It's Still Water.. but oh! The Bling factor!

Here's a pic of the bottled water that won the packaging award this year. I'm still wondering what they judged on; amount of wasted money?!?

Check it here

Mobile Phones proven to Affect the Brain

We've heard so many reports about damage to the brain by mobile phone usage now. And - of course -we've also heard an equal number of reports (usually paid for by the Telcos) refuting the claims of damage.

Now the latest New Scientist carries a report on a study that shows that mobile usage does affect two proteins in the head. The interesting point about the report is that the scientists have no idea of the role of said proteins.

It's sort of... "well, we know that it affects you but because we don't know HOW it affects you we can't say don't use them."

I still get raves from our TalkSafe users and here is a 3-page .pdf report from many of them. At under $30 it seems to me to be one of those necessities that we all have to make a decision on. I have one on my mobile, my laptop and my home hands-free.

Click for more data plus order point.

Just a Beautiful Pic to Share

If you are an owl lover like me you're going to love this pic.
Here

Foot Patches Feel The Pinch

Yes, after a long period of stability, the Footsies detox foot patches available to Aussie customers are going up in price.

We get so many people using these as a regular detox practice, that I thought we ought to let people know so they can grab a bargain while stocks last.
The ever-popular Footsies Tranquillity and Xtra patches will be going up by $1.50.

Here's the link for Aussies.
In the States, you can breathe easy. The excellent Acupeds foot patches from ION LIFE USA are steady as they go, and you can order them here.

Old Water Filters; A New Twist!

Aussie scientists have been delving into the strange phenomenon that causes old water filter cartridges to give better tasting water.

Writing in the Inderscience publication International Journal of Environment and Waste Management, the team explains how bacteria that grow on particles in a sand filter effectively extract the compounds that produce the taste.

Natural earthy and musty smells in our drinking water are not usually a health risk, but many consumers prefer a fresher taste. This represents an ongoing challenge to the water companies.

"Although adverse odors do not present a risk to human health, their presence often leads to a misconception that the water is unsafe for drinking," explains Gayle Newcombe, Research Leader at the Applied Chemistry Unit of the Australian Water Quality Centre in Salisbury, South Australia.

She and her colleagues have investigated the effect of sand filters in extracting the most common earthy molecules, geosmin and methylisoborneol, from the water supply. These two compounds occur naturally in water and are non-toxic.

Newcombe and her colleagues at the Australian Water Quality Centre and Bridget McDowall in the School of Chemical Engineering at The University of Adelaide have now demonstrated that they can remove geosmin and MIB using biologically active sand filters. In such filters, the particles of sand are allowed to accumulate a biological film of beneficial bacteria that absorb and break down the biodegradable odor molecules.

The team tested sand filter material taken from working water treatment plants. They found that sand taken from a 26-year old filter had a well-established biofilm and was able to remove any detectable traces of geosmin and MIB in less than two weeks. Fresh filter sand with no biofilm, in contrast, was essentially ineffective, removing less than two-thirds of the geosmin and MIB even after several months of operation.

The team is now investigating how to accelerate the development of active biofilms for water purification.

Adapted from materials provided by Inderscience Publishers, via EurekAlert!, a service of AAAS.

Coke pH: Settling the argument about tooth rotting.

Des Wiggins called me up this week. He's been telling people that Coke was pH 2.5, and he was pulled up by a doctor friend who said that was impossible, that it would burn all the way down. (Each 'point' in pH represents a ten-fold increase of acidity, so 2.5 would have ten times the 'burn' of 3.5).
So I decided to settle it once and for all.
Here's the Video.

Sanctuary Detox and Learn

A couple of years ago Cassie and I spent an amazing ten days fasting at the Sanctuary on Kho Phan Gan, Thailand. It was amazing not just because of the fasting and its health benefits, but also because it was a lovely, lovely place where we did (almost) nothing. Now fellow Alkalarian Daniel Reid, author of The Tao of Detox, is conducting a retreat at the Sanctuary.

