of many therapists that giving patients powerful and positive suggestions can help to offset the negative and unwanted self-talk that contributes to pain. The exercise is based on the work of Dr Harry Stanton, Director of the Higher Education Research and Advisory Centre, University of Tasmania, and the author of several books on stress management and imagery:

‘As the days pass, you are going to feel physically stronger and fitter in every way, more and more resistant to illness and disease of all kinds. All the organs of your body function correctly so that you have a sense of tremendous physical well-being. In your daily living, you will feel more alert, more wide awake, more energetic and full of zest and vitality. Every day, your nerves will become stronger, your mind clearer and calmer, more composed, more placid and more tranquil. You will become emotionally much calmer, much more settled and much less easily disturbed.

‘Things which used to irritate and worry you will lose the power to do so. Every day, you will become and will remain more and more completely relaxed and less tense each day, both mentally and physically.

‘As a result of your increased ability to feel relaxed you will find that each night you will fall asleep at the hour you wish and will complete the sleep until the hour you wish to wake next morning.

‘Your sleep will be calm, peaceful and profound, marked only by pleasant dreams. On waking, you will feel well, bright, alert and eager for the day’s tasks. You will wake feeling that each day is the first day of the rest of your life. A life that will be better and better in all the ways you Want it to be.

‘Should you at any time feel tense or worried, you can calm your mind and relax your body by taking five deep breaths. And, as you breathe out, you will feel yourself letting go of the tension, unwinding, feeling the calmness and relaxation flowing all through your mind and body.

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One small needle cures a thousand illnesses.

Ancient Chinese saying.

/i/ypnosis can be defined as a psychologically stimulated mind and body state of arousal. This state is accompanied by the attentive focusing of concentration in a repeated way with a corresponding decrease in awareness of your surroundings and unwanted thoughts. Put another way, hypnosis is an ability to concentrate on a specific voice or thoughts on a repeated basis to the exclusion of other unnecessary thoughts or ideas. Suggestions in this state are more likely to be acceptable if they are what the subject needs, or wants, to be told. This capacity can be caused either by formal hypnosis using a signal from another person or in response to a self-induced signal. For example, thinking of a specific code word and counting in a specific way.

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Drugs in the anti-inflammatory group are potentially among the most important and effective medications prescribed in pain clinics.

The most commonly prescribed NSAIDS in Australia include Dolobid, Feldene, Orudis SR, Voltaren, Clinoril, Brufen, Naprosyn and Indocid. Recent trends have seen the use of these drugs made more convenient by the development of potent single dosage per day drugs such as Feldene and Orudis.

A gel form of Feldene is now available in Europe and is being tested in Canada. There are suppository forms of the two most commonly used anti-inflammatory drugs, Naprosyn and Indocid, which help to overcome the problem many have when using oral forms of these medications — unpleasant side-effects of gastric irritation or gastric ulceration.

These rectally administered drugs bypass the delicate stomach lining. They can thus be extremely useful for those who cannot tolerate oral medication.

The anti-inflammatory drugs have been shown to have a pain-relieving effect which is equal to, or sometimes greater than, the simple analgesics mentioned above.

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