I know how many of you are keen to find natural ways to reduce your blood pressure.

I daily recommend some of these that I know work – relaxation, breathing exercises and meditation; garlic, which can reduce cholesterol also; green tea; and as good a diet as possible – specifically high in vegetables and whole grains.

However, I have found a useful source of information that gives a little more – minerals magnesium, potassium and calcium; cider vinegar; and folic acid. Although I am not certain how much evidence there is in favour of these, it is worth giving them a try.

The trouble is, we doctors have to know so much about so much, that we have trouble finding space in our regular updates for the things that count for you – natural health.  I still have to keep up to date on the medicines that I need to prescribe (as they DO have great effects), and of other aspects of gynaecology, cardiology, paediatrics, geriatrics, reproductive health care, respiratory prescribing, arthritis, etc. This all takes so much time that I cannot keep as up to date with complementary therapies as I would like to – but at least I try.

If you click on the link to see the rest of this post, you will see some information by Joe Barton of Barton Publishing – he has found natural ways to help with hypertension. If you choose to go on & click the link at the end of his post – be warned, it is a pushy sales page, and I disagree with some of the things he says about doctors and medicines (they are not addictive).

I also want to let you know that if you do go on and buy his Ebook, this site would benefit financially – the first contribution to help run this site. At present I have funded it entirely at my own cost – not insubstantial including setting it up.

Anyway, enjoy the information and putting it in practice…

Be Naturally Healthy!

Alisonx

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

Dr Alison Grimston is a United Kingdom GP and spiritual healer who works with animals and people. Here she offers insights and information on integrating the best of complementary and scientific medicine in human and animal care.

Do you know how to cure high blood pressure with no medication? Most people would probably say to eat healthy (lower your salt-intake) and make sure you exercise. Unfortunately, most doctors tell you this and forget to tell you the other treatments you can be doing to lower your score and eventually be med-free.

The truth is that doctors are educated in medical schools were natural health and simple ‘common sense’ secrets are not taught. Unfortunately, medicine and antibiotics are only being taught because our medical industry is completely reliant upon pharmaceutical companies.

But new research is now showing the sometimes medicines are not the only treatment. In fact, some natural treatments are just as effective as their medicine counterpart.

Which is making some think, "Is there something doctors are NOT telling us?"

Naturally Treat High Blood Pressure

High Blood Pressure Medications (Diuretics, Beta Blockers, Alpha Blockers, and Vasodilators) work because they lower your blood pressure. The problem is that they make it look that you are healthy but are your numbers showing the truth?

High Blood Pressure medications work because they synthetically alleviate the pressure of the arteries and blood. For instance, with diuretics the blood will become less salty (less thick) and your pressure with drop. Another example would be beta blockers which synthetically cause the heart to beat slower.

Though these medications look good on paper, they are NOT treating the disease known as the ‘silent killer’. In fact, they could be prolonging your life but they will never fully treat the disease. And statistics show that users will eventually die from the high blood pressure.

But what if you could naturally treat high blood pressure.

7 Hypertension Tips Your Doctor Won’t Share with You

So you want to know, ‘how to cure high blood pressure’? First, you need to know how to prevent high blood pressure holistically. Because curing high blood pressure starts with a holistic treatment. Holistically treating hypertension simply means using the ‘whole’ body to cure the problem. This is completely different than taking a pill to synthetically thin out the blood.

1. Three Miracle Minerals- If you are suffering from high blood pressure, you should be supplementing your diet with 3 miracle minerals that lower high blood pressure. Magnesium, Calcium and Potassium have been shown to help lower blood pressure.

2. Garlic- Garlic has been shown to benefit the heart, lower cholesterol and lower high blood pressure naturally. The compound in garlic, allicin, is thought to naturally lower high blood pressure. Find a quality supplement today.

3. Folic Acid- Vitamin B which is found in green leafy vegetables reduces homocysteine levels in the blood. This vitamin will lower the risk of heart disease and alleviate the pressure naturally.

