I’m fully aware the patient group at WholeHealth Chicago is an interesting bunch. With or without any chronic health issues, they’re what doctors call “pro-active” about their health and well-being. For example, Bob, with middle aged spread, his newly diagnosed high blood pressure, high cholesterol, started his treatment elsewhere is now meeting with Olivia Darrow, […]
Category: Aging
Anti-aging medicine uses a wide variety of diagnostic tests and therapies to maximize healthy longevity. Many anti-aging approaches are part of standard health care including colonoscopies, mammograms, cholesterol measurement, and hormone replacement. More alternative approaches include detoxification, growth hormone therapy, and nutritional supplements.
MALE MENOPAUSE: IS IT REAL?
Definitely. Last week, wrote how actor Naomi Watts experienced menopause symptoms earlier than she ever dreamed possible, her mid thirties. For men, testosterone levels start drifting downward in this decade as well. Most men don’t notice anything, others do feel something is “off”. “My energy is not the same.” “Don’t have interest in sex like […]
ACTOR NAOMI WATTS, SURPRISED BY MENOPAUSE, WRITES A GOOD BOOK ABOUT IT
“Dare I Say It”, is subtitled, “Everything I Wish I’d Known About Menopause”. Being female has never been a walk in the park for Ms. Watts. She was last in her class to have her first period at eighteen, needed the guidance of Cosmopolitan Magazine and Sidney Sheldon novels (anyone remember those?) to learn the […]
WHY I STARTED WHOLEHEALTH CHICAGO: NOT WANTING YOU TO DIE FROM SOMETHING STUPID
Years and years ago, I was the Medical Director of a REALLY LARGE group here in Chicago. At its peak, we had over fifty doctors, both primary care physicians and members of virtually all specialists. We provided care for over 20,000 patients both in Chicago and the suburbs. There were patients in about 15 primary […]
Hydration and Longevity
You’ll like this story. Sometime in her eighties, my Aunt Hildy, who passed on at 94 or so, handed me a book, “Your Body’s Many Cries for Water”, by an Iranian physician with a totally unpronounceable name, Fereydoon Batmanghelidj, M.D. She told me it had changed her life. Dr. B. attributed virtually all chronic illnesses, […]
LONGEVITY MEDICINE: AN UPDATE
I’ve been getting more and more inquiries about prescription medications, supplements, and infusions all being promoted for their ‘anti-aging’ and ‘longevity’ benefits. Patients want to know, quite reasonably, what’s real? What’s not? What’s dangerous? What’s crazy? Let’s spend this Health Tip on an update among the world of the anti-aging ‘gurus’ (There are plenty of […]
MORE STEPS TO PRESERVE YOUR BRAIN AND PREVENT DEMENTIA
High on the wish list (probably highest, actually) of a new patient coming into WholeHealth Chicago for “wellness” is not just “longevity” but “longevity plus ‘brains/wit/wisdom’” a la Betty White, Norman Lear, George Burns, late Chicago actor Mike Nussbaum. So let’s talk “brain” and say you’re in one of these four situations: 1. There’s dementia […]
Delay Aging and Monitor Your Progress
Most people figure they must be getting older based on how they feel and look. We wince at our first grey hair, deepening wrinkles, and shifting body fat. We huff and puff climbing the stairs, forget names, and occasionally leak fluids. We relate to the line from a Leonard Cohen song, “I ache in the […]
YOUR “LOW ESTROGEN FACE” AND HOW WE CAN HELP
Sex hormones are not to be taken lightly. Some recent research measuring blood levels of estrogen in several hundred young women and then making facial “composite photos” showed that those with normal to high (but not too high) levels of estrogen were more physically (read “sexually”) appealing. Go overboard with estrogen and all sorts of […]
Natural Treatments for Osteoarthritis and Rheumatoid Arthritis
It’s important that you keep these two forms of painful arthritis separate in your mind. Osteoarthritis (OA) is considered ‘non-inflammatory’ and basically a ‘wear-and-tear’ phenomenon that occurs with passage of time. There are inflammatory components as ‘anti-inflammatory medications’, like aspirin, or the NSAIDs (Motrin, Aleve, etc.) will relieve pain, but so will Tylenol, which is […]
NINE IMMEDIATE STEPS TO PRESERVE YOUR BRAIN
High on the wish list (probably highest, actually) of a new patient coming into WholeHealth Chicago for “wellness” is not just “longevity” but “longevity plus ‘brains/wit/wisdom’”, a la Betty White, Norman Lear, George Burns, actor Mike Nussbaum. So let’s talk “brain” and say you’re in one of these four situations: For everyone listed above, 1 […]
NEWS FOR WOMEN ABOUT A NOBEL PRIZE WINNER, ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE, AND ADD
If you’ve got some spare time, you might want to read two or three articles summarizing the work of Claudia Goldin, the first woman to be a solo winner for the Nobel Prize in Economics. Most involves gender inequalities, especially in marriage and the workplace. The results of which I observe with painful regularity in […]
Hydration and Longevity
Sometime in her eighties, my Aunt Hildy, who passed on at 94 or so, handed me a book, “Your Body’s Many Cries for Water”, by an Iranian physician with a totally unpronounceable name, Fereydoon Batmanghelidj, M.D. She told me it had changed her life. Dr. B. attributed virtually all chronic illnesses, premature death, and susceptibility to infections to the state of chronic dehydration we had allowed ourselves to endure by our insufficient intake of water.
