Better brains, naturally.

Mercury and Mental Health

How would you like to receive a diagnosis of chronic mental illness, be placed on leave from your job, and be tormented by depression, insomnia, anxiety, and obsessive thoughts—when your real problem was too much tuna fish? It happened to a young teacher in Alberta, Canada.

A published report on this man in the Journal of Forensic Science demonstrates the role toxic exposures can play in mental health. The teacher was suicidal by the time he reached Dr. Stephen Genuis, MD. A member of the American Academy of Environmental Medicine, the doctor ran tests that revealed high levels of mercury. It was learned that the teacher had eaten canned tuna everyday for years. After changing his diet and undergoing treatment to reduce mercury levels, the patient started to improve. Within eight months, he was symptom-free, discontinued his medications, and returned to work.

Genuis notes that a range of environmental toxins can affect brain function, emotion, thinking, and behavior. He suggests that chemical toxicants should always be considered when a patient is demonstrating neuropsychiatric symptoms.

Source: “Toxicant exposure and mental health—individual, social, and public health considerations,” Stephen J. Genuis, Abstract: Journal of Forensic Science, Vol. 54, No.2, March 2009.

51 Pesticide Residues on Fresh Green Beans

A blog reader told us about What'sOnMyFood.org. On this site you can select a type of food (like poultry liver or strawberries) and learn which pesticides have been detected in samples. After that sobering news, you can find out what percentage of the time each pesticide was present, and how hazardous it is. U.S. and imported foods are included, and organics are compared with conventional foods.

The site reports hazards of each pesticide 

You will learn these details:

• Is the pesticide a known carcinogen (or just probable or possible)?
• A neurotoxin?
• A hormone disruptor?
• A developmental or reproductive toxicant?

Looking at green beans and butter

Since it's summertime I decided to check conventional fresh green beans. That's how I learned there are 51 types of pesticides that might be used on them. About 30% of the time, two different known neurotoxins were found among those. For butter, 80% of the time a cancer-causing pesticide was found. 

You decide

We hear lots of discussion on how expensive organic foods are, and people question whether they are really worth the difference in cost. After a careful review of this site, you can make your own decision.

Plastics Causing Low Birth Weight in Infants

A group of chemicals called phthalates are known to cause serious health problems including disruption of the endocrine, reproductive, immune, and brain/nervous systems.

The Environmental Working Group says sources of phthalates include:

• Personal care products: deodorant, fragrances, hand lotion, insect repellent, shampoo, soap
• Water: sewage sludge, tap water, water treatment 
• Industrial air pollution
• Environment: agriculture, industrial water pollution
• Miscellaneous: medical tubing, rocket propellant
• Consumer products: adhesives, detergents, flooring, inks, paints and coatings, plastics, rubber

A new study shows that maternal exposure to the chemical compound causes low birth rate in babies. Seventy percent of infants studied had phthalates in their systems, and those with higher levels had the low birth weights.

It's impossible to escape all exposures, especially because they are not clearly marked on products. But you can check the list above and make it a point to completely avoid those you can, or select natural alternatives.

This MSNBC article shares some tips, with a focus on going fragrance-free.

How Too Little Sleep Can Be Deadly

My philosophy is that life is short, so why waste it in extra sleep? That’s why I cringed when I read some recent sleep studies. It turns out that chronic shortened sleep can make a “short life” even shorter.  

Two studies presented at the Associated Professional Sleep Societies annual meeting this month show that chronic lack of adequate sleep can increase odds of dying prematurely.

Short sleep times have been associated with cardiovascular disease, depression, and insulin resistance in adults. Adding to the problem, the use of sleeping tablets in an effort to increase sleep time has been associated with a four-fold increase in suicide risk in the elderly.

Researchers also found that adolescents with parental-mandated bedtimes for midnight or later were 25 percent more likely to have depression and 20 percent more likely to have suicidal thoughts than peers who had mandated bedtimes of 10 p.m. or earlier.

Cognitive behavioral therapy is sometimes recommended to improve sleep, and Dr. Weil offers these tips for better sleep. More information:  American Academy of Sleep Medicine

The Passing of Dr Abram Hoffer

It's always a feeling of loss when brilliant people who dedicated their lives to helping others leave this world. For me, it particularly hits home that Abram Hoffer, MD, PhD has left us at age 91 because he has been a wonderful member of our ACN advisory board.

I was humbled when he first volunteered to work with us. And I was always a bit intimidated when speaking with him because of his stature in the fields of nutrition and psychiatry. His ground-breaking contributions to discovering causes and better treatments for schizophrenia are legendary, and his nutritional insights were key to starting the movement of orthomolecular medicine. Dr. Hoffer's efforts are well described in an obituary by his son John. 

