Alzheimer's treatment

Researchers testing promising, non-pharmaceutical Alzheimer's treatment

(NaturalNews) Researchers at Johns Hopkins University are carrying out clinical tests in which a pacemaker-like device is implanted into the brains of patients with early-stage Alzheimer's disease.

"We are very excited about the possibilities of this potentially new way to treat Alzheimer's," said lead researcher Constantine G. Lyketsos.



Alzheimer's is an incurable, degenerative disease that leads to progressive loss of cognitive function, including memory and the ability to perform simple daily tasks. An estimated 5.2 million people over the age of 64 currently suffer from Alzheimer's disease in the United States, and this number is project triple by 2050.

Although researchers have searched effective pharmaceutical treatments for years, none have yielded any promise. The new multi-center trial is designed to test a completely different model of treatment, in which electrical stimulation is delivered directly to the brain in order to slow and even reverse cognitive decline.

"Recent failures in Alzheimer's disease trials using drugs such as those designed to reduce the buildup of beta amyloid plaques in the brain have sharpened the need for alternative strategies," said Paul B. Rosenberg, director the Johns Hopkins University site for the study.

"This is a very different approach, whereby we are trying to enhance the function of the brain mechanically. It's a whole new avenue for potential treatment for a disease becoming all the more common with the aging of the population."

Deep brain stimulation

The device consists of a tiny, pacemaker-like stimulator that sends 130 electrical impulses per second through wires that are implanted in the brain's fornixes. The fornix is essential in transmitting information to the hippocampus, a structure believed to play an important role in memory synthesis and learning. In many early stage Alzheimer's patients, the first symptoms appear in the hippocampus. The electrical current is not detectable by the patient, Rosenberg said.

These "deep brain stimulation" devices have already been in use for 15 years in patients with Parkinson's disease, another neurodegenerative disorder. More than 80,000 people have received the implants, which appear to reduce the incidence of tremors and the need for medication. Other studies are underway to determine whether deep brain stimulation can effectively treat obsessive-compulsive disorders or depression.

In a preliminary study conducted in 2010, researchers found that patients with mild Alzheimer's disease who received the devices experienced sustained increases in glucose metabolism over a 13-month period, whereas the typical course of the disease is for glucose metabolism to decrease. Glucose metabolism is an indicator of nerve cell activity.

The new study will be conducted on 40 patients at five institutions across the United States and Canada. Half the participants will have their devices activated two weeks after surgery, while the other half will have their devices activated one year after surgery. The study is double-blind, meaning that neither doctors nor patients will know which group each participant is in.
The study is funded by the National Institute on Aging (part of the National Institutes of Health) and the medical device company Functional Neuromodulation Ltd.

Sources:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/12/121205102615.htm

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/038510_Alzheimers_treatment_natural_remedies_brain_stimulation.html#ixzz2Gb7AXYlt

Cricinfo International Scores

Cricinfo International Scores

Dry skin solution

Dry skin? Try upping your vitamin D intake

(NaturalNews) One of the major drawbacks of winter is the effect cold, dry weather has on your skin. The good news is, research shows that upping your vitamin D intake could actually help mitigate that problem and keep your skin looking and feeling better.

One recent study by the Johnson and Johnson Skin Research Center found a link between low vitamin D levels and drier skin, "which was subsequently ameliorated by topical application of vitamin D," according to a summary.

Researchers conducted an observational study of two groups of 83 and 61 subjects. In the first part of the study, blood serum levels and skin conductance measurements were taken in the group of 83 participants following a one-week washout period.

"Results showed subjects with lower levels of vitamin D had lower average skin moisture," the summary said.

Sound vitamin D levels mean moister skin, less irritation

From that group, a subset of 61 study participants with insufficient vitamin D serum levels were given a topical ointment containing vitamin D. "Results showed increased skin moisture and improved clinical grading of dry skin," said the summary. Overall, the findings "suggest a relationship between vitamin D3 levels and hydration of" skin.

