Dr.Garber’s Blog

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The positive effects attained by homeopathic medicines are often attributed by homeopathy’s detractors to the placebo effect. This phenomenon, while misunderstood by many as something that is not real, is nonetheless a very real part of the human experience. This is why drug studies are conducted as “placebo-controlled” trials - to allow for the fact that participants in the trial will manifest symptoms whether they are given the actual drug being tested or a sugar pill (the placebo.)

To discover whether or not people taking homeopathic medicines are subject to a greater placebo effect than pharmaceutical drugs, as the critics of homeopathy claim, German investigators conducted a systematic review of randomized controlled trials. The study concluded that the placebo effect is no greater in homeopathy than with conventional drugs:

Homeopathy. 2010 Jan;99(1):76-82.

Placebo effect sizes in homeopathic compared to conventional drugs - a systematic review of randomised controlled trials.

Nuhn T, Lüdtke R, Geraedts M.

Klinik Roderbirken, Roderbirken 1, 42799 Leichlingen, Germany.

Abstract:

PMID: 20129180 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

A new study has shown the efficacy of homeopathic medicines in the treatment of moderate to severe depression. The study, conducted at the outpatient clinic at Jundiaí Medical School (Faculdade de Medicina de Jundiaí, São Paulo, Brazil) is the first randomized controlled double-blind trial with a reasonable number of subjects to draw conclusions about the homeopathic treatment of depression. Homeopathy is recognized as a medical specialty in Brazil.

Published in eCAM (an online journal of the Oxford University Press) this study showed that individually selected homeopathic remedies were as effective and were safer than Fluorxetin (Prozac.) You can read the entire study at  http://ecam.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/nep114v1

This is a very exciting study that will go a long way towards the furthering of quality homeopathic research. The study did use individually selected remedies for each participant which ultimately is the best way to treat any illness. For people who don’t have access to a homeopathic physician and are looking for a non-pharmaceutical  approach to dealing with depression, my biotherapy formula for depression has been shown to be a safe and effective way to help with this problem as well as the stress of everyday life.

The number of Americans using antidepressants doubled in only a decade, while the number seeing psychiatrists continued to fall, a study shows. About 10% of Americans — or 27 million people — were taking antidepressants in 2005, the last year for which data were available at the time the study was written. That’s about twice the number in 1996, according to the study of nearly 50,000 children and adults in today’s Archives of General Psychiatry. Yet the majority weren’t being treated for depression. Half of those taking antidepressants used them for back pain, nerve pain, fatigue, sleep difficulties or other problems, the study says.

Click here to read the whole story from USA Today

Dr. Garber’s Comments:

The information in this article raises so many issues it’s hard to know where to even start. More and more people are being prescribed antidepressants, not necessarily for depression and not necessarily by psychiatrists. There are serious consequences to taking these drugs as I have discussed many times before. The whole concept of the “off-label” use of drugs and how the pharmaceutical companies promote it is finally coming under scrutiny, as recently witnessed by Pfizer’s $2.3 billion fine for it’s dangerous off-label promotion of several of it’s drugs. The fact that many people who would benefit from psychiatric care don’t get it because of inadequate or no insurance coverage for that type of care, and end up being prescribed potentially harmful drugs by by doctors who’s expertise lay elsewhere, is just one small piece of the current health care delivery mess we have now.