Because Dr. B. also felt that water had curative properties, his work was literally shredded by conventional physicians here in the U.S., where he was regarded as a “crank” and a “quack”. The Wikipedia entry is especially brutal since it’s written by Stephen Barrett of Quackwatch, which (if you bother to read it) seems to have a special loathing for Dr. B. because of his claims that good hydration promotes longevity.
And so the years pass. Dr. B. dies at 74, although his books (he wrote seven more) all remain in print, apparently being read by the well-hydrated, healthy, and generally ignored by the desiccated conventional physicians.
Updates On Anti-Aging Medicine And Dementia Prevention
Taurine. Never heard of it, right? It’s an amino acid, one of the building blocks of protein, and helps digestive, cardiovascular, musculoskeletal, and nervous system functions. However, we require more taurine than we can manufacture, so deficiencies are possible. Fortunately, plenty of taurine is found in protein foods: meat, poultry, dairy, seafood, and yes, vegans […]
NAD+: Getting Serious About Anti-Aging Therapy
We’re living in a time of major, worldwide breakthroughs when it comes to understanding how we age and also the steps we can take to not only slow down aging, but to all appearances reverse the process. Over history, the fountain of youth seekers came, literally and figuratively, to dead ends, but back then Ponce […]
How Menopause Can Destroy Mental Health
“Pretty dramatic title,” I thought, “especially for usually staid, Guardian newspaper.” But the writer had been collecting data from UK doctors, interviewing patients, and clearly was shocked at what she had found. Not only were individual women describing their personal experiences with serious bouts of depression, anxiety, panic attacks and suicidal thoughts, but also “brain […]
Water and Your Longevity
You’ll like this story. Sometime in her eighties, my Aunt Hildy, who passed on at 94 or so, handed me a book, “Your Body’s Many Cries for Water”, by an Iranian physician with a totally unpronounceable name, Fereydoon Batmanghelidj, M.D. She told me it had changed her life. Dr. B. attributed virtually all chronic illnesses, […]
Three Paths To Great Looking Skin: Diet, Hormones, Your Gut
Let’s clear away what everybody knows about speeding up skin aging: cigarettes(click to yucky picture), too much sun exposure, junk foods. As a nutritionally oriented physician, a healthful diet is really important for an attractive skin. Nowhere is the phrase “garbage in, garbage out” more apparent than there, right on your face. When you’re eating […]
Quell The Fire of Menopause Hell With Bioidentical Hormone Replacement Therapy (BHRT)
When it’s time, you can expect to transition through menopause in one of three ways. If you’re unlucky enough to land in Menopause Hell, give some serious thought to bioidentical hormone replacement therapy (BHRT). Some women experience Menopause Heaven, in which your periods start changing and then stop without drama. A year goes by without […]
Slow Aging and Track Your Results
Most people figure they must be getting older based on how they feel and look. We wince at our first grey hair, deepening wrinkles, and shifting body fat. We huff and puff climbing the stairs, forget names, and occasionally leak fluids. We relate to the line from a Leonard Cohen song, “I ache in the […]