4. Apple Cider Vinegar- Many or my customers have found success with apple cider vinegar which contains vitamins C, A, E, B1, B2 and B6, in addition to potassium, magnesium, and copper.

5. Relieve Stress- Do you know there are numerous ways to relieve stress? Breathing exercises, exercising, or reading a book are simple ways to relieve stress and lower high blood pressure. And there are even more than this!

6. Your Diet! You know the major Do’s and Don’ts about high blood pressure dieting. Just remember to be eating your water-soluble fibers (fruits and vegetables). Fibers, especially water-soluble, will flush your system and plaque. Also, switch to whole grains! With less plaque in the arteries you will eventually be hypertension-free! Our HBP report goes into great detail about how you can treat hypertension with your diet.

7. Green Tea! It is loaded with antioxidants and research shows it lowers high blood pressure. Whether it is the ‘relaxing’ factor or the natural herbs in green tea, 1 cup of green tea will be helpful for your health!

Normalize your High Blood Pressure in 3 Weeks or Less

What foods should you be eating? What other vitamins are a must? What exercises are an absolute do? What herbs are making doctors scratch their heads? Why is chocolate now good for you?

Are you interested in lowering blood pressure naturally, with out drugs? We offer a 100% guaranteed, medical doctor-approved HBP Remedy Report which shares numerous natural health tips and guarantees to normalize your pressure in 3 weeks or less. If you are serious about living young again, please visit our How to Cure High Blood Pressure Website.

About The Author

Guaranteed to work in 3 weeks or less! Joe Barton and Barton Publishing Inc. have been publishing Hypertension Remedy Reports that teach you how to cure high blood pressure naturally. Are you next?

Click Here! to find out more….

Hi there, naturally healthy people!

I was recently approached for advice about managing depression, alongside medication.

I see many people with depression every week. It is so common in the current stressful circumstances that we live in. For many, it is not until they truly find themselves that they find the resources to get better -permanently.

I recommend http://www.livinglifetothefull.com/ , or its Australian equivalent, http://www.moodgym.anu.edu.au/   These are computerised CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) which is brilliant, given that the NHS can’t afford face to face CBT for everyone who would benefit.

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

The fantastic patient leaflets that I use every day are on www.patient.co.uk – search under depression & you will pick up self help guides as well as specific leaflets on medications (most used are SSRIs these days, like fluoxetine & citalopram) and even on St John’s Wort. There are also excellent self help guides on stress & anxiety; although I am not always certain how many of my patients actually fill them in, if you do so they help you to think through your problem & introduce CBT.

There are many other approaches to depression & I would recommend finding a coach to help you find ways of addressing your mind/body/spirit and home/work life balance. 

Reflexology can be excellent at helping the energy to flow again, and Spiritual healing and Reiki can help you to heal yourself.

EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique)is very powerful, especially if maintained. Ann (see Tap to the Top -  EFT Workshops and Training) is absolutely fantastic, so if you are able to work with her it would be working with a guru. EFT is great, as part as a multidirectional self management plan.  The main thing is to gradually change your way of thinking about yourself, your internal conversation – NLP can also help here.

Don’t forget relaxation and meditation – my website www.TheNaturallyHealthyPet.com has the best CDs I have ever found on it, including an introduction to meditation through the chakras called Journey Through the Chakras.  But the healing CDs by Nigel Shaw (also on my site) are amazing; I only have to hear the first chords now to relax. Deep breathing is essential. Yoga can help to teach you this.

Nutrition – essential – tip out all junk foods, coke, crisps etc. Try to eat as close to natural as possible, raw foods are good (see the Raw Food Coach ), organic is better than non organic & farmed well better than factory – the food holds the energy of the animal  – I found this info amazing. Drink plenty of water – I drink filtered now.

You can guess how difficult I find it to work in the NHS, trying to give all this information out in 10 minutes as well as take a history!

LOL
Alison
www.holisticdoctoronline.com

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

Hello, Naturally Healthy People!

A recent useful posting by an American doctor, Astrid Pujari, M.D., on the use of tee tree oil in the management of fungal toenail infections has inspired me to write more on this very useful plant oil.