"Some people use vitamin D for skin conditions including vitiligo, scleroderma, psoriasis, actinic keratosis, and lupus vulgaris," added a summary of vitamin D in general from the U.S. National Library of Medicine, a division of the National Institutes of Health.

In fact, a number of studies have shown that vitamin D is very crucial in maintaining the correct balance of tissues present in skin. A lack of balance "can lead to wrinkled and parched skin due to disruption in this balancing phenomenon," writes Pratima Sharma for OnlyMyHealth.com. "The relationship between skin balance and vitamin D is a mutually beneficial one. One is responsible for the other, and vice versa."

The skin consists of a special layer designed to convert ultraviolet B radiation from the sun into vitamin D; a lack of sun can hamper this conversion, and in the winter, when it is much more cloudy, that can have a substantial impact on the dryness of your skin.

"Another smart way of treating vitamin D deficiency is by exposing yourself to the sun, optimally," Sharma says. "You need to consider making the most of the morning sun as much as possible."

Boost your 'D' with diet

That said, she and other experts caution that too much exposure to sunlight can also be harmful. Fortunately, besides taking vitamin D capsules and using topical vitamin D-containing lotions, you can obtain much of the supplement in the foods you eat:

-- Catch a plate of salmon. "In addition to providing more than 100 percent of your vitamin D requirements for the day, this fatty fish is chockfull of omega-3 fatty acids, which can help combat dry skin and hair. Other good fish sources containing vitamin D include sardines, cod liver oil and tuna," writes registered dietician Kristin Kirkpatrick, for the Huffington Post. Eggs also contain a healthy dose of vitamin D.

-- Enjoy a glass of sunshine - orange juice. By starting your day off with an eight-ounce glass of fresh, tangy orange juice you can get about one-third of your daily vitamin D requirement. And here's an additional benefit: You get vitamin C as well, which strengthens collagen, an element that is key to slowing the rate of aging of the skin.

-- Grab a cup of yogurt. A regular helping of this tasty food provides about 20 percent of your daily requirement of vitamin D, and comes with the added benefit of being a probiotic food that adds "good" bacteria to your intestinal tract for better digestion and fewer infections.

-- Healthy whole-grain breakfast. Choosing a healthy, whole-grain breakfast cereal to start your day off right can give you a quarter of the daily vitamin D you need, as well as a good dose of fiber, which can help you maintain a better weight. Check the label before you buy and make sure you're getting a cereal fortified with vitamin D.

Sources:

http://www.vitasearch.com/get-clp-summary/40491

http://www.huffingtonpost.com

http://www.onlymyhealth.com/dry-skin-vitamin-d-deficiency-1320819921

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/038490_dry_skin_vitamin_D_nutrition.html#ixzz2GSn5KoqU

Psychiatrist and children

Don't let your child see a psychiatrist. Ever
(NaturalNews) If you have a child, don't let him/her see a psychiatrist. Ever.

Read Mike Adams' new article about psychiatry. It's one of the best I've ever read, and I've been researching this pseudoscience for 20 years.

http://www.naturalnews.com

Then read this one, too. It's also excellent. I wrote it.

http://jonrappoport.wordpress.com/2012/02/27/the-liars-liar/

Yes, I know, I'm bragging, which is a sign of a mental disorder: Self-Inflation at the Expense of Sacred Psychiatry Disorder. The preferred treatment is electroshock therapy and MKULTRA re-programming. I'm opting for a walk in the park coupled with two doses of outrage at these fake doctors who poison brains and believe they're healers.

Here is a clue. The government gives psychiatry its fake legitimacy. That's how the game works. The government blesses the medical licensing boards that award psychiatrists permission to drug your children, alter their brains, poison them, and of course make all the fake diagnoses in the first place.

Without the government, these fakes would sink into the waves and be gone forever. Nobody in his right mind or wrong mind would ever step into a psychiatrist's office. It would be like volunteering to stumble out on to a mine field seeded with explosives.