Something I have always remembered was his frank assessment of the field of neurology. One day I was lamenting the lack of response by neurologists to natural and biomedical approaches for Tourette syndrome. Dr. Hoffer explained that it usually takes over 20 years for a new concept to be accepted in medicine, and that neurologists tend to be closed-minded and usually take much longer to accept change. He also said that conditions such as obsessive compulsive disorder and Tourette syndrome were rare during most of his practice, and the increase in recent years must be of environmental origin.

I was recently in Vancouver and met several people who were still patients of Dr. Hoffer. They raved about him and spoke of him as if he were family. He will be deeply missed by so very many around the world. 

Jim Carrey Makes a Great Case on Vaccines

It's so frustrating to hear a news commentator or medical "expert" make false health assertions: sugar cannot trigger hyperactivity; diet does not affect Tourette syndrome; there's not really more autism these days, we just know how to recognize it better.  

You feel helpless as you realize that millions of parents and physicians have heard a misleading message spoken with great authority. They are left with this dangling news snippet that forges opinions and may guide actions. As a result, children can be harmed. 

In an excellent blog available today on the Huffington Post, Carrey takes on CNN's Campbell Brown for declaring that vaccines have been proven safe. Brown is just one of many who has done the same in recent months. 

Vaccine safety is a complex issue but Jim Carrey has pared it down to the basics. And there's nothing funny about it. Read here.

Sobering Facts on AntiDepressants

So many antidepressants are being prescribed these days that, well, it's depressing. Even toddlers are now a user group.

Though their judicious use can be valuable, antidepressants are not well researched for long term use nor for the age groups now taking them. Further, dangerous side effects are not fully exposed, and financial conflicts of interest by scientists muddy the waters.    

A reader sent some links to give an idea of the scope of the problem. You can judge for yourself:

A powerful proponent of psychiatric drugs for children under investigation for risperidone research. Here

Development of different movement disorders associated with antidepressant use. Here

Comprehensive list of side-effects with links to their research abstracts. Here

Use of Paxil in Tourette syndrome exacerbates tics. Here

The moral of the story: do your research and be informed when you make decisions on medications, and explore your natural alternatives.

The Latest on Cell Phone Dangers

This 9-minute video from Australia's ABC Lateline program could save your life or, even more likely, your child's. 

In a nutshell, scientists are warning of malignant brain tumors from extended cell phone use, while the industry is vehemently insisting they are safe.

Sound familiar? (Cough-cough-pass the cigarettes.)

Researchers find the problem is worse with those who started using cell phones as teenagers rather than adults. Naturally there is even greater concern for the growing number of young children now using the phones.  

Check out the video or read the transcript.  And as you do, remember that something as significant as a brain tumor is just the tip of the iceburg. Who knows what other more subtle central nervous system effects are taking place from the radiation--from increased tics to impaired concentration to hyperactivity? 

An Eye-Opener: Meeting Doug Kaufmann of Know the Cause

Last week while in Dallas to prepare for our upcoming conference, I had the honor of being interviewed by Doug Kaufmann, host of the popular health TV program Know the Cause. The program will be aired sometime in the coming weeks, and I'll let you know the date. We're excited that Doug will be speaking at our conference, and I hope you have a chance to hear him there.

Doug is a man on a crusade. He returned from Vietnam in 1971 with a severe illness that doctors couldn't explain or treat. To his surprise, Doug discovered it was fungal and food-related. After curing himself, he set out to educate others. His show and books focus on the fungal and food connection with illness, and his TV show reaches an audience of 80 million.

Doug has dedicated his career to helping people understand the widespread damage fungals, of which Candida Albicans is one, can cause. See his library for reader-friendly books on the subject. Go to his site for free information including his recommendations for a fungal-free Stage 1 Diet.

Doug's slogan is "If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got." He's all about changing lifestyle and diet to promote health, and he's the perfect messenger. He walks the talk, is down to earth--and loved by his audience.

I learned a lot from Doug's message and made changes to my diet as soon as I returned home. I know you'll learn from him also. Anyone can view his shows online on his site. Also, look for a link on his site to see if his program Know the Cause is available in your area.  

Are You Sure Your Tap Water is Safe?

With the recent trend to avoid purchasing drinking water in plastic bottles, more people are turning to home water as their source. It saves money, it's better for the environment, and there's not the concern of plastic leaching into the water. But is your home water safe?

Efforts by a nonprofit group in North Carolina make it easy to test for lead, copper, and arsenic in your water with low-cost test kits. Each of these can cause neurological damage when levels are too high. The

Environmental Quality Institute works with the University of North Carolina to research environmental toxins while also serving the public through testing.

For information on having your home or water tested, contact Clean Water Lead Testing (www.leadtesting.org) or call 828.251.6800. This website also has helpful links on water quality issues beyond lead, copper and arsenic.