Integrative Health Blog

 

You have just received a diagnosis of cancer. It is normal to feel overwhelmed and experience mood swings. Your emotions might range widely from fear and sadness to anger and disbelief.  However, working through your emotions and making a plan may help you in your journey toward healing. I am writing this in hope of helping you to pick a path of clarity so that you can feel calm, strong, and positive as you approach your cancer treatment options, and in the process, help you reclaim your life.

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How Prolonged Stress and Inner Conflicts Contribute to the Illness Process

As part of the Integrative Cancer program at NIHA, we look for any inner conflict and any prolonged stress a person may have because we know it may result in profound changes in the physical body of the person. 

You may have heard about the new science of “Epigenetics" which studies how our environment and our beliefs modulate what our body cells “print out." The now popular ACEs Study (Adverse Childhood Experiences) describes the deep influences childhood trauma can have on the later development of adult illness and wellness of a person.

Emotional trauma usually happens in relationship. Someone has hurt you, was neglectful, abused or abandoned you. (It is not the car that hurt you in an accident but the distracted driver.) Internal conflicts can derive from trauma from childhood (“developmental trauma", often called “childhood wounds”) or they can come from unresolved conflicts that are coming from current life situations such as your job, family, relationships, money, loss, loneliness, chronic illness, accidents, and even inherited conflict from our ancestors.

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Oral Cancer....Not Just for Smokers

More than 43,000 Americans will be diagnosed with oral cancer this year.  According to the National Cancer Institute, oral cancer is more common than leukemia, skin melanoma, and cancers of the brain, liver, bone, thyroid, ovaries, and cervix.  It is a major cause of disfigurement and death in the United States.

Oral cancer  includes cancers found in the mouth, and on the tongue, lips, throat, parts of the nose, and larynx.  Seventy five percent of these cancers are caused by tobacco and alcohol use but anyone can get oral cancer. Also, human papillomavirus (HPV) is a significant risk factor for the development of cancers in the tonsils and the back of the throat.

Your mouth is one of your body’s most important early warning systems.

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Join us for the webinar:

Mindfulness, Meditation and Cancer

Date: Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2017

Time: 8:00-9:00 pm 

Presenter: Dr. Gant

 

REGISTER

Mindfulness-based therapies have been shown clinically to improve immunity and outcomes for various conditions such as cancer. At the very least, extricating the mind from a preoccupation with the past and future can provide significant benefits for sleep, mood and autonomic arousal. Fear and anxiety impairs the immune system's response to infections and cancer, and mindfulness can help to ground the mind in the present. 

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Is it your bedroom, where you can get restful sleep regularly? 

Maybe. The International Agency for Research on Cancer had classified shift-work “that involves circadian disruption" (disruption of the 24 hour biological clock) as probably cancer causing to humans (Straif, 2007), but a large study published in 2016 did not find a statistically significant relationship between shift work and cancer (Travis, 2016). So avoid shift work if you can, perhaps the jury is still out on this one.

Is it your garden?

Although not a room in your home, you can garden organically and avoid pesticide exposure, or use lawn maintenance services that avoid chemical pesticides. Why? Certain pesticides are known to increase breast cancer (triazine pesticides), lung cancer (carbamate and phenoxyherbicides) and brain and blood cancers in children (indoor insecticides) (Sanborn, 2004).

Is it your bathroom, where you use multiple personal products made with dozens of chemicals, every day?

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Here at National integrated Health Associates (NIHA) we have a dynamic team of doctors and health practitioners involved in Integrative Cancer Care.

We integrate modern medical science with living wisdom from generations around the world to provide specialized adjunctive cancer care from cancer prevention to where appropriate, cancer treatment.

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Dr. Charles Gant, MD, practices functional medicine, an emerging field of medicine which specializes in diagnosing the precise metabolic, allergic, immune, infectious, nutritional, toxicological and genetic uniqueness of each patient.

As a physician member of the NIHA Integrative Cancer Care team, he is happy to blend his work with some extraordinary skills of other team members to provide our patients with what may be one of the most comprehensive approaches to cancer care in the area.

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The American Cancer Society states that aside from tobacco use, the most important risk factors that can be changed for cancer prevention are: body weight, diet and physical activity. For disease prevention, an anti-inflammatory diet is second to none! A nourishing, anti-inflammatory diet focuses on whole foods that are colorful, rich in nutrients, and full of fiber and healthy fats.

Nature’s bounty gives us so many vegetables and fruits that are colorful - that’s our clue that a food is full of nutrients. The deeper and richer the color, the more vitamins and minerals are present. It doesn't matter which vitamins or minerals are in a particular food because they are all important for health. Whole foods are essential when creating an anti-inflammatory lifestyle. 

Processed foods don't provide an anti-inflammatory effect on the body. They can cause inflammation in the body. They are usually made with Omega 6 oils like corn, soybean or canola that have been heated at high temperatures and have therefore been damaged. These oils create free radicals in the body, which, along with the high sugar content of most processed foods, creates inflammation. Research has shown that chronic inflammation paves the way for most chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes and cancer.

Sugar = Inflammation

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According to National Cancer Institute:

1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women will develop cancer in their lifetime.

It is not surprising that cancer rates are rising to over 40% of the population given:

1. The exploding levels of environmental toxicity
2. Steadily increasing stresses
3. Unhealthy life styles
4. Critically deficient or imbalanced nutrients in our foods

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October is breast health awareness month. As a woman I am keenly aware of breast cancer and not just in the month of October. It’s estimated that 1 in 8 women will develop invasive breast cancer in her lifetime.

I believe that it is my responsibility to do everything I possibly can for my breast health. For me, that includes breast thermography which is a non-invasive screening tool used to determine a woman’s risk of future breast cancer.

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