Click here to learn about Dr. Garber’s safe and effective homeopathic depression formula

The AMA is opposed to President Obama’s plan for a government sponsored health insurance plan. And so am I! Who Me? On the same side as the AMA? Well, in this instance, yes. The AMA is opposed to the creation of a government sponsored health insurance plan, and so am I. But for very different reasons. The AMA opposes it because it will cut into doctors fees, also that of hospitals. On the other hand, I am against it because it circumvents the real issue. What we don’t need is more or different health insurance plans, government sponsored or otherwise. What we do need is a government sponsored health plan, sans the insurance part. The former still leaves us with all the pitfalls of the corporate profit motive behind medical decision making. At least the current health insurance policies, those that are coupled with Health Savings Accounts (HSAs,) which I have been a proponent of and have for my own family as the best current option, take the “Is it covered?” part out of the equation. I still remember so vividly, many years ago, a patient of mine asking after I enumerated for him his options for the treatment of his condition, which included surgery as well as a very effective non-invasive technique, what was covered by his insurance policy. When I explained to him that the non-invasive alternative to surgery was not a covered procedure, he said he would opt for the surgery, despite the risks. This blew my mind but at the same time I understood. I understood on a personal level what it meant to him financially but I also understood just how completely out of control our health care delivery system was. This man was willing to undergo a high risk surgical procedure, with an uncertain outcome, rather than elect to have a well documented, effective and relatively risk free non-surgical procedure performed, because one was covered by his health insurance plan and the other was not. It was truly a sad state of affairs. So now our country is on the verge of making a great leap towards rectifying this situation - or a great mistake. Pandering to the guise of the powers that be, rather than shooting for true reform in how health care is delivered in this country, will set us back decades. I am thrilled with the current administration’s agenda in most every arena but I fear that it’s push towards health care reform is going in the wrong direction.

Suicides are on the rise because of this economy. People are stalled in their lives due to fear and uncertainty. President Roosevelt was right when he said “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Let’s turn that darkness into light.

HELP ME HELP THE WORLD!

My formulas for Sleep, Anxiety and Depression will help you, your friends and loved ones better deal with today’s unprecedented challenges. Without the harmful side effects of pharmaceuticals. They are safe and effective and have been prescribed successfully by doctors to thousands of patients over the years. Together we can help millions!

HELP ME HELP THE WORLD!

Because this is so important to me, and I know that money is tight for everyone, from now through Independence Day (July 4, 2009) you will be able to buy Dr. Garber’s Natural Solutions for Sleep, Anxiety and Depression at 50% off the retail price. Buy for yourself and for someone you know who could use a helping hand. To order, click on the following links: Sleep, Anxiety, Depression.

Together we can get through this and bring a sense of well being to everyone we know.

HELP ME HELP THE WORLD!

Thank you for your support.

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The Sunday New York Times Magazine has a regular feature called Diagnosis. Each week a doctor presents a “mystery” case, one that on the surface defies a typical clinical workup. Today’s case, describing a condition that developed as a result of a tumor in the Pituitary gland,  was as intriguing as any other I have read. But what I found fascinating, no, make that mind-bogelling, was one statement made by this particular doctor. In discussing this patient’s history she described the various symptoms produced by his tumor as being relatively common problems and that because they had developed at different times and had each been addressed by a specialist that “It would take an act of imagination to link these symptoms. The patient never made this leap, and neither did any of his doctors.” This is exactly where the problem lies in the world of medical specialization. No one sees the forest for the trees. Each specialist this patient saw looked only at one particular symptom. Not one stepped back to look at the man - the whole man. Had anyone bothered to do this, fifteen years of suffering might have been avoided. This is what holistic medicine is all about, taking into account the totality of a patient’s symptoms, and doing so within the context of that patient’s story. And contrary to the writer’s opinion, it has been my experience that even when all the attending doctors haven’t made that “leap,” the patient usually has. A very wise professor of mine used to say, “Just listen to your patients. They will give you the diagnosis.”

Anytime a patient comes to see me and gets the help they are looking for with their particular health challenges, I am pleased. What I find particularly rewarding, though, is when I get the chance to help a woman who is having trouble getting pregnant, or maintaining her pregnancy, finally have a baby, and to do so without the high costs, frustrations and, most of all, without the side effects of most fertility treatment.

