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Soup is good food. It’s especially good for weight loss. Bob Barnett and Barbara Rolls based the best-selling Volumetrics around the idea that dishes low in calories (i.e., lots of water) and slow-to-eat (i.e., soup!) were the best for losing weight. There’s something to that. [...]
Half the U.S. takes at least one supplement daily. My personal favorite is a guy who came into my office with a Trader Joe’s double-handled bag and deposited 33 bottles on my desk. 45 minutes later…* Three reports this week again show that dietary supplements can act like [...]
Food with packaging…so convenient, so easy, so iffy. Bisphenol A (BPA) and phthalates (especially DEHP) are endocrine disruptors, especially of male hormone levels. BPA and phtalates are found in plastics that touch your food and beverages. The FDA is trying to reduce consumer exposure to [...]
I don’t take care of patients on the web, yet. Most of my patients are, however, e-patients. And I didn’t even know it. E-patients are real, not virtual. They’re networked, curious, want to be well-informed about and take better control of their health, confused about what info is [...]
Earlier this month, I got a flu shot. I also took 2000IU of vitamin D3. Some people see this as redundant. Not me. The recent news that pregnant women who get flu shots protect their fetuses and themselves meshes perfectly with the recent news that vitamin D3 is more [...]
Why people stop taking their prescribed medications is really important, because everyone loses. The patient and her family lose the needed medical effect. The clinician and clinic lose a tool. Employer and health insurance company lose an employee’s health and dollars. Pharma company loses [...]
The WSJ has a front page piece about food-drug interactions, and how eating the wrong healthy foods–olive oil, fruits, vegetables–can interact with prescription drugs. Not a word about how eating the wrong, unhealthful foods can cause the need for those drugs and their prescription to [...]
The Lancet study finding that ARBs (Angiotensin Receptor Blockers), commonly prescribed for high blood pressure, heart failure and kidney disease actually result in more cancer, especially lung cancer, is alarming. But so would be the sound of people stopping their meds this moment because of [...]
Food as medicine has had a long history, but until recently in the U.S., it’s been seen as a sort of fringe element. A little scruffy, not very tasty, and honestly, a bit weird. Foodies often don’t like the idea because food should be about flavor, love, aroma, authenticity, [...]
The recent omega-3 lawsuit about reported PCB contamination (from the oil of farmed fish) of some omega-3s supplements raises 3 issues: a. Are OTC omega-3 capsules safe? b. Do their benefits outweigh their potential harms? c. Are there good alternatives, such as food(!?) and prescription meds? a. [...]