Tee tree oil is an essential oil derived from the leaves and branches of the tea tree of Australasia.  While toxic when taken orally, as Dr Pujari points out, it has a multitude of uses when used topically.

The natural oil has a varied composition of terpene hydrocarbons, cineol and other alcohols.  In fact more than 100 different compounds have been found in tea tree oil.

It has antibacterial and antifungal action in vitro (ie in labroratory conditions, rather than in live animals). It may even be effective against MRSA (methicillin-resistance staphylococcus aureus).

It is used mainly as an antiseptic, and was used traditionally by Australian aboriginals for athletes foot, bites, cuts and stings. There is some evidence for its effectiveness in skin problems such as acne, eczema, head lice, psoriasis and bacterial infections of the skin.

Adverse reactions include local rashes and allergy, and one source says drowsiness and other CNS effects, diarrhoea, irritation of the oral mucosa, and vomiting, but these are presumably on oral intake only. Effects in pregnancy and breast feeding are unknown.

In animals, tea tree can be used topically, even undiluted, for wounds, thrush in horses (a bacterial infection of the frog of the foot, quite different to the fungal infection in humans), ringworm, and fungal, viral and bacterial infections generally. It can also be used in aloe vera gel or seaweed gel for topical applications. 

For urine infections, it can be applied topically to the skin in between the back legs of dogs and horses, but there have been occasional reports of adverse effects such as severe inflammation and even temporary paralysis. 

A few drops can be added to a bucket or bowl of drinking water for urine infections and as an immune stimulant, but the animal should also have access to plain drinking water so that it can make a choice.

Tea tree oil is an invaluable adjunct to any family medicine cabinet!

Have a great week, naturally healthy people!

Alison

Reading the September 1st British Medical Journal on my return from holiday I was pleased to see both an editorial and a research paper focussing on prescribing antibiotics in primary care. 

A study in Australian children showed that, 2 months after being prescribed antibiotics for a respiratory infection, they were twice as likely to have antibiotic resistant bacteria in their throats than a control group.

The editorial cautions the use of antibiotics in upper respiratory infections that will often get better without, and urges us to use antibiotics as carefully as we should oil – as a non- sustainable resource. The bacteria will always evolve ways of getting over whatever antibiotics we come up with, which is why the drug companies are working faster and faster to come up with new drugs more rapidly.

My own approach, as ever in general practice, is to look at each case individually. However, I know that I would hesitate to use antiobitcs in my own children if they had a sore throat or otitis media, unless it looked very purulent and they were very unwell. I usually give the parent an opportunity to return if the child is not improving, or a prescription to get made up in 24-48 hrs if symptoms are worsening.  If there are no signs of a chest infection (as opposed to bronchitis, which is an upper airway infection that does not need antibiotics), then antibiotics are not needed for a chesty cough, either.

Experience is key, along with education of patients and their families. One particularly useful aid to this is the patient leaflets that I give out in surgery, which come from the http://www.patient.co.uk site – do look! There is excellent information about the use of antibiotics.

Sore throats can be a bit different of course. If there is strong evidence of tonsillitis (although a study previously showed that a clinician cannot distinguish this accurately from glandular fever, a viral infection that does NOT need antibiotics), with pain, pyrexia, a pusy discharge on enlarged red tonsils, and tender enlarged cervical lymph nodes, then antibiotics are useful. However, if antibiotics are used, a further study showed that a full 10 day course of penicillin V is needed to eradicate Streptococcus from the throat. This goes against our trend in other infections to shorten the duration of a course of antibiotics. Now if only I can find those two references…

So you can see how complicated evidence based medicine is, how it is a full time job keeping up with it, and how we have to do our best to come up with a workable way forward with these things.

I am convinced of one thing since I started my healing journey – it is vitally important to let the body’s own immune system work wherever possible, and not step in with antibiotics until and unless necessary. And I was amazed when a homeopathic doctor friend of mine told me that he managed all of his own children’s otitis media with homeopathic remedies! It had never entered my head before that this would be possible. There is so much to learn in medical school that the complementary therapies fall by the wayside.