I know this is a very emotional area for most women, and many men too. It’s certainly understandable that when such an important life event seems to be eluding you, you want to explore every option. When you read the comments on any fertility blog or website they run the gamut from those who say they experienced “some side effects” but felt they were worth it now that they had their baby, to those who experienced more severe side effects, or were bed-ridden for most of their pregnancies, or had multiple births, to those who’s use of fertility drugs may have been responsible for their cancer. [I say "may have been" because although there is a strong association between fertility drugs and various cancers, especially ovarian cancer, a definite causal relationship has not yet been demonstrated.]

There are different reasons why a woman may be unable to conceive, or to maintain a pregnancy, but for the majority it is because of hormonal imbalance. One of my stated purposes for this blog, in addition to providing you with my thoughts on issues of importance to you and your family’s health, is to provide information on treatment alternatives to dangerous pharmaceutical drugs. In this particular area, a homeopathic formula of my own design happens to be the best suggestion I can offer. Dr. Garber’s Natural Solutions FemCycle does just what the name implies - it helps to regulate the female cycle. As I mention in the video above, I originally created this formula for a patient of mine with PCOS (polycystic ovary syndrome,) which is a common cause of infertility, who had not been able to successfully conceive. After three months on FemCycle she was pregnant, carried the baby to term and subsequently had another child. FemCycle is not a  treatment just for infertility. It helps to balance the hormones by stimulating the body to produce the appropriate amounts for each woman, not by adding hormones from the outside. In doing so it works on problems that arise in every part of the reproductive years, from young girls having their first periods and experiencing physical discomfort or emotional ups and downs, to women experiencing menstrual irregularities, PMS, dysmenorrhea, painful ovulation and endometriosis, to perimenopausal and menopausal symptoms. I have even seen positive improvements in breast health as demonstrated with breast thermography (more on that in another post.)

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Well, you’ve been asking and here it is - the third and final installment of my series on cholesterol. So far in this series I’ve discussed  the different types of cholesterol as well as some of the other fats that are found in the blood. I’ve also discussed the factors that cause inflammation in the blood vessels, the real culprit in this saga. In this post I will let you know what you can do about it all, also what I feel you should not do, and why.

I’ll get the “what I feel you should not do” part, the Ugly in the title, out of the way first so the remainder of the post can stay positive and proactive. But this area is no less important. If you’ve been reading my blog posts you probably already know that I’m referring here to the statin drugs - Lipitor, Mevacor, Zocor, Crestor, etc.

All drugs produce side effects. These side effects can be quite severe, sometimes fatal, and the statins are no exception. All doctors know this and the question always is, or should always be, what is the benefit of a given drug versus the harm. A big problem is that most doctors, whether they are conscious of it or not, tend to minimize the harm from the drugs they are prescribing because, for the most part, prescribing drugs is what they do to treat their patients. A very interesting Washington Post article clearly illustrates this curious phenomenon.

The most common side effects of statins are muscle pain and muscle weakness. The muscle symptoms are a result of the drug causing a breakdown of muscle fibers, called  rhabdomyolysis, which the body must then eliminate. In excess, this can overload the kidneys, resulting in kidney failure. One cholesterol lowering drug, Baycol, has already been taken off the market because so many people taking it died as a result. Other side effects produced by statins are liver damage, digestive problems (nausea, diarrhea, constipation,) neurological problems such as peripheral neuropathy and even memory loss.

Since these drugs are the top selling pharmaceuticals (Lipitor has been the #1 selling drug in the world for the last five or six years) you may be wondering how is that possible if they’re so bad. What does Garber know that all these doctors who are prescribing statins don’t know? The sad but true answer to this question is that ad campaigns that extol the benefits of drugs are, unfortunately, more powerful than education about side effects. Early on in their history, studies were done done that showed the cholesterol lowering effect of statins reduced the risk of heart attack and stroke. Many of the studies were sponsored by the pharmaceutical companies that made the drugs, others weren’t, but no expense was spared on the part of the makers to capitalize on those positive findings. The result of that effort has been clearly evidenced by statin’s wild popularity. However, more recent studies involving much larger patient populations over a much longer time period have shown that this is not necessarily the case. There are some benefits provided by statins, this is not in dispute. But as the benefit to risk ratio continues to decrease one must really consider the alternatives, especially when there are so many that work so well. I urge you to click on the above links and see these studies for yourselves.