Media, naturally, go along with the psychiatric hoax. Thousands of articles keep coming out of the hopper to support the authoritative pronouncements of these deranged monsters with medical degrees and "training" in diagnosing mental illnesses.

There are no mental illnesses or disorders. There never have been.

There are people with problems, there are people who suffer, there are people who are in desperate circumstances, there are people who have severe nutritional deficiencies, there are people who have been poisoned by various chemicals, there are people who have been abused and ignored, there are people who have been told there is something wrong with them, there are people who are different and can't deal with the conforming androids in their midst, but there are no mental disorders.

None.

It's fiction. It's a billion-dollar fiction. It's a gigantic steaming pile of bullshit. Always has been.

There is not a single diagnostic test for any so-called mental disorder. Never has been. No blood test, no urine test, no saliva test, no brain scan, no genetic test. No science.

http://jonrappoport.wordpress.com

So why hasn't psychiatry been destroyed and outlawed? Because there is money in it. Big money. Pharmaceutical money. And because the public is in a trance. Mothers and fathers are quite willing to take their children to these brain poisoners...lambs to the slaughter.

The silence of the lambs.

People are entranced by so-called professionals with fancy degrees who speak technical babble. It all seems real. Because if it weren't real, then...what? People would be forced to admit they are living in a fantasy. And people don't want to admit that. They would rather die than admit that.

But that's what psychiatry is. An elaborate fantasy. If every psychiatrist in the world vanished tomorrow, the world would immediately become a far healthier place.

If every celebrity who outrageously whores for psychiatry would stop on a dime, the world would be a far healthier place right away.

You think Dr. Phil is a fake? He's nothing compared to psychiatrists with their prescription pads. He's a saint by comparison. The drugs are brain poisons. If you really want to know the truth about the drugs, go to breggin.com and read everything Dr. Peter Breggin has ever written about the drugs. He covers the whole slimy waterfront.

There is some horrendous handwriting on wall. Believe me. You can see it all around you if you look. The shrinks are treating younger and younger children with the brain poisons, every day. They're diagnosing children who are practically toddlers and they're drugging them. They're ripping their brains. It's happening. You may not want to know about it, but it's there. It's a crime on the order of murder.

And the bastards at the FDA and the bastards who train doctors in medical schools are going along with it. They're accomplices to the ongoing crime. They have blood on their hands.

Here is a story Dr. Breggin told in his classic book, Toxic Psychiatry. It says it all:

"Roberta was a college student, getting good grades, mostly A's, when she first became depressed and sought psychiatric help at the recommendation of her university health service. She was eighteen at the time, bright and well motivated, and a very good candidate for psychotherapy. She was going through a sophomore-year identity crisis about dating men, succeeding in school, and planning a future. She could have thrived with a sensitive therapist who had an awareness of women's issues.

"Instead of moral support and insight, her doctor gave her Haldol. Over the next four years, six different physicians watched her deteriorate neurologically without warning her or her family about tardive dyskinesia [motor brain damage] and without making the [tardive dyskinesia] diagnosis, even when she was overtly twitching in her arms and legs. Instead they switched her from one neuroleptic to another, including Navane, Stelazine, and Thorazine. Eventually a rehabilitation therapist became concerned enough to send her to a general physician, who made the diagnosis [of medical drug damage]. By then she was permanently physically disabled, with a loss of 30 percent of her IQ.

"...my medical evaluation described her condition: Roberta is a grossly disfigured and severely disabled human being who can no longer control her body. She suffers from extreme writhing movements and spasms involving the face, head, neck, shoulders, limbs, extremities, torso, and back-nearly the entire body. She had difficulty standing, sitting, or lying down, and the difficulties worsen as she attempts to carry out voluntary actions. At one point she could not prevent her head from banging against nearby furniture. She could hold a cup to her lip only with great difficulty. Even her respiratory movements are seriously afflicted so that her speech comes out in grunts and gasps amid spasms of her respiratory muscles...Roberta may improve somewhat after several months off the neuroleptic drugs, but she will never again have anything remotely resembling a normal life."