Hello naturally healthy people!

As a GP I often get asked about insomnia. This may be short- or long-term.

For many people, insomnia is a transient thing while they are going through extreme stress, such as bereavement or divorce. I used to suffer from lack of sleep myself, and when my job was most stressful I would wake several times per night for months, worrying about the staff or the practice, or complaints. I combatted this through healing and meditation, but there are other ways.

Click here for an excellent patient leaflet on insomina from the patient.co.uk website:

http://www.patient.co.uk/showdoc/23068774/

Some simple things that you can do to reduce your insomnia are:

Reduce caffeine-containing drinks, especially at night

Reduce alcohol in take and stop any street drugs

Do not smoke in the 6 hours leading up to bed – time

Exercise well earlier in the day, but exercising in the few hours before sleep can interfere with sleep.

Do not have a heavy evening meal

Recognise your diurnal rhythm, recognise when you are tired in the evening & follow your instinct, but try not to sleep during the day.

Ensure that your bedroom is a calm, relaxing place to be. Too much clutter can interfere with your energy, too stuffy and you will not be able to breathe clearly, and don’t have a television in the room.

Relaxation techniques can be helpful – they were extremely effective for me (see below). Learn to relax at yoga classes, buy a relaxation CD (see the CD pages of my NHP website, http://www.thenaturallyhealthypet.com/categories/20070910_2) or contact other sources such as the Brahma Kumaris (www.brahmakumaris.org.uk/).

CBT can be helpful – there are insufficient therapists available for demand, but you can do CBT yourself from your computer using Moodgym ( http://moodgym.anu.edu.au/) or Livinglifetothefull (http://www.livinglifetothefull.com/).

Drugs are unhelpful except in the very short term for extreme stress, such as bereavement. All hypnotics (sleeping tablets) are addictive, even the new ones, sometimes even within a week of starting taking them. Antidepressants such as amitriptyline can help with sleep at very low doses, without that same addictive potential. If you are considering medication, talk to your own doctor.

Since I started doing Spiritual Healing and meditation, however, sleeping is no longer a problem. Even if I do wake up and worry, I know I can (and do) push the concern away until a more appropriate time, and I get back to sleep within 1-2 minutes.

I know many people will not believe this, but meditation and self-hypnosis really do work.

First of all you need to understand that you choose whether to be stressed or not. This may sound far-fetched, but when I get stressed now I stop to consider at what point I am making that choice. Once you realise that you have a choice, you can take steps to change the way you think about things. This can be helped by NLP (neurolinguistic programming), hypnosis and hypnotherapy, and CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy).

In order to stop worrying (when you are aware that you are worrying excessively about something) you need to find some way of distancing yourself from the worry. For me I find that putting the worrying situation or relationship into a pleasant hotel room full of healing and peace, and throwing away the key, allows me to focus elsewhere. An alternative is to place the worry onto a cloud in your imagination, and watch it drifting away to leave you with a good night’s sleep. Some people have a “worry pot” with a lid – they write the worries down onto a slip of paper and put it in the worry pot until their once weekly time for lookign through the worries. Often some of the worries do not then seem so major. Some people burn the slip of paper, or put it in the freezer. The trick is to keep trying out techniques until you have found one that works for you.

And don’t forget the deep breathing! This is essential in allowing your muscles and whole body to relax. I find it effective in any stressful situation, and within 3 -6 deep breaths I am usually asleep at night.

Anyway, that is enough for one week! Meanwhile, post a reply on the comment form below the blog post with any tips that you would like to share to help with relaxation and insomnia.

Until next time, keep naturally healthy!

Alison

The content (including graphics, text, and information available on or through this website) and health information presented or discussed on this website is NOT a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, treatment, counseling, and/or therapy. The information, data, responses to your questions, and materials contained in, or made available to you with, this site and/or its content are not, nor are they intended to be, a medical evaluation or examination, medical advice or consultation, nor are they a replacement for, professional medical or mental health evaluations, examinations, advice, consultations, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the advice of a qualified medical professional relating to any medical condition.