Before I start discussing what you should take instead of statins I want to discuss lifestyle changes, as these are without a doubt the most important actions you can take to improve your cardiovascular health. First and foremost, if you smoke - STOP! I know it’s not easy (yes, I am an ex-smoker) and I’m not going to try to make any of you feel guilty. It’s just a fact that the single most important risk factor for cardiovascular disease is cigarette smoke.

Next comes diet and exercise - but you already knew that, didn’t you? Taking a pill may be easier, another reason pharmaceuticals have taken such a hold over us, but making lifestyle changes is so much more empowering. Of course there’s no one diet that is right for everyone but when it comes to cardiovascular health there are certain rules of thumb that do apply to everyone and have a positive effect on almost all the different blood fats. These include increasing the amount of fresh fruits and vegetables and reducing the amount of animal protein in your diet, much along the lines of what is known as the Mediterranean Diet, and eliminate, as much as possible, trans fats from your diet. Trans fats are fats that are created by the addition of hydrogen to liquid fats (look for ‘partially hydrogenated’ on the label) to make them solid. They behave much like saturated fats in that they tend to increase the bad (LDL) cholesterol and decrease the good (HDL) cholesterol. Fortunately they are fairly easy to eliminate from the diet because they are mainly used in foods you already know to be unhealthy: cakes, cookies, crackers, margarine and other shortenings, potato chips, in fact, most packaged foods. As for exercise, it depends on where you’re starting from. The important thing is to do more today than you did yesterday, and do some sort of exercise every day. If you’re leading a basically sedentary lifestyle, as most people do, don’t decide that you need to start training for a triathlon. There’s a wonderful movement afoot (pun intended) called the 10,000 Steps. This program is very easy to incorporate and will improve not only the cardiovascular system but also conditions like type-2 diabetes.

If your blood fat picture is such that following all the above is just not enough to do the trick, or needs more of a boost while you are starting to make these lifestyle changes, there are nutritional supplements that are readily available that can help. As I said in earlier posts, it’s not so much to the total amount of cholesterol but it is the ratio of the good to the bad. The omega-3 fatty acids, as are found in fish oil, will increase HDL and also decrease triglycerides. Fish oil supplements have so many other beneficial properties that I recommend them to just about all my patients. Remember from part 2 of this series that I said that the real culprits in this blood fat story are the factors in the blood that produce inflammation in the blood vessels. Fish oil has an anti-inflammatory effect, reversing some of the effect of c-reactive protein and decreases the levels of homocysteine in the blood, both leading causes of blood vessel inflammation. Homocysteine levels are also modulated by Vitamin B-6, B-12 and Folic Acid. Adding soluble fiber to the diet, as food (preferably) or as a supplement, will also help decrease triglyceride levels and LDL cholesterol levels. Certain constituents found in red wine, called phenolic antioxidants, have been found to increase HDL cholesterol, keep LDL cholesterol from forming and reduce blood clot formation. If you don’t drink alcohol, these are also available in supplement form.

I hope this three part series on cholesterol has given you some helpful information on a complex subject and some useful tools to help you improve your health without the dangerous side effects of pharmaceuticals.

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A March 30, 2009 article in the Los Angeles Times sited a new poll by the National Sleep Foundation. It found that 27% of Americans say “anxieties about personal finances, the economy or a job loss kept them awake in the previous month.” Even in the best of times, sleep disorders affect as much as 34 percent of the U.S. population - a virtual epidemic. But when times are trying, as they are in this economy, one of the first symptoms people tend to experience is insomnia.

