I am asked everyday by my patients, "Are you getting the vaccine?" I tell them that I do many different things to keep me safe from infections, illness, and disease, even covid-19. I tell them that I have a deep trust and belief in my immune system's ability to protect me, according to evidenced-based science. Many of these strategies are no different from what I have recommended for years to address colds, influenza, and illnesses.

Most important among them is to optimize one's vitamin D levels (50-80 ng/L) and to support that with magnesium supplementation. Vitamin D has been shown to protect us against most forms of solid organ cancers, heart disease, heart attack, and strokes. Covid-19 patients that have lower levels of vitamin D do not do well and suffer more serious symptoms of disease, even death. Omega-3 fatty acids in the form of fish oils or krill oil do similar things. So the "Big Three" that I rely on regularly are vitamin D, magnesium, and omega-3 fatty acids.

Specific for viral infections, including covid-19, I supplement with zinc and add quercitin. Zinc inhibits a virus' ability to replicate but is hard to get into cells. Quercitin shuttles zinc into the cell where it can do its magic.

Add this strategy to common sense non-medical procedures such as washing your hands, hydrating, getting rest, cutting down on sugar and alcohol (not to mention smoking of any kind!), exercising regularly. If you do this your immune system will take good care of you. You might get sick, but your symptoms will be milder. Chances are you will be fine. Years ago I have struggled with sinus infections, colds, and bronchitis every winter UNTIL I adopted the above approach.

My office has been open during the entire pandemic, treating other health care providers and emergency patients. During that time I have been exposed to covid-19 persons, have been on an airplane to Florida since last year several times helping with an ailing parent, and through it all I have not contracted covid-19, a cough, a cold, nor a sinus infection. I attribute this to the above strategy and getting regular chiropractic care, which effectively stimulates a healthy immune system. The bottom line is that I have faith in my body's ability to fight off disease. Experience has shown me that as long as I take care of my body, it will take care of me.

The entire world has been dealing with this situation for over a year now and fear and panic are still rampant, unfortunately. So what can you do? Wash your hands, use a mask, social distance? Stay away from people, even family members? Wait for the "vaccine" to take hold and safe us? Sadly, the media has done an effective job at scaring people into distrusting their own intuitive sense and the body's ability to fend off disease and heal. In addition, the media, big tech, and even our own government rarely put things into context, instead they focus on the old adage, "If it bleeds, it leads!"

My thoughts: covid-19 is real and extremely contagious. The statistics for mortality are not that much different than influenza, but this bug seems to be much more contagious. If there is one thing that it has done, it has exposed how unhealthy we are as a nation. Chances are people that are not healthy will not do as well if they contract covid-19. Obesity is one of the major risk factors for poor outcomes with covid-19 and about 45% of Americans are considered obese!!! The elderly suffer more, but not just because of old age. They usually have other health issues, called co-morbidities, that reduce their vitality and ability to fight off infections, including the common cold and flu. However, I often hear reports of elderly people well into their 90's recovering from covid-19 uneventfully, with nothing more than mild to moderate symptoms. They are usually healthy, not subjected to polypharmacy (multiple prescriptions), and living an active life. But anyone with health issues, regardless of age, is at risk for getting sick from covid-19 or any infectious germ for that matter. 

Then there is the subject of case counts. Unfortunately, a positive PCR test does not necessarily mean an active infection is present, especially if the person is asymptomatic,  or without symptoms of disease. In fact, it is a poor test that was not designed for diagnosis and yields many false positive results, especially if the testing protocol utilizes high cycle thresholds. Each cycle amplifies the sample's specimen but after 17 cycles, the accuracy of the outcome drastically reduces. Standard cycle thresholds are over 35 and even 40! This means the specimen sample is amplified so much that a positive test is inevitably achieved. At this level the test is identifying an insignificant amount of a piece of viral genetic material that is usually not viable, and therefore not infectious. Unfortunately, the cycle threshold is rarely reported in test results. So, an asymptomatic person that tests positive is either pre-symptomatic (and time will tell if they have contracted the disease as symptoms will appear, usually within one week), or has just enough viral particles to trigger a positive test (especially after many cycles of amplification) but not enough to cause disease and symptoms, and therefore be contagious to others.