If you'd care to gift yourself or your loved one, download the .pdf details here

Good News Week

More good news in the mail today.

Rachael, a new ION LIFE Alkalarian, wrote to me about her experience in dealing with my Alkaline Specialists team.

She's just taken delivery of her new DELPHI, and regarding the service she got, she says:

"Very thorough information and the staff gave us so much of their time on the telephone. Service and delivery, excellent."

Once again, this makes coming to work all that more rewarding!

If you want to know more about alkalizing, give the team a call. We have so many ways to help you change your life for the better!
Call free in Australia on 1800-ANTIOX, in the US, it's

~Ian

Anti Depressant Studies 'Biased and Misleading'

Stan, my Canadian ION LIFE partner, sent me a clipping about how clinical reports are misused and er.. filtered.

We are now told that we have 'evidence-based medicine'. This wonderful sounding newspeak term supposedly 'integrates individual clinical based expertise with the best available external clinical evidence from clinical research'. A good doctor backed up by good data, right?

So you can go to the doc confident that 'evidence-based medicine' willa ssure you of correct diagnosis by an educated unbiased doctor. Right?

One would assume that EBM, by its very nature, would take into account all available evidence. After all, that's what it says it is. Right?

So here's a new term we poor sap-patients have to deal with. It's called 'publication bias'; the phenomenon of'positive outcome' studies being more readily accepted than negative outcome ones. Put another way, everyone wants a good cancer drug, and no-one wants to hear about side effects. So when the Jan 17 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine carried a story identifying 'publication bias' in the release of studies about antidepressant medication, with a survey of 74 studies registered with the FDA, it raises a few hackles.

Of the 74 studies:
38 had positive effects,
36 had negative effects,
...but 22 of the negative ones had - for whatever reason, not been published. This changed the whole 'look' of the total studies. By not publishing 22 negatives, it looked like the positive 'score' on the subject was a highly acceptable 94%. Unfortunately, when reviewed by the FDA, of these 'positive' studies, only 51% were genuinely positive.

So the drugs reviewed appeared around one third more effective than the net research really found.

The author of the study states; "The bottom line for people considering an antidepressant, I think, is that they should be more circumspect about taking it."

Now wait a minute. let me get what he's saying! He is suggesting that a chronically depressed person should study all the reports to decide whether his doctor has been fed a story about the whizbang drug he's about the prescribe.

Come on! Who are you kidding!

Just to muddy the water a little further, the esteemed Lancet journal found that although studies support the use of a variety of antidepressants for kids, the hidden unpublished data shows a tendency towards suicidal behaviour.

Very depressing. Where's the Valium?

Caffeine Update: Pregnancy.

According to a new study that's just been released, pregnant women who consume over 200 mg of caffeine per day have TWICE the risk of miscarriage than women who consume no caffeine at all. Two hundred milligrams of caffeine is roughly the amount that's found in just two cups of coffee.

I just gave coffee up again. It's such an insidious social drug! Staff wanted a capucino machine in our new premises.. so who tested it out? Moi! And then who felt like one at the same time every day? Moi. And who got the effect of the down-end of my mood swings as a result? Cassie.

Is there a choice between a good woman and a good drug? No. The coffe had to go.

Dermatitis; Result!

Karen Scott emailed us today wrapt about her ION LIFE experience.

"Dermatitis I had for 31 years cleared up in 2 weeks when I used a chlorine free shower filter and began drinking alkaline water."

A great way to begin my week. ~ Ian

Michael Pollan talks about a new way to see world change.

Author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollan is a wonderful lecturer on how to look anew at how Nature may be able to give us answers about the planet's future.
Watch him Here

And while we're on the subject you can check his guest blog here where you also find his eminently sensible rules for eating;

1. Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food.
2. Avoid food products with more than five ingredients; with ingredients you can't pronounce.
3. Don't eat anything that won't eventually rot.
4. Shop the perimeter of the supermarket, where the food is least processed.
5. Avoid food products that make health claims.
6. Eat meals and eat them only at tables. (And no, a desk is not a table.)
7. Eat only until you're 4/5 full. (An ancient Japanese injunction.)
8. Pay more, eat less.
9. Diversify your diet and eat wild foods when you can.
10. Eat slowly, with other people whenever possible, and always with pleasure.