If the smug scum who run the NY Times put THAT story on the front page right under a huge headline, we might see something good happen in this country.

Chronic whiners want to claim the government has to protect everybody all the time, as if that were possible, as if that were really the government's aim. These whiners are busy-bodies, meddlers, and self-made victims. They sometimes pose as scientists. They love psychiatry. They equate psychiatry with government. You know, "share and care."

They assert that government knows best. At bottom, they're vicious little idiots.

But they're very useful idiots, because the government welcomes their help in keeping the populace in line.

And psychiatry is a cardinal strategy in that regard.

Chemical straitjackets for the lambs.

The silence of the lambs.

Jon Rappoport
The author of an explosive collection, THE MATRIX REVEALED, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com


About the author:
The author of an explosive new collection, THE MATRIX REVEALED, Jon
was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of
California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an
investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics,
medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine,
Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon
has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic,
and creative power to audiences around the world.
www.nomorefakenews.com

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/038348_psychiatry_quackery_medical_hoax.html#ixzz2F7lwB3V7

Radiated meat and FDA

FDA quietly increases allowed radiation doses of meats for human consumption

(NaturalNews) Rather than actually take the time to address the root causes of meat and poultry contamination, which more often than not are a direct result of outrageously unsanitary factory farming practices (http://www.naturalnews.com/025716_antibiotic_animals_antibiotics.html), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has instead decided to simply up the doses of radiation that industrial food producers are allowed to blast on their filthy, contaminated meat products.

In the first new rule recently published in the Federal Register, the FDA specifies that "unrefrigerated uncooked meat" can now be irradiated right alongside refrigerated, frozen and cooked meat. And in the second new rule, the FDA increases the amount of ionizing radiation that can be applied to poultry products such as chicken by 50 percent, bumping the dosage up to 4.5 kilograys (kGy) of radiation from the previous 3.0 kGy.

You can view the two published rules here:
http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/FR-2012-11-30/pdf/2012-28967.pdf

These two rules, which were enacted quietly and without any media fanfare (big surprise), come more than a decade after the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) first petitioned the FDA for their passage back in 1999. And in the years that followed, numerous consumer advocacy and food safety groups decried the proposals, warning that irradiation is dangerous.

But the FDA ignored all the comments made by these groups, which included reputable names like Public Citizen and the Center for Food Safety (CFS), and continued forward with its irradiation agenda. According toFood Safety News (FSN), the FDA actually went so far as to belittle the merit of the input given by these groups, referring to them as "general" comments that did "not contain any substantive information that could be used in a safety evaluation of irradiated poultry."

FDA ignores science showing dangers of irradiation, claims there are no safety issues

This careless dismissal by the FDA is completely bogus, of course, as the CFS and many other groups have repeatedly offered valid scientific evidence showing that irradiating food denatures its quality, nutritional value, and safety. The production of "unique radiolytic products," for instance, which include various mutagens, or radioactive substances, is one major negative byproduct of irradiation that is both proven and undeniable. (http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/campaign/food-irradiation/)

And yet the FDA does not seem to care much about the facts as they concern the safety (or lack thereof) of irradiation, as the rogue agency has been on a crusade for the past several years to irradiate virtually everything that Americans eat. Meat, fruit, spices, breads, you name it -- if the grocery store sells it, then the FDA wants to nuke it for your "safety." (http://www.naturalnews.com/023945.html)

And in the rare case that an irradiated food actually bears a proper irradiation label -- the FDA, after all, has established incredibly lax rules that allow most irradiated foods to be sold to consumers without labels -- the flowery emblem, known as a radura, that has been created for food irradiation is unlikely to have much of an impact anyway, as it was deliberately designed to appear pleasant and insinuate that a product is "natural." You can view the ridiculous irradiation radura here so you know what to look out for:http://www.naturalnews.com/023945.html