In recent years studies have begun to link chronic sleep deprivation to serious physical health consequences. Regularly catching only a few hours of sleep can hinder metabolism and hormone production in a way that is similar to the effects of aging. Chronic sleep loss may speed the onset or increase the severity of age-related conditions such as type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity, and memory loss. Researchers have shown that just one week of sleep deprivation altered subject’s hormone levels and their capacity to metabolize carbohydrates.

The list of side effects from prescription sleep drugs is long, with the most common being headache, drowsiness, dizziness, nausea, muscle and joint pain. The most commonly prescribed class of sleep drug has been shown, in addition, to produce some pretty bizarre behavior. People have been arrested while “sleep-driving” as a result of having taken these drugs and some people have reported “sleep-eating,” sleepwalking into their kitchen, consuming thousands of calories with no memory of it in the morning!

The same LA Times article quoted a sleep specialist at a well regarded medical center in NY as saying that “strange sleep behavior can occur naturally and it’s wrong to blame the pills… .” This doctor also just happens to be a consultant for Sanofi-Aventis, the maker of Ambien (the top selling sleep drug) and commented at the their request. These bizarre side effects are so significant that the FDA in 2007 ordered the makers of Ambien, Lunesta, Sonata and ten others to issue strong new label warnings.

It is because of the prevalence of sleep disorders, the terrible effect sleep deprivation has on the body and the even more terrible side effects produced by prescription sleep drugs that I developed Dr. Garber’s Natural Solutions® for Sleep. This unique, all natural homeopathic formula helps you achieve a restful night’s sleep without the unpleasant and often dangerous side effects of prescription sleep drugs. Some people find that taking Dr. Garber’s Natural Solutions for Anxiety and/or Depression during the day and the Sleep formula before bed produces an even better result, depending on their particular circumstances.

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In the first part of this series I discussed a bit about cholesterol in general, how important cholesterol is to health and the fact that high cholesterol, in and of itself, is not necessarily bad. I want to touch briefly now on the different types of blood fats (lipids.) By now pretty much everyone has heard about “good” cholesterol and “bad” cholesterol. Well, it’s not quite as simple as just good versus bad but for our purpose here let’s use those terms. The so-called “good” cholesterol is HDL, which stands for “high density lipoprotein” and the so-called “bad” cholesterol is LDL, which stands for low density lipoprotein. A lipoprotein is simply a molecule that contains a fat and a protein together and it is in this form that fats move around through the blood stream. There are several other lipoproteins besides HDL and LDL, which is why, if you have a blood test that measures HDL and LDL as well as the total amount of cholesterol, the numbers don’t add up. It’s these other lipoproteins that make up the difference. As with everything in the body, it’s really about balance. So it’s not so much the absolute amount of these fats that’s important as it is the ratio. What we want is the HDL to be higher and the LDL to be lower, relative to the total amount of cholesterol. The lower the ratio of LDL to total cholesterol, the lower your relative risk of cardiovascular disease.

Another important class of lipids, called triglycerides, also play a role in cardiovascular health. Triglycerides are where the energy from food goes when you take in more calories than you need at the time. It is different than cholesterol and can be high when your cholesterol level is normal or even low. High triglycerides can play a significant, and independent, role in the production of cardiovascular disease.

As I mentioned in part 1 of this series, the real culprits that allow high cholesterol levels to become problematic are factors found in the blood that create inflammation and damage the inside of the blood vessels. It is when the lining of the blood vessels are damaged in this way that excess cholesterol may accumulate and form the plaques that can block blood flow. The two most important of these factors that I look at are homocysteine and C-reactive protein, often abbreviated as CRP.

Coming up in the third and final installment of this series I will tell you why I feel that statins, the drugs that are prescribed to reduce cholesterol, are harmful and how you can bring your lipid profile into a healthy balance through dietary and lifestyle changes and specific nutritional supplementation.