Thirtry One Ways NOT to be a cancer statistic.

Courtesy of Readers' Digest, a good summary of what you can do today to protect yourself from C_____ tomorrow.
Here

If Aspartame is OK in Coke, then surely it won't hurt rats, right?

Whe a lady found her whole family addicted to Diet Coke, she decided to test the research that said Aspartame, the artificial sweetener in Coke was safe, by simlating Diet Coke addiction in rats.
The results are bizarre.
Warning; some ugly images.
See the test here

John Kanzius, Putting power over cancer and fuel in our hands.

Just take a look at this guy! He's not a scientist or a corporate mogul but his retirement research is about to change the world.

And with huge projects all over the world creating drinking water from seawater there's going to be a lot more salty water to burn!

Monday-itis Overcome

It's Monday. You had a BIG weekend and you seriously need a nap. Science has come up with then answer to napping and not getting caught. Paste on Eyeballs. Why didn't anyone think of this before!

The BIG Killer every year.

I've often talked about the massive problem of sub-health drinking water in poor countries. This graphic says it very, very well.

The 'fffff' test.

Had a client call up this morning askuing for a 'ffff test kit '. It took awhile to realise he wanted a pH test kit.

Independently Ageing

There is close correlation between living independently and reaching the ripe old age of 100, according to a new study conducted by the Boston University Medical Centre.

Researchers found that a very high proportion of people who live to 100 lived independently until well into their 90s.

They studied over 700 centenarians in the Boston area and found that 90% were functionally independent at the age of 92 years and, amazingly, 75% were still independent at the age of 95 years.

Another interesting finding from the study was that people who lived to 100 are generally able to avoid age-related diseases until very late in life or entirely, with 72% of male centenarians and 34% of female centenarians still free of age-related diseases at the age of 97 years or older.

The researchers found that the centenarians were very different with regards to years of education, socio-economic status, religion, ethnicity, and patterns of diet (vegetarians to diets high in saturated fats). But there was one distinct pattern – centenarians in the Boston area were almost twice as likely to be women than men.

Coke finds a new Market.. in India

A report just arrived tells me that Indian farmers have found a new use for Coke - instead of shelling out to the multinationals for pesticide, they are shelling out to multinational CocaCola Corp and using it as a spray-on pesticide.

Why am I not suprised? With an acidity of around 10,000 times higher thahn the alkaline water I drink, it would make a great antifungal for starters!

Here's the report with much more detail.

Distilled Water

I often have people ask me about the effect of distilled water on the body, especially since Dr Zoltan Rona published a very derogatory opinion about it. So it's good to get a readers' feedback on his own experience.

"I was drinking huge amounts of distilled water & was noticing on occasions pains on each side of my heart. Well, I think it was my heart or in very close range of my heart. Then at times, the pains were both sides at once.

After giving up the Distilled Water & going onto bottled water, the pains went away quicker than you could say, I feel better now.

I never went the the doctors to have it checked out, yes stupid me, but as I said, no more pain at all.

Now I'm drinking about 5-7 litres of Alkaline Water a day & I couldn't think of anything better to drink - other than the occasional fresh fruit juice!

Perth Alkaline Man"

Some years ago I had a lady come to see me from England. A professional dancer, her doctor had told her that her bones were like a seventy year old, and that she should stop drinking distilled water immediately. It just amkes sense; the water surrounding our cells is saline, alkaline and mineralised. Why would we supplement it with distilled water?
~ian

Your Free Bottled water... with added extras!

Just in from USA

Tests have confirmed a substance found in bottles of treated water distributed to the public in the Albuquerque area is black yeast.