So what are we to do? Get the vaccine? That is a personal choice base on one's own study of the evidenced base literature. If you have not gotten the vaccine, or do not plan to do so, you must still be proactive to protect your health and those around you. Here are some simple strategies to employ:

1. The obvious: wash your hands, and often!
2. Stay home if you are sick or don't feel well and stay away from others that feel the same
3. Avoid sugars, grains, alcohol as they reduce your immune response.
4. Take the "Big Three": Vitamin D, magnesium, omega-3 fatty acids. It is known that people with low vitamin D levels do not do well with covid-19.
5. Specific for viral infections, and covid-19 in particular, take zinc and quercitin, known viral stoppers.
6. Hydrate, as this virus likes dry membranes.
7. Get plenty of rest and exercise.

Trust in your body's defense mechanisms. God gave us an immune system designed to ward off and fight disease and infections. Treat it well and it will take care of you. Remember, 99.9% of people getting covid-19 recover, most have minimal and even no symptoms. Take care of your health issues and implement some or all of the above strategies to stay healthy. 

You know the one I am talking about. "Ahhhh chooo!!!" The one that sneaks up on you out of nowhere. It's not your typical sneeze that you occasionally get. No. It carries an energetic signal telling you that something is wrong. It might be a subtle thought. You might feel OK overall, but maybe a little tired. Maybe you didn't sleep well the night before. Then the conversations in your head start," Uh oh! Am I coming down with something?" Bang! Then it happens again. Now maybe a loved one exclaims from another room, "Uh Oh!!! Are you OK?"

Your gut and intuitive sense tell you that you may be heading into a few days of feeling run down, tired, and maybe even outright sick! In fact, you may be coming down with something that you have to either head off or at least lessen its severity. The key is to pay attention to that deep sense that something is changing, something is wrong. It just happened to me!

What did I do, and what do I do when it happens? Initially, I go to "battle stations" and prepare, even if it does not amount to anything. If it does, and you slide into a cold complete with  a sore throat, congestion, cough, etc, you will at least be prepared.

First of all, I hydrate with water and lot of it, preferably filtered. I drink a full glass of room temperature water once per hour with a bit of lemon / lime squeezed into it. I don't count the ounces; I just note the appearance of my urine and look for it to run clear and often. I also take 500 mg of a chewable vitamin C with the glass of water. Make sure you get a brand that doesn't have sugar or fructose in it. Some people are sensitive to vitamin C and might develop loose stools. Great! You are cleaning out the way your body is designed.

Then, I make sure to get great chiropractic treatments to balance and stimulate my nervous system. Remember the chain reaction:  Spine-Nervous System- Health and Healing.

Next I take extra vitamin D, magnesium, and omega-3 fatty acids: what I call the "Big Three". They are known to boost the immune system along with alot of other things. There are literally a hundred herbals, vitamins, and minerals you can take, however, I like to pare it down to the minimum. The omega-3's I take are in the form of fish oils or krill oil.

My diet shifts to crisis mode: eat only when hungry, eat light, even try a little fasting, even if it's only limited to the intake of soups, bone broths, steamed vegetables. Just for a day or two. Certainly no sugars, grains, or alcohols. Warming foods, even with a little bit of spice, stimulates the microscopic cilia, or hair cells, lining the entire respiratory tree to move mucous up and out, the so called "ciliary elevator".

Lastly, rest. Cut your schedule, take a hot bath and while you are at it check out the "wet sock" treatment in my "articles" section on this website. Baby yourself but if you have the energy, do things that feed you: light exercise, read, meditate. Listen to your body. It will tell you if you should or should not do certain things. Basically, lighten your load and heal.

Hope this helps! 