If you wish to truly avoid irradiated foods; however, the best way to do this is to purchase only organic or locally-grown and verified foods. You can also learn more about the history of irradiation and how to spot potentially unlabeled irradiated foods by visiting the following two links:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/Irrad/LabelingStatus.cfm and
http://www.organicconsumers.org/irradlink.cfm

Sources for this article include:

http://www.foodsafetynews.com

link: http://www.naturalnews.com/038255_radiation_meats_FDA.html

Curcumin's abilities and cancer

Curcumin's ability to wage war on cancer stem cells further verified by research

(NaturalNews) Promising new research has demonstrated once again that the ingredient curcumin, which is the principal curcuminoid of the widely used Indian spice turmeric, a member of the ginger family, is a major cancer fighter, this time proving effective against esophageal cancer.

According to researchers at the University of Kansas'Cancer Center and Medical Center, study results indicate that "curcumin inhibits the growth of esophageal cancer cell lines," though how it works "is not well understood."

The results of the study are especially noteworthy given that esophageal cancer is the eighth most common type of cancer in the world and the sixth most lethal.

This 'novel' cancer treatment works wonders

In the U.S. alone, between four and 10 persons for every 100,000 die from esophageal cancer every year. The disease mostly strikes men over the age of 50, according to published statistics.

In 2011, the American Cancer Society estimated that 16,980 Americans (13,450 men and 3,530 women) were diagnosed with the disease. The organization also estimated that a majority of those diagnosed with esophageal cancer - about eight in 10 - would die.

"Esophageal adenocarcinoma, the major form of esophageal cancer in the U.S., is the most rapidly rising cancer in the western world," said a summary of the study's results. "It is generally diagnosed at a late stage and has a poor prognosis, with a five-year survival of less than 10 percent."

"Although the current treatment includes chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and, if possible, esophagogastric resection, many patients with esophageal adenocarcinoma experience progression of disease despite such treatment, suggesting that such tumors are resistant to standard therapy," the summary said.

Enter curcumin therapy. Other "novel" forms of treatment and therapy have not proven as effective, say researchers, especially in patients who have advanced cancer.

"The magnitude of this problem mandates the need for novel therapeutic agents, specifically the use of agents for chemoprevention. This is most attractive for esophageal adenocarcinoma since a pre-malignant condition, Barrett's esophagus, is a well-recognized lesion," says the summary.

In short, a common form of cancer that is resistant to current standard treatments is being bested by treatment with an age-old spice.

"Curcumin seems to have multiple molecular targets and its enhanced potency in cancer in various cancer cell lines and xenograft tumors renders it a strong candidate for therapeutic applications for esophageal cancer as well as other cancers and inflammatory disease states," said the study.

Dramatic reductions in the spread of cancer

Previous research has also found that curcumin - and its primary element, turmeric - have been found to reduce cancer growth and brain tumors as much as 81 percent.

"Used by ancient Chinese and Indian systems of medicine, curcumin has been shown to reduce brain tumor size by 81 percent in 9 out of 11 studies," say researchers from the University of California-Los Angeles.

"Turmeric and curcumin are both extremely cheap methods of boosting your health, and are readily available almost worldwide," said Mike Barrett, co-founder of alternative health organization, Natural Society. "The ubiquitous nature of turmeric both in the form of supplementation and spice sets up turmeric to be the next vitamin D over the next few years. As more medical professionals begin to recognize the benefits of turmeric and curcumin, a major media blitz will follow as it did regarding the multiple known effects of vitamin D."

In the UCLA study, 21 participants who had contracted head and neck cancer saw the spread of their disease halted after being given chewable supplements containing 1,000 mg of curcumin each.

"Curcumin, the main component in the spice turmeric, suppresses a cell signaling pathway that drives the growth of head and neck cancer, according to a pilot study using human saliva by researchers at UCLA's Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center," the National Cancer Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health, said, confirming the university's results.

Sources:

http://www.plosone.org

http://www.cancer.gov

http://www.prnewswire.com

link: http://www.naturalnews.com/038184_curcumin_cancer_stem_cells_research.html