The Albuquerque-Bernalillo Water Utility Authority halted distribution of bottled samples of Rio Grande water last month following the discovery of foreign matter in several bottles. Water utility officials vow to do more testing to ensure safety.

(Ian: As they would!)

But they say they're confident the yeast could not have survived the water purification process.

(Ian: As they would say.)

The authority had distributed about 900,000 of the bottles.

So You Think Smoking is Better than being a Heroin Addict?

Scott Roskelly of UC Hospitals reports:

"That was good!" "Do it again."

This is what the brain says when people use tobacco, as well as ‘hard drugs’ such as heroin. New research published in the February 13 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience indicates that the effects of nicotine and opiates on the brain's reward system are equally strong in a key pleasure-sensing areas of the brain – the nucleus accumbens.

"Testing rat brain tissue, we found remarkable overlap between the effects of nicotine and opiates on dopamine signaling within the brain’s reward centers," says Daniel McGehee, Associate Professor in Anesthesia & Critical Care at the University of Chicago Medical Center.

McGehee and colleagues are exploring the control of dopamine, a key neurotransmitter in reward and addiction. Dopamine is released in areas such as the nucleus accumbens by naturally rewarding experiences such as food, sex, some drugs, and the neutral stimuli or ‘cues’ that become associated with them.

Nicotine and opiates are very different drugs, but the endpoint, with respect to the control of dopamine signaling, is almost identical. “There is a specific part of the nucleus accumbens where opiates have been shown to affect behavior, and when we tested nicotine in that area, the effects on dopamine are almost identical,” says McGehee.

"...It also demonstrates the seriousness of tobacco addiction, equating its grip on the individual to that of heroin. It reinforces the fact that these addictions are very physiological in nature and that breaking away from the habit is certainly more than just mind over matter," says McGehee.

Ian: No, I'm not a smoker but i have lived with one...

Cancer Breathalyser on the Way

A Wales University is developing a cancer breathalyser.

Diagnostic techniques based on exhaled breath are much less developed than traditional blood or urine analysis techniques, and are not widely utilised in clinical practice. Such techniques have also previously been seen as crude, subjective and unreliable.

However, due to improved analytical methodology, volatile marker-based diagnostics offers new potential in the rapid diagnosis and monitoring of illnesses.

Just imagine being pulled over by the enforcers after a few drinks and being told 'Sir, do you wnat the good news or the bad news? The good news is that you are not drunk. The bad news is....."

Alkaline Specialist in Training

My team is expanding. If you live in Australia and would like to live in beautiful Byron Bay working and learning with a dedicated team of people helping people, I'd like to talk to you.

You'll need to have a strong ethical base, an interest in health, good communication and PC skills.

If you think that fits, contact me

ION WAYS Goes GangBusters

As some readers may know, ION LIFE USA is the US distributor of Jupiter Science Water Alkalizers. (Link on header of this page)

Now ION WAYS, an offshoot of ION LIFE USA, is going 'gangbusters' in the USA with a new formula network marketing system selling Jupiter models.

It's spreading daily and I have to say the ION WAYS team have really perfected spreading the message of alkaline balance, with 'water parties' being held all over the US.

If you think you'd like to join ION WAYS, click on the link above and I'll organise it for you. We need ethical, dedicated people willing and committed to help others.

Is there a better way of making a living?

The Cardanali Weighs in on Bottled Water

VENICE, ITALY— Cardinal Angelo Scola, this city’s patriarch, is urging Catholic Venetians to give up bottled water during the Christian fasting season of Lent,

He is asking them to donate the money they save to a water pipeline project in Thailand.

The mayor of Venice is backing the request. He says he now drinks only tap water and calls bottled water an unnecessary luxury, according to the report.

A local water company is donating carafes to tap water drinkers to use for storing water in the refrigerator.

Why You Need To Do Your OWN Health Research!