   It's that time of the year when we are told that we need to get our flu vaccines. The banners outside drugstores hail, "Get Your Flu Shots Today!!" We are also told that a bad flu season is ahead of us again. However, studies show that the flu vaccine program is not very effective. We are also subjected to fear tactics to force us into getting flu shots. For instance, the CDC regularly says that 30,000- 50,000 people die each year from the flu! Wow! That's alot of people.   Unfortunately, these statistics are skewed, using combined deaths from other causes. According to the U.S. National Vital Statistics System, yearly flu deaths in 2010 were 500. That's 500, not 5,000. In some years it was only 200-300. As a comparison, over 1,800 people died from hernia surgery and over 800 women died from childbirth. In 2013, over 3,600 people died from asthma and almost 3,000 died from peptic ulcers. 
   The best vaccine program that I recommend is evidenced based, common sense, and incredibly safe: optimize your vitamin D intake. That means have your blood levels checked (you can do it yourself: www.grassrootshealth.net).
Even though the laboratory range is 20-100 ng/L, no one should be below a level of 50 ng/L. The OPTIMAL range (not just normal) is 50-80. Magnesium must be taken with vitamin D, as should vitamin K2. 
   The body will normally absorb the sun's UVB rays and convert cholesterol in the skin to vitamin D. In just 20 minutes the body can produce 10,000-25,000 IU's of vitamin D, more than what is in 200 glasses of milk! Recent studies show that the minimum dose should be 5-8000 IU per day! Not the measly 800 IU that we are told is the RDA.
   By the way, in 2014, a Canadian study published in the journal Nutrient, determined that the Institute of Medicine seriously miscalculated the RDA for vitamin D by a decimal place!! That's being off by a factor of 10! The RDA was calculated at that time to be 800 IU. It should have been 8,000!
   So, get your D levels checked. If it's low, contact a Vitamin D literate practitioner and get your level optimal!!

   It's back to school and back pain from school backpacks is very common and the month of September usually brings children into our office with symptoms of back pain, but also neck and shoulder pain. More than 14,000 children have back pain from backpacks every year. A recent study in the June 2016 Spine Journal researched the effects of backpacks in over 5000 children in Italy, ages 6-19. They found out two major findings: 1) that the duration of use was more prone to causing back pain compared to weight of the pack, and 2)  girls had more intense and frequent pain than boys, In addition teen girls were at more risk to suffer serious pain. 
  Choose a good fitting backpack, limit your load and pack  it correctly, and choose wisely what really needs to be in the pack. I

Things to do to limit back pain:
1.  If you do not need to carry your backpack, then put it           down, and do not carry it for long periods without a rest.
2.  Carrying more than 10% of your body weight in a pack          can be harmful.
3.  Use a pack with wide, padded straps
4.  Use a pack with chest and hip straps to keep the pack           snug and close to the back.
5.  Use a pack with multiple compartments for better load
     distribution.
6.  Keep the pack from hanging no more than 4 inches               below your waist.
7.  Use both shoulder straps and do not sling the pack over
     one shoulder. You want an even and balanced load.
8.  You might try a pack with small wheels on it when                   carrying heavy longs for long periods.

Check out the new webpage at the bottom of the menu list!

Mayonnaise and tuna fish have gone together for years. However, for someone who is sensitive to eggs, or just wants a change, here is a great substitute for mayonnaise in your tuna fish! Just use avocado. I call it a "tunacado"! Delicious and nutritious. The avocado supplies you with healthy oils and fats, the tuna provides the protein.

Ingredients for one:
    •    1 cans of flaked light tuna
    •    1/2 ripe avocado
    •    1/4 cup chopped celery
    •    1/4 cup chopped red onion
    •    1/8 cup chopped, toasted walnuts
    •    1/2 tsp dijon mustard, optional
    •    1/4 tsp cumin, optional
    •    salt and pepper, to taste. I like to add jalapeno pepper

Instructions
    1.    In a large bowl, mash up avocado with the back of
           a fork or potato masher.
    2.    Add in tuna, celery, red onion and walnuts. Mix well.
    3.    Add in dijon, cumin and salt and pepper. Mix well.
    4.    Serve on bread, top on salad or eat plain.
    5.    Will keep up to 1 week in refrigerator.

Enjoy!

    Grains, contrary to popular belief, are not good for us as they supply too much of the inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids. People in this country eat far too many in the form of breads, cereals, and yes, my favorite–pasta. Even whole grain pasta is not good. A grain is a grain, is a grain. It still supplies omega-6 fatty acids, even the "natural" whole wheat, whole grain foodstuffs. Even the government's food pyramid is upside down!
    So what are you supposed to do, especially when you like pasta like me? Especially spaghetti and meatballs? I use a julienne vegetable peeler and make zucchini noodles. Use the skin and all and peel right down to the seeds. You can then cut up the core and thrown them in a stir fry or sauce. Take the zucchini noodles and saute them in coconut oil (or olive oil) for 2-3 minutes until just tender, season to taste. and voila– a great tasting and healthy pasta-like dish. You can put them in a stir fry, eat them as a side dish, put spaghetti sauce on them, etc. Sometimes I mix in carrots that are julienned too. Try and just eat!