Cancer recognition through Discrimination

I've long been intrigued by the link between some health philosophies and victim consciousness. It has seemed to me that there are some ideas that (especially on the net) are reborn again and again, always under the protective and attractive mantle of 'information they tried to supress'.

It also appears that some of the people are attracted to these 'perennial philosophies' use the same form of discrimination on everything else. It's not hard to see it when almost every email they send you is about yet another 'hidden truth', 'supressed health knowledge' or shocking revelation. I do wonder sometimes whether these people would be happy with a victim-less idea!

Cancer, being the enormously controversial subject that it is, attracts manyn of these 'supressed information' concepts and they do regularly appear in my InBox.

Here's such a cancer therapy idea that I first saw some years ago, and that was sent to me again in another of its internet reincarnations.

On studying it, I tried to understand how it could be useful and gave up. That doesn't mean it's wrong; it just means I didn't have enough need to know. Another one I've discussed on this page is the bicarbonate of soda cure, which to my mind seems sensible and understandable, perhaps because of my background in study of acid/alkaline balance.

These days I try valiantly to remove considerations about the motive of the sender from information I receive. Even if they do send it to me to reinforce their concept of a world ruled by shadowy entities behind large desks in multistorey buildings, it shouldn't affect my appreciation of what I read, but after the hundredth such email, it isn't getting much easier. I certainly agree with David Suzuki, who labelled the Internet 'The Information Super-Hype-Way".

Too Much Water?

Craig emailed me today about his hospitalised sister:

"I thought this was a very interesting fact.
my sister in law has just be admitted into royal perth hospital for having seizures
doctors have told her that her sodium levels are very low, and drinking to much water can be harmful.
The doctor has told her to stop drinking lots of water, its not good for you
interesting...."

Craig, I'm not surprised. Drinkers of reverse Osmosis water, distilled water or straight rainwater can expect this effect if they seek to hydrate by drinking large amounts of water. Why? Because the body's water - the water every cell in our body is bathed in, is saline, alkaline and mineralised!

It's our inner sea, so drinking 'pure' water is about the most unnatural thing you can do. When in our evolution did we drink pure water.? A stream, a spring, a lake; they are all mineralised!

So of course your sister in law's drinking habit was reducing her sodium. Sodium, magnesium, potassium and calcium are all essentail parts of your alkalien buffer, the storehouse the body accumulates to battle your acid tide.

I have seen people's actual visage change when they have begun drinking ionized alkaline water. Their friends have told them they look more 'hydrated'.

A Wake Up Call: Excerpts from new film exposing Fast foods.

Garbage taking over our Oceans

The Image is a little small, but you get the picture. A MASSIVE sea of garbage - mostly plastic as shown. Here's a larger image.

Krill Oil; Is there a Limit?

Today I received a report about the future of Krill oil;

"Aker BioMarine is set to launch a new krill oil for supplements next month and predicts the market for the oil - a source of omega-3 - will experience significant growth over the next few years. The Norwegian firm says the oil not only contains omega-3 phospholipids but also astaxanthin, a potent antioxidant. "For this reason the krill oil is believed to be more bioeffective and resistant to oxidation than other sources of omega-3," said nutrition and health vice president Jostein Dalland. The firm believes that although the market for krill oil is in its infancy, it will experience a lot of growth over the next few years. "

In case you aren't aware, krill is a tiny shrimp-like crustacean that is the major food of whales. It is abundant only in Arctic and Antarctic oceans. So important is it to whales that their baleen 'seive' you see around their lips is designed to filter out water and keep the tiny krill in their mouths.

Which brings me back to this post's purpose. It seems to me that we have plundered every wild place on earth in search of a new and better supplement ingredient. Acai from I don't know where, Goji from Tibet, salt from the Himalayas, and now whale fodder from Antarctica.

The question that comes up for me is...

Is it so necessary to have a new antioxidant supplement that we have the right to plunder the major foodsource of our beloved whale friends?
Just a thought... when do we say 'enough'?

Men's Health and Drinking Water; What we all Knew but wish we didn't.

I received a report this morning about the cumulative effect of chemicals in drinking water and how it affexcts 'men's health' - and we all know what that means, don't we!

It's one of those issues that doesn't go away, yet every day we have another story of another friend with another untreatable ailment. Hmmm...
Here's the report.

Gout and Sodas

This is a bit of 'Well Du-Oh' article linking soft drinks (sodas to you on the other side of the Pacific) to Gout.

As readers know, it's been a big journey for many of our users who've reported almost instant gout relief as they have embarked on their own Alkalarian journey.

Here's the article

A Nice Way to do Business!

This is a pic of the amazing bunch of flowers the ION LIFE team received from EmcoTech, our supplier of Jupiter Science Water Health Systems on the occasion of moving into our new premises.

What a surprise! .. Made our day!

The Acid Alkaline Food Guide

At last! I have sourced what I think is the best, most up-to-date resource for Alkalarians, created by acid/alkaline specialist Dr Susan E. Brown PhD.

This 193 page book has the most comprehensive food listings I've yet found, plus the research that places their food classifications far above the commionly accessible acid/alkaline food charts you've probably seen on the net.

If you are serious about going alkaline, you'll do what I did; look at every part of your life, including lifestyle, food, beverages, water... because each one of these have a role in the acidic degradation of our body.

When I see books like this coming onto the market I'm very happy. It means more and more people are embracing the Alkalarian way, changing thei lives, their families; lives and their collective future.

if you'd like a copy and live in OZ or NZ, call one of my Alkaline specialists on 1800-ANTIOX. If you are elsewhere, it's also available on Amazon, or from my website here

Making a Living and Loving What you do!

I had a visit from a lovely lady called Nicki. recently. She is a raw food devotee and has a stall at the Brisbane markets selling her culinary creations, plus our organic virgin coconut oil.

You know, when you see someone following their dream, don't they shine!

If you haven't yet discovered the secret of virgin organic coconut oil, click here to download a copy of our free 'Untold Truth About the Oil We Eat" book. If you'd like a hard copy and haven't used our high antioxidant coco oil yet, let us know when you order and we'll give you a free copy. It's packed with information about this wonderful health resource.

Order here

The Role of Antioxidants in Cancer Treatment

I have great respect for Dr Ralph Moss, author of' The Moss Reports, regular updates on cancer treatment.

Here's some of what he has to say:

"There are few issues in cancer therapy so surrounded by confusion as the question of whether or not cancer patients should continue to take antioxidant supplements during radiation treatment.

Prompted by the many questions I receive from clients on this topic, I am now offering two investigative reports on the subject. The first of these - Do Antioxidants Interfere With Radiation Treatment for Cancer? - is designed to help patients make sense of the conflicting information they are likely to encounter on this issue. This 26 page report contains up-to-the-minute information concerning the controversial question of whether antioxidants can safely be taken during radiation treatment, and includes new research data that more clearly identifies which patients are most likely to be affected by potential interactions.

Because the question of antioxidant use is an area of such vital importance to cancer patients, we are also offering this new report packaged with our earlier report on the use of antioxidants during cancer therapy. This combined report, 83 pages in length, offers an exhaustive discussion of the topic, covering the use of supplemental antioxidants during both chemotherapy and radiation.

For further details and information on purchasing either the single or the combined report please scroll down to the end of the newsletter.

An important paper on the interaction of antioxidants and radiation therapy was recently published in the International Journal of Cancer. Interestingly, despite the significance of its findings, this study has received virtually zero attention from the scientific community or the media.

As background, in April 2005, Isabelle Bairati, MD, PhD, and her colleagues at the Hôtel-Dieu de Quebec Research Centre and the Universite Laval completed a ten-year study on the interaction of antioxidants and radiation therapy. This was hailed as the first placebo-controlled, double-blind, randomized trial assessing the effect of supplementation with antioxidant vitamins during radiation therapy. The study concluded that supplements of synthetic beta-carotene (30 mg per day) or alpha tocopherol (400 IU per day) had a harmful effect on cancer patients. In particular, the authors claimed that the cancer recurrence rate was 40 percent higher among patients who had been randomly assigned to the supplementation arm of the trial. They therefore called on patients and physicians to exert caution in using antioxidants until new evidence could be provided by future trials.

Kedar Prasad, PhD, and other proponents of the concurrent use of antioxidants during cancer treatment criticized the Bairati paper. They were disappointed that Bairati and colleagues had used ordinary alpha tocopherol as their choice of vitamin E when Prasad's previous work had shown that it was not just alpha tocopherol but alpha tocopherol succinate that had the anticancer efficacy. They also felt that natural forms of the vitamin were more effective than synthetic, drug store-type vitamins. But, by and large, the medical world accepted the Bairati trial as definitive proof that antioxidants interfered with radiation therapy. Word spread like wildfire in oncology circles, confirming a long-held belief that antioxidants interfered with standard cancer treatments such as radiation and chemotherapy. The take away message, as stated in a Universite Laval press release, was that "Supplements May Speed Up Development of Cancer." Advocates of complementary and alternative medicine
(CAM) were confounded by this large and impressive study.

But now the other shoe has dropped.

In December 2007, Dr. Bairati and her Quebec colleagues published a major modification of their previous conclusions. Further analysis revealed, they said, that the danger of synthetic antioxidants was limited to one particular sub-population: cigarette smokers - specifically, those who continued to smoke during radiation treatment. The authors analyzed the outcome in 540 patients who had been given radiation for head and neck cancers. During the follow-up period, 119 patients had a recurrence of their disease and 179 died. Smokers were the group with the worst prognosis. However, astonishingly, smoking in the period leading up to or following radiation therapy did not modify the effects of the two supplements. It was only smoking during the course of radiation therapy that led to a statistically significant increase in the risk of a recurrence. It was a large enough increase to skew the statistics for the group as a whole, leading to the erroneous conclusion that antioxidant s interfered with radiotherapy in the general patient population.

Statistically, increased risk is generally expressed as a "hazard ratio" (abbreviated HR). In this study, current smokers had an HR of 2.41 for recurrence, in other words more than double the chance of a recurrence compared to the rest of the patient population. The HR for death from any cause was a similar 2.26. But the hazard ratio for dying of their initial head and neck cancer was a whopping 3.38 in patients who got radiation, smoked and also received a single synthetic antioxidant.

"These results could best be explained by the hypothesis that the combined exposures reduced the efficacy of radiation therapy," Bairati and her colleagues now say. "Particular attention should be devoted to prevent patients from both smoking and taking antioxidant supplements during radiation therapy" (Meyer 2007).

According to the National Cancer Institute, 85 percent of head and neck cancers are linked to tobacco use. (Alcohol use further exacerbates this trend.) This has been widely known for years, and so it is shocking that there are still people so hopelessly addicted to tobacco that they not only continue to smoke after they've been diagnosed with head and neck cancer but continue to smoke right through their radiation therapy. It was in this subset of particularly unhealthy individuals that antioxidants were associated with an increased risk of disease progression. As Bairati and colleagues suggest, such individuals should definitely not compound their problems by then taking a synthetic antioxidant.

But the more important lesson for patients and practitioners is that antioxidants do NOT generally interfere with the effects of radiation therapy, as was previously suggested. They do NOT increase the risk of a recurrence, of death from head and neck cancer, or of overall mortality in the average patient. In this updated study, the harmful effect of synthetic antioxidants was entirely limited to those relatively few tobacco-addicted patients who continued to smoke during their radiation therapy. Thus, the major premise underpinning oncologists' condemnation of antioxidants during radiation therapy has crumbled, although few seem to have noticed so far."

If you'd like more information you can register on his site for updates. Well worth it!
Go here

More Help For Computer-Bound Chairpersons

We've shared some good posts about how to keep your back in shape when using computers all day. This is an er.